Readers, many of you have heard of Ramadan, it’s the month when your Muslim friends are the most irritable and lazy. Ramadan is kind of like Christmas, but instead of having a giant feast with a holiday ham, we celebrate by starving ourselves-that is to say abstaining from any food or drink-while the sun is up. And whereas married couples may carry out some sort of Mr. and Mrs. Claus fantasy after the kids are put to bed, Muslims do not have a holiday mascot that adds spark their sex lives-conversely, abstaining from sex is also part of Ramadan. The Muslim holy month is time meant to be spent reflecting on blessings and helping others.

With that said, we can’t eat or drink, and it’s almost 100 degrees outside. Logic tells us to stay inside and be inactive. That’s what a strategic faster would do. I had that same idea on the first day of fasting, which is arguably the hardest day.

Luckily, it was a Saturday, so I woke up at 11 a.m., and after realizing it wasn’t 8:33 p.m. yet, I went back to sleep, I was determined to nap away my hunger pains.

 Unable to force myself into unconsciousness until iftar , I woke up an hour later. In further attempt to have my day defined by inactivity, I reached for my laptop with the intent of Netflix-ing and stumbling to my heart’s content.

I’d like to go on record as saying Stumble Upon is a fasting Muslim’s worst enemy. I found myself looking at page after page of delicious Nutella-based recipes. My stomach grew louder, as if to say, “you masochistic bastard!” At that moment, I had a change of heart. My stomach was right, I needed to stop looking at what I didn’t have and do something meaningful with my life.

So I immediately pulled up Imgur on my browser to look at cat pictures-it’s what any self-respecting college male would do on a Saturday. Nearly 50 cats and countless minutes later, I made a truly profound discovery.

I found myself staring at picture of an orange and dark striped cat named Libby walking in front of a much larger yellow Labrador, Cashew. You see, Cashew is blind, so Libby functions as her “seeing eye cat.” Libby leads Cashew through obstacles and to her food bowl every day. Beyond that, they are each other’s best friends-they even sleep next to each other at night-it’s a very meaningful and pure relationship.

Despite their clear differences, they still provide each other with help and companionship. Can we say the same for ourselves? 

So what “profound discovery” did Libby and Cashew reveal to me? You could say the lesson learned is that I should not shy away from helping someone who is different from me. Rather, I should seek out the disadvantaged to help them, but also embrace their companionship. But that sounds like the ramblings of a food-deprived pseudo-zombie.

Granted, those are all valuable lessons. Lessons that seem fitting of the holy month of Ramadan. But what I discovered is a far more profound answer to a longstanding question: Cats are indeed better than dogs. 

“Click.”