Pussycats are terrific therapy for Tinnitus, of course, and everything else, come to that.
(I do have to mention right now that there is a cat killer in our area - over 400 cats murdered and mutilated in the last three years. The bodies are disembowelled, left on your doorstep, or at the entrance to the nearest junior school.
Needless to say - I sincerely hope this perpetrator dies the most horrible of deaths.)
"KARMA - ARE YOU LISTENING ?!?!"
Sorry to have had to tell you that, but you will see the relevance.
Percival - Percy to his closest friends - likes to go outside for a midnight walk.
Obviously I can not let him go out on his own. So I take a flashlight, walk down the alleyway and out onto the meadow where he can explore and run about for half an hour.
It's pitch dark, but he loves to follow my torch beam around the park, and then we come home together.
You get the picture.
He always lets me know when it's
"walkies time" by going up to the front door, sitting down, looking over his shoulder, and just waiting for me to put on my shoes and coat. Usually between 11:00pm and midnight.
The other night it was absolutely freezing cold, I mean seriously cold,and blowing a gale.
Unperturbed, he walked up to the front door, sat down, and waited for me as usual.
I said
"Oh Percy - I do love you sweetheart - but I just can't do it tonight baby.
It's too cold. I'm sorry.
Perhaps we can go out tomorrow.
I'm sorry sweetheart."
(I talk to them like that - I'm a bit soft see.)
He didn't look all that impressed.
I got the 1,000 yard stare, that actually means "I thought you said you loved me?"
About ten minutes later, I'm looking all round the house for him, realising he'll be off somewhere sulking, but I just couldn't find him anywhere.
The little cupboard by the front door was half open, and so I looked inside.
There he was, up on the shoe rack,
"Standing Up Inside His Father's Walking Shoes."
He hadn't given up.
Talk about giving me a guilt complex.
I said to him "It's alright standing in my shoes sweetheart, but you're not entitled to give an opinion - until you've walked a mile."
Out of six pairs of shoes, he knows which one's I put on for a walkies.
I have to tell you - that cat has
a wisdom beyond his species.
(Sorry everybody - some pics came up twice.
More care needed.)