Why have cats become so popular?

How did this trend start? Ok so it seems that recently cats are taking over the internet and now everyone owns them or goes D'awww when they see one. Sure cats can be cool pets but still, why have they become to mainstream to appear in every internet picture with a caption that reads "___cat says ___". In my opinion its gotten kinda out of control, because there is honestly nothing THAT great about them and after seeing 100+ cat pictures,videos,gifs, I am starting to grow tired of it all. I remember the days where kids would talk of the cat lady as a bad thing, and that she is lonely. but now people envy that cat lady for her ADORBZ CATZ?!