Did I mention that the cat tends to curl up on Michael’s bed during the evening? At night we put her in the utility room as, if we left her the freedom of the house, she would begin yowling for food outside our door at 4 a.m. She doesn’t like the utility room despite its comforts which include a rug, an armchair and ready access to the outside world via her cat flap. She has to be lured in. I am usually last to bed. I go into the kitchen and open the cupboard under the sink where the dry cat food is kept and, usually, before I have closed the cupboard she comes streaking into the kitchen from upstairs at a speed that is surprising in one so portly. Her hearing is amazing.
Unrelated (though cat related, stay with me here). I was cycling down the lane the other day and a neighbour whom I don’t know was at his garage with a small, yappy dog which came up and barked at me and generally held me at bay. I waited for the neighbour to come and rescue me, which he did, “She’s all bark and no bite,” he said scooping her up under his arm. “She’s terrified of your cat, actually.” It appears that Hodge has been wandering around the neighbourhood terrifying local dogs. In this particular case, the neighbour had come home one evening to hear his dog going ballistic in the hall. When he went in it was to discover that Hodge had let herself in through their dog flap and was lolling on the landing watching the dog racing up and down the hall barking while being too scared to go and tackle her. Oh mortification.