This is the worst tennis match I've ever watched

May 9, 2011 7:02 PM

The dreaded SLYT: Kitten vs an Extremely Horrible Thing
posted by louche mustachio (99 comments total)

Nope. Can't click.
posted by likeso at 7:04 PM on May 9, 2011

YOU MUST CLICK
posted by louche mustachio at 7:05 PM on May 9, 2011 [29 favorites]

No kittens were killed injured in this video.
posted by dobbs at 7:07 PM on May 9, 2011

YOU'RE A TOTALLY FREAKED OUT KITTY!
posted by loquacious at 7:08 PM on May 9, 2011 [2 favorites]

Can we call an embargo on SLYT cat videos now please, regardless of adorability?
posted by mochapickle at 7:08 PM on May 9, 2011 [9 favorites]

Google translates the Russian title as "kitten against a terrible unknown crap."
posted by louche mustachio at 7:08 PM on May 9, 2011 [9 favorites]

BUM-BUM-BWAAAAAAAAH!
posted by briank at 7:08 PM on May 9, 2011

Holy shit, I can't believe the thing did that. The kitten held up admirably in the face of that horror.
posted by Greg Nog at 7:09 PM on May 9, 2011 [12 favorites]

Can we call an embargo on SLYT cat videos now please, regardless of adorability?

Nope.
posted by BitterOldPunk at 7:10 PM on May 9, 2011 [115 favorites]

TRIGGER ALERT: tennis ball
posted by everichon at 7:11 PM on May 9, 2011 [42 favorites]

Truly One of the most terrifying pieces I video I have ever seen. There was a debate earlier on reddit about this video, various arguments about brain parasites, invisible spectres and the true nature of terror.
posted by Ad hominem at 7:12 PM on May 9, 2011 [5 favorites]

Can we call an embargo on SLYT cat videos now please, regardless of adorability?

OK, but we'd better stockpile them in here, so they can't find them.
posted by louche mustachio at 7:12 PM on May 9, 2011 [5 favorites]

Kitten and an Extremely Horrible Thing.
posted by sebastienbailard at 7:12 PM on May 9, 2011 [1 favorite]

That terrible unknown thing scared me so much I can no longer type.
posted by Ad hominem at 7:14 PM on May 9, 2011

No, kittens were killed or injured in this video.
posted by Mei's lost sandal at 7:15 PM on May 9, 2011 [4 favorites]

Can we call an embargo on SLYT cat videos now please, regardless of adorability?

I would much prefer if you chose to not view them, as I actually live in a state and have a doctor's prescription and identification card permitting me to legally consume medical cat videos.
posted by loquacious at 7:15 PM on May 9, 2011 [56 favorites]

Oh hey hold on a sec, Extremely Horrible Thing. I've got to stick my foot in my ear.

story of my life
posted by Balonious Assault at 7:15 PM on May 9, 2011 [25 favorites]

Best. Soundtrack. Ever.
posted by lazaruslong at 7:18 PM on May 9, 2011 [6 favorites]

I clicked, I couldn't help myself... MY EYES. OH GOD, MY EYES.
posted by likeso at 7:21 PM on May 9, 2011 [1 favorite]

Russian pussy video is 30% of the internet these days.
posted by stargell at 7:26 PM on May 9, 2011 [14 favorites]

Russian pussy video is 30% of the internet these days.

That gives a new and awful dimension to the Google translated title.


New, awful, and... unsanitary.
posted by louche mustachio at 7:30 PM on May 9, 2011

"Courage is resistance to sphere, mastery of sphere—not absence of sphere. Except a creature be part coward, it is not a compliment to say it is brave; it is merely a loose misapplication of the word. Consider the flea!—incomparably the bravest of all the creatures of God, if ignorance of sphere were courage." — Mark Twain

posted by howlingmonkey at 7:31 PM on May 9, 2011 [3 favorites]

Can we call an embargo on SLYT cat videos now please, regardless of adorability?

THAT CAT DID THAT CRAZY CAT THING!!!

I am here to post in this very important thread because it is relevant to my life.
posted by TheBones at 7:32 PM on May 9, 2011 [4 favorites]

Cat and iPad
posted by ZeusHumms at 7:34 PM on May 9, 2011 [3 favorites]

Reminds me of cat vs. crows, also by ignoramusky
posted by piratebowling at 7:38 PM on May 9, 2011 [6 favorites]

"Courage is resistance to sphere, mastery of sphere—not absence of sphere. Except a creature be part coward, it is not a compliment to say it is brave; it is merely a loose misapplication of the word. Consider the flea!—incomparably the bravest of all the creatures of God, if ignorance of sphere were courage." — Mark Twain

Clemenski is worth reading in the original russian, not in this bastardized half-translation. While accurate, this version doesn't have the poetry of the original болван Wilson, penned by the great sage while he was piloting a paddle wheel down the Volga.
posted by sebastienbailard at 7:42 PM on May 9, 2011 [4 favorites]

And so we dance with death, a spiraling sidelong tarantella. Fascination and terror are the twin pistons that drive us through the frenetic choreography, and we live for the very moment when we can touch death and escape. Death itself remains inert, impassive, inured to the circling ballet of our existence, but we must make the mad orbits of moths in a streetlight's glow until, ultimately, we tire, and join with death, our brief flirtation with life exhausted.
posted by Salvor Hardin at 7:43 PM on May 9, 2011 [19 favorites]

Can we call an embargo on SLYT cat videos now please, regardless of adorability?

Why do you hate the joy? The joy, we need more of it.
posted by FelliniBlank at 7:48 PM on May 9, 2011 [7 favorites]

And so we dance with death a tennis ball, a spiraling sidelong tarantella. Fascination and terror are the twin pistons that drive us through the frenetic choreography, and we live for the very moment when we can touch death the tennis ball and escape. Death itself Balls themselves remains inert, impassive, inured to the circling ballet of our existence, but we must make the mad orbits of moths in a streetlight's glow until, ultimately, we tire, and join with death balls, our brief flirtation with life exhausted.
posted by louche mustachio at 7:51 PM on May 9, 2011 [2 favorites]

My little Siamese found this interesting.
posted by tomswift at 8:00 PM on May 9, 2011 [2 favorites]

Cat videos are a staple on the internet. But I think the Russians have taken it to a whole new level and turned a commodity into art. I don't know if they breed more photogenic cats, or if I'm just bemused by their letters meaning different things. Either way, this video was shot well, appropriately frantic. And the score was fantastic.
posted by chemoboy at 8:01 PM on May 9, 2011

"Can we call an embargo on SLYT cat videos now please, regardless of adorability?"

And the point, then, of the internet would be WHAT?
posted by tomswift at 8:01 PM on May 9, 2011 [12 favorites]

Can we call an embargo on SLYT cat videos now please, regardless of adorability?

Or maybe we can call an embargo on people coming into a clearly labeled thread to complain about the existence of clearly labeled thread. Don't like SLYT cat videos? Well, no one is forcing you watch them.
posted by MaryDellamorte at 8:02 PM on May 9, 2011 [5 favorites]

For those of you who prefer dogs, Jack Russell Terrier vs. an Extremely Horrible Thing.
posted by Johnny Assay at 8:05 PM on May 9, 2011 [5 favorites]

You're a kitty! You're a very stupid kitty!
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 8:05 PM on May 9, 2011 [2 favorites]

Cats Try to Understand Treadmill

posted by ZeusHumms at 8:10 PM on May 9, 2011 [9 favorites]

This is just the latest attempt by the Russian Mafia to wrest control of the lucrative cute kitten video market from the Yazuka.
posted by gamera at 8:10 PM on May 9, 2011 [7 favorites]

If music cat videos be the food of love, play on.
posted by contessa at 8:10 PM on May 9, 2011 [2 favorites]

In fairness to the terrier, maybe he thought it was a goose. And we have established that geese are genuinely dreadful beasts.
posted by louche mustachio at 8:10 PM on May 9, 2011 [2 favorites]

How in Pete's name did they get the music to sync up so perfectly? This is the second Russian cat video where they clearly hired an orchestra to perform a custom written score for the video. That's some serious cat video love there.
posted by Xoebe at 8:15 PM on May 9, 2011 [10 favorites]

Ah you posted the other video, piratebowling!
posted by Xoebe at 8:16 PM on May 9, 2011

How in Pete's name did they get the music to sync up so perfectly? This is the second Russian cat video where they clearly hired an orchestra to perform a custom written score for the video. That's some serious cat video love there.

Kind of seems that way, but...no! The kitten has been practicing that choreographed routine for ten weeks, twelve hours a day.

Russian cats do not fuck around.
posted by contessa at 8:24 PM on May 9, 2011 [22 favorites]

God, those crows, they piss me off.
posted by longdaysjourney at 8:24 PM on May 9, 2011 [1 favorite]

sebastienbailard: "Kitten and an Extremely Horrible Thing ."

WHAT DID I TELL YOU ABOUT FEEDING THEM AFTER MIDNIGHT?!
posted by Cat Pie Hurts at 8:25 PM on May 9, 2011

The internet is powered by kittens.
posted by Ad hominem at 8:31 PM on May 9, 2011 [1 favorite]

Cats Try to Understand Treadmill

That cat is simply engaging in percussive engineering.
posted by maryr at 8:36 PM on May 9, 2011 [2 favorites]

Sure, it seems funny and all until you realize that the kitten just watched that tennis ball eat everyone in the house.

We are watching the third act of a horror film and we've missed the beginning.
posted by quin at 8:46 PM on May 9, 2011 [18 favorites]

Right, this is the first thing I watched after seeing Black Swan and I'm still not sure the movie's over. Gotta go pluck my skin now, thx.
posted by furiousthought at 8:51 PM on May 9, 2011

Holy shit, that was fantastic.
posted by rtha at 8:54 PM on May 9, 2011 [1 favorite]

In Soviet Russia, kitteh posts SLYT of you!
posted by KingEdRa at 8:57 PM on May 9, 2011 [2 favorites]

Actually this video shows how the audio was done on the first video.
posted by delmoi at 8:59 PM on May 9, 2011 [6 favorites]

everichon: "TRIGGER ALERT: tennis ball"

KeeRIST! Spoiler that crap! Ruined it for me.

Totally.

Not even worth watching.

Loser.
posted by Samizdata at 9:12 PM on May 9, 2011

At about 1:04 it totally does the Silence thing. Scared scared scared (looks away) huh what's up guys (glances back) AUGH!
posted by you're a kitty! at 9:21 PM on May 9, 2011 [2 favorites]

tomswift : My little Siamese found this interesting.

My Siamese kitty watching your Siamese kitty watching the video.
posted by quin at 9:33 PM on May 9, 2011 [8 favorites]

Good God. It's moggies all the way down.
posted by maudlin at 9:39 PM on May 9, 2011 [5 favorites]

My cat watching your cat watching my cat!
posted by HuronBob at 9:40 PM on May 9, 2011 [9 favorites]

quin.....keep this up and you're going to need to buy me another bottle of wine!
posted by HuronBob at 9:41 PM on May 9, 2011

My cat is ignoring you all, like a proper feline.
posted by maryr at 9:43 PM on May 9, 2011 [1 favorite]

now this is emergent behavior
posted by archivist at 9:53 PM on May 9, 2011 [1 favorite]

My cat is waiting for your cat to get tech literate and respond in a digital manner.!
posted by HuronBob at 9:53 PM on May 9, 2011

... yep, its cats all the way down.
posted by KingEdRa at 10:14 PM on May 9, 2011

Sure, it seems funny and all until you realize that the kitten just watched that tennis ball eat everyone in the house.

We are watching the third act of a horror film and we've missed the beginning.

cattooth?
posted by dhartung at 10:15 PM on May 9, 2011

My cat disapproving of your cats

She don't please.
posted by louche mustachio at 10:26 PM on May 9, 2011

CRISIS OF INFINITE CATS
posted by The Whelk at 10:29 PM on May 9, 2011 [3 favorites]

Can we call an embargo on SLYT cat videos now please, regardless of adorability?

No because then when will I use the line "cats are dumb"? Oh yeah, everytime I see a cat.
posted by IvoShandor at 11:23 PM on May 9, 2011

How to stop cats pissing on your car. [cats were harmed in the making of this video. heh!]
posted by netbros at 11:36 PM on May 9, 2011 [2 favorites]

[cats were harmed in the making of this video. heh!]

OUT.
posted by louche mustachio at 12:04 AM on May 10, 2011 [2 favorites]

This is a picture of a cat and an extremely horrible thing, but I am actually serious, so click with caution.
posted by danny the boy at 12:05 AM on May 10, 2011 [7 favorites]

Actually, it's not that horrible. I think they're pretty cute. Look, he just wants his tummy rubbed!
posted by danny the boy at 12:18 AM on May 10, 2011

This is a picture of a cat and an extremely horrible thing, but I am actually serious, so click with caution.

The cat just thinks that's a delicious pillbug. Even if it is an oversized, abyssal if not outright fhtagninian pillbug.

I'm actually alarmed that a cat and giant isopod have been in the same room. That's a bit stranger than fiction.
posted by loquacious at 12:32 AM on May 10, 2011 [1 favorite]

I imagine the thought process went something like:


WHAT


WHAT ARE YOU







are you a food?
posted by louche mustachio at 12:51 AM on May 10, 2011 [19 favorites]

And the point, then, of the internet would be WHAT?
posted by tomswift at 4:01 AM on May 10

Don't go there.
posted by Decani at 1:06 AM on May 10, 2011

God that video was rad
posted by JenMarie at 2:15 AM on May 10, 2011

What you don't see in the video is the previous two weeks spent conditioning the kitten by throwing the tennis ball at it every hour on the hour. This generates the required level of intimidation.
posted by asok at 2:27 AM on May 10, 2011

Russian pussy video is 30% of the internet these days.
posted by stargell at 7:26 PM on May 9 [10 favorites +] [!]

I will quote this till the day I die.
Have a VERY good day today!
posted by hal_c_on at 3:31 AM on May 10, 2011

Jack Russell Terrier vs. an Extremely Horrible Thing.
I sort of hope that the ducky imprinted on the dog.
Or is that too cruel?
posted by Mister Moofoo at 3:55 AM on May 10, 2011

Love the Siamese kitty Esher self portraits. Please Mr. Internets, can I have some more?
posted by chemoboy at 4:48 AM on May 10, 2011

Awww. Poor kitty seems genuinely hair-standing-on-end terrified. How did it get to that size without ever having seen a ball-shaped object?

And I'll take SLYT cat videos over outragefilter, newsfilter, OsamaFilter, ObamaFilter, and BuzzFeedCollectsOtherPeoplesPhotosFilter any day of the week, thank you very much.
posted by Gator at 5:48 AM on May 10, 2011 [2 favorites]

Love the Siamese kitty Esher self portraits. Please Mr. Internets, can I have some more?

Are you sure? No, really, are you sure?

Because I'm currently standing before a howling temporal maelstrom filled with flying cat claws tearing at the very fabric of space and time. Have you ever seen a really good cat fight in an alley? Have you ever seen a really good cat fight in (and out) of a Klein bottle... in the eighteenth dimension?

I don't even own a cat but suddenly there's n+1 cats in my apartment with an alarming taste for tuna and human flesh, and I haven't bought a can of tuna in months. This is very problematic.

The internet is made with cats. You're taunting cats with cats over the internet. Like nuclear fission as run by profiteering industrialists and bureaucrats this is less than a zero-sum game - eventually you'll pay the piper. There's such a thing as a criticatally, a kitty event horizon that challenges the known rules of physics...

Look! I was there, man! You don't get it! You've never seen a catesseract with your own eyes! You don't want multiple temporally displaced cats mating outside of the rules of relativistic physics! Wormholes exist, man, but they're actually cat holes! They're filled with cats! Fuck yes I'm crazy! You can't experience such a thing and escape with your sanity! There is only cat.

Fuck. I've said far too much. If I suddenly go missing... it was the cats. Tell her I love her. Don't even bother looking for traces of rancid tinned seafood because they've already eaten my sleeping face.
posted by loquacious at 6:11 AM on May 10, 2011 [10 favorites]

Can we call an embargo on SLYT cat videos now please, regardless of adorability?

Screw you joy-killer. Just don't click, how hard is that?
posted by pickinganameismuchharderthanihadanticipated at 6:44 AM on May 10, 2011 [2 favorites]

Did someone mention infinite cats?
posted by Anything at 6:52 AM on May 10, 2011

Uh, by which I mean this.
posted by Anything at 6:52 AM on May 10, 2011

This is the worst tennis match I've ever watched

Then you must have missed Blancmange v. Podgorny.
posted by Rarebit Fiend at 7:10 AM on May 10, 2011 [4 favorites]

A bit of derail...
Regarding the technical aspect of this video and others like it (crows v cat v cat) on the tubes, it seemed like a time consuming process to edit the sound into the video, or vice versa. Would it be possible to have a program measure the movement in a given video and then find the closest match to it musically?
posted by MrMulan at 7:20 AM on May 10, 2011 [1 favorite]

Awww. Poor kitty seems genuinely hair-standing-on-end terrified. How did it get to that size without ever having seen a ball-shaped object?


Knowing cats, this one could have been born and raised by a family of Nerf balls and it would still behave this way.
posted by oneirodynia at 7:25 AM on May 10, 2011 [4 favorites]

I hardly ever click on SLYTs, but this was just the thing for clearing the mental palate after some of the other posts.
posted by no relation at 9:07 AM on May 10, 2011

1) This is one of the times when I was delighted to have watched the video and read half of the thread before I saw the title of the post (realsies hilarious in all cases).

2) It's also a case where I am initially torn 49.9/50.1% between wanting to snark on the ubiquity of ZintercatTubedom and simply laughing my ass off in childlike abandon (in this case I went the "joy" route and didn't look back)

3) It's truly fascinating how palpable this cat's terror is-- my enduring replays will owe to that after teh LOL's have died down (which they won't until after I show it to all of my friends, coworkers and extended family first hand anyway, so... [*cracks knuckles]).

the unironic use of the word "realsies" is for entertainment purposes only and does not necessarily reflect the opinions of plarfegan studios, its sister corporations, or their shareholders
posted by herbplarfegan at 9:34 AM on May 10, 2011

Oh that poor, poor kitty. The horror--the horror!

Thanks for this. I would like to go on record as stating that cat videos are often the only thing between me and a very black mood. So by all means, keep 'em coming.

Videos about cats, and the occasional honey badger, of course.
posted by kinnakeet at 9:57 AM on May 10, 2011 [1 favorite]

God is an infinite sphere, the center of which is everywhere, the circumference nowhere.

Poor kitten
posted by fallingbadgers at 12:46 PM on May 10, 2011

I enjoyed the initial post but, awful person that I am, I enjoyed even more the one posted in this thread with the Australian guy who rigged a garden hose to a motion sensor to spray all the cats pissing on his things at night. The problem with outdoor cats is they tend not to respect property lines!
posted by Justinian at 1:44 PM on May 10, 2011

Kitteh is very brave in spite of the terror inspired by the fuzzy yellow spheredemon.

I wish all scores for YT videos were as well done as this. That was fantastic.
posted by notashroom at 1:46 PM on May 10, 2011

Never mind the kitteh. I'm constantly amazed by the sheer ugliness of Russian home decoration.
posted by HeyAllie at 4:26 PM on May 10, 2011 [2 favorites]

Oh shit. That cat taunted happy fun ball.
posted by qvantamon at 5:24 PM on May 10, 2011 [3 favorites]

Even very large cats fear extremely horrible things. With special surprise ending.
posted by scalefree at 2:07 PM on May 12, 2011 [3 favorites]

That was perfect!
posted by rtha at 2:13 PM on May 12, 2011

The kitten in the OP video is doing a tiny version of the puff tail then turn sideways to antagonist and slowly crab-walk forward move, which is one of my favorites.
posted by LobsterMitten at 2:47 PM on May 12, 2011

> Even very large cats fear extremely horrible things . With special surprise ending.

Those Paw Are Adorable.
posted by mrzarquon at 5:33 PM on May 12, 2011 [1 favorite]

Just got home from a rough night, and that got a big LOL from me. Thanks, I needed that.
posted by Gator at 6:48 PM on May 12, 2011

Owl Babies vs a Similar But Apparently Slightly Less Extremely Horrible Thing.
posted by quin at 7:59 PM on May 14, 2011 [1 favorite]