nouns - Which comes first: cat or dog?

Which comes first in a sentence?

I know some word pairs such as bacon and eggs, where bacon always comes first. E.g:

Make me bacon and eggs for dinner, honey.

Cats and dogs are the two most common pets I know of. What is the preferred order?

1. Dogs are superior.

   
   
   
   

   
   

   Don't put dogs and cats together, they might fight!

   
   




2. Cats are superior.

   
   
   

   
   

   Don't put cats and dogs together, they might fight!

   
   

Answer

Given the phrase it's raining cats and dogs, you might be led to believe that this is the usual ordering. However, COCA gives the following frequencies:

cats and dogs    272
dogs and cats    359

So it seems there isn't really a preferred ordering.