born the illegitimate kitten of jim davis' garfield, 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 "" 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 deprogrammed several weeks later by a humorous application of the ludovico technique (by forcing him to watch reruns of "leave it to beaver"); this was ultimately unsuccessful and bill was sent off to the betty ford center. in the video "a wish for wings that work" opus professes to have saved bill from a lab where his brains had been replaced with tater tots.