These were the scenes at the château of Louis Catorze’s cat-cousin King Ghidorah recently. Might I add that my sister and her family have one (1) cat:

The impinging feline was busted on the Ring security device positioned by King Ghidorah’s food bowls. My sister chatted away through the talky bit, assuming it to be King Ghidorah, and it was only when Nephew 2 wandered into the kitchen that they discovered the truth. “It’s not King Ghidorah, Mum! IT’S NOT KING GHIDORAH! It’s a small, really nice black cat!”

Incidentally Château Ghidorah is a non-Sureflap household, so their kitchen turns into an all-you-can-eat buffet whether they want this or not.

The absence of any visible cerises noires, and the fact that King Ghidorah, who is usually a massive Alpha Male scrapper, was happy about all this, suggested that the visitor was a young female cat. After nuzzling Nephew 2, purring and trilling, she approached King Ghidorah for a sniff and a kiss:

My sister posted on local forums, and a representative from a local rescue came over a couple of days after these photos were taken to scan for a chip. There wasn’t one, so L’Impingeuse was promptly collared and labelled with the rescue lady’s phone number. However, this plan to send a message to her humans was royally scuppered because, the day after the collar and label were affixed, the little sod returned without them.

The rescue lady then dropped off a SECOND collar and label but, in order for them to work, L’Impingeuse actually needed to leave. She wouldn’t. In fact, she just stayed and made herself at home for the rest of the week.

After a few more days, the rescue lady finally received a message from the owner. Apparently they had been away dealing with an emergency, and the cat had escaped from the neighbour’s place where she was supposed to be under house arrest.

So I don’t think we will be seeing her anymore.

My nephews were a little sad as they had become used to a second cat being around, with the bell on her collar jingle-jangling as she went. However, Nephew 2 is relieved that his portion of the inheritance will not become the Second Cat Fund (since he was the first to condone the impinging by stroking her).

Anyway, Mesdames et Messieurs: we must chip our cats. We already knew this, obviously, but it doesn’t do any harm to repeat it. Had the owner done this, my sister would have been able to establish ownership quickly. (And the rescue lady said that the absence of a chip meant L’Impingeuse most likely wasn’t spayed, either, so she could return home and pop out hundreds of babies.)

We have also learned that, given half a chance, all cats will take the piss. We already knew this, too, didn’t we?