Cat people Community, joy and celebrity felines at California convention

"It's cuteness overload," said Bianca Chapman, who was attending for her fourth year. "I can't stop smiling. I leave here with my face sore."

- Dani Anguiano

There is no event for the cat-inclined quite like CatCon, as the celebrities of the kitty world - human and feline - and thousands of cat lovers headed for downtown Pasadena, near Los Angeles, last weekend. Here, the question was not "do you have a cat?" but "how many cats do you have?"

More than 10,000 people attended the two-day event, dubbed "Disneyland for cat people" by one guest, and tickets sold out. "CatCon is a place where you can close out the outside world, and commune with people over our love of animals," said Susan Michals, its founder. "It's really a happy place, and it's just good fun celebrating our kitty friends."

Inside the city convention centre, there were 200 kittens waiting to be adopted and hundreds of vendors selling everything a cat lover could want: treats, kitschy T-shirts, crocheted beds and medieval period-inspired portraits of regal cats.