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We all know that Louis Catorze uses either creepy staring or screaming when he wants to get his way. 

The creepy staring is usually deployed when he’s hungry. Despite being thicker than a concrete milkshake, Catorze knows perfectly well that, eventually, being stared at will make us feel so uncomfortable that we’ll end up dropping whatever we’re doing to make it stop. 

As for the screaming, we still haven’t worked out what it is that he wants. Although, now that we know it’s a symptom of hyperthyroidism, we try harder to be more tolerant.

One afternoon, when I was in the kitchen making a batch of kombucha, Catorze decided to unleash a creepy-staring assault on me. Luckily, because I was busy cutting up fruit and sterilising bottles, I was able to ignore him and skilfully avoid eye contact. Just like being the newbie in a maximum security penitentiary, your best bet is to just keep your head down and not respond. 

Then the screaming started. 

I continued to ignore Catorze. However, when he saw that neither creepy staring nor screaming were having the desired effect, the little sod reared up on his hind legs and dug his front claws into my shins. 

Cat Daddy, without looking up from his phone: “He wants you to go into the living room.”

We’ve been here before, Mesdames et Messieurs. Our cat has a favourite room in the house and he bullies us into going there, so that he can sit on our laps. And, now, he has tired of psychological intimidation and crossed the threshold into physical assault. Oh. Mon. Dieu. 

Once I had bottled up the kombucha, I was finally ready to obey The Dark Master’s instructions. I dutifully went into the living room, settled down on my enormous full-body pillow with my legs outstretched and spread a blanket over me, tucking the edges underneath me as it was quite chilly. 

That was when Catorze decided that he no longer wanted to follow me into the living room. 

Instead he hovered around his papa whining like a dying dog, until Cat Daddy finally snapped, scooping Catorze up in one hand, dumping him on my lap and marching out again, closing the door behind him. And, of course, just as nature abhors a vacuum, a cat abhors a closed door. Even if it leaves him in a room that, only moments beforehand, he was desperate to go into. 

Cue more dying-dog-meets-angry-poltergeist whining and scratching at the door, meaning I had to dislodge myself from my cosy blanket-cocoon to let him out again. 

Someone, ANYONE, please remind me why we put up with this?

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