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Official Site: Berkeley Breathed

Bill the Cat, or Bill D. Cat, according to the final Outland strip, is a fictional cat appearing in the works of cartoonist Berkeley Breathed, beginning with the comic strip Bloom County in the 1980s and continuing in Outland and Opus in the following decades. Bill also appeared in some of Breathed's illustrated children's books, including A Wish for Wings That Work, which was also made into an animated Christmas television special, and also on greeting card and other sundry merchandise. The cat's most frequent spoken sentiments are "Ack!" and "Thbbft!", unlike most other animals (and children) in Breathed's work, who not only can speak English, but have advanced vocabularies. The former is a result of his regularly choking on hairballs, the latter sound an approximation of the "raspberry".

Bill the Cat is commonly seen as a parody of Jim Davis' Garfield (Milo Bloom appears to fear a visit from United Feature Syndicate's copyright lawyer surrounding Bill's similarities to Garfield). Breathed has also described Bill as his attempt to create a character so repulsive that it would have absolutely no merchandising potential. But surprisingly, Bill the Cat trinkets and figurines have sold in great quantity, and often appear in the strips.

Bill the Cat was inspired by a colorful economist named Bill Moore. Moore was a graduate assistant at the University of Texas at Austin during the 1970s, and one of Berke Breathed's teachers. Recognizably wild-eyed (and one legged), Moore also became one of Breathed's friends. His name was inspired by a local homeless man of Iowa City, Iowa, who was dubbed Bill "The Cat". Nothing is known of Bill's whereabouts from the early 2000s onward. It is assumed he either moved to a different town, or, more likely, is deceased.

Bill the Cat's character was raised in Dubuque, Iowa, left for New York to become a film star and left his girlfriend, Sally, behind. Some of Bill the Cat's film roles include the leads in Orangestoke: The Legend of Bill, Lord of the Monkeys and Terms of Bill's Endearment. During this period, he drank heavily, used illegal drugs, and "free-based Tender Vittles" until his friends helped him to recover. On September 30, 1983, Bill drove his Ferrari into a cactus at 140 miles per hour, dying instantly in the crash (the media, not wishing to divulge the true nature of Bill's death, claimed that he died of acne). The only part of Bill that was salvaged from the wreckage was his tongue, which young genius Oliver Wendell Jones used to clone Bill and bring him back to life. In the latter months of 1984, Bill's bid for the American presidency was effectively ruined by his decision to run off and join (and end up leading) the Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh cult in Oregon, only to be "rescued" and deprogram several weeks later by a humorous application of the Ludovico technique (by forcing him to watch reruns of Leave It to Beaver.) (All of this, by the way, a fictional account of his life, as mentioned by the other characters.)

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