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Tuesday 3 May 2016

Cat Lady

I have a foster cat. His name is Sox which I don't like so I am tying to convince him he's called Sir Bernard Sox. He's not keen. I am also quite hopelessly in love with him. 
I've always liked cats but never had one. When I was growing up, my brother was/is allergic to animal fur so we never had any animals in the house and then since I've lived on my own I've worked unpredictable hours and it didn't seem fair to leave a cat on it's own for ages. Now however I am writer/freelancer/layabout and so I thought the time could be right. 
I decided to foster through the RSPCA as I like the idea of giving a cat a nice home for a bit before they go to a permanent home. Or falling in love with a cat and praying they don't get adopted so I can keep him. 
Sox was a sad cat when he arrived. He'd been a lap cat and then his owner died and he ended up in a shelter where he proceeded to have a breakdown. He arrived about a month ago and set about proving how many places there are to hide in a one bedroom house. 
I went out for a few drinks the evening he arrived. When I came back he was gone. I couldn't find him anywhere. In my slightly addled state I at first thought he'd shot out when I'd opened the front door so I put my coat on and went to look for him. No luck. When I came back I still couldn't find him so I assumed that I had imagined getting a cat and went to bed. On Sunday I traced him to under the bath (which I had no idea you could get to). Working on the assumption that if he got in he could get out, I left some food in the bathroom and left him to it. By lunchtime I had visions of a dead cat under the bath so took the side off the bath and there he was staring at me like I was an idiot. Which is fair. 
I left him to it. Only to discover he'd gone again. 
By Wednesday morning there was still no sight or sound of him. I began to compose messages to the RSPCA to let them know that I had killed a cat in three days. I went to work and the cavalry arrived in the form of my friend Adrian who took the kickboards of the kitchen and found him. I was sent photos of the cat finally eating and seeing daylight. I went home ready to spoil him. Only to find he'd gone again. 
It turns out he was throwing himself down a six inch gap by the side of the fridge and then getting stuck under it. The joys of a suicidal cat. 
Three weeks later and he's like a different cat. He follows me around, he sleeps with me (in a strictly platonic sense) and likes to be no more than a few inches from me. Unless I have visitors. If it's Adrian, I am dead to him and they rejoice in one another. If it's anyone else, he buggers off and hides. 
I have fully embraced being a cat lady. I know that I am mere weeks from bottling my own piss and wearing felt hats. I am also aware that this is probably not reciprocated. I know that if I fell down the stairs and died he would eat me. But I know that I would be fine with that, I'd just be happy he was eating. 


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