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Je crie, donc je suis

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Sa Majesté Louis Catorze, Le Roi Soleil, supreme ruler of Le Château, sworn enemy of canine foe and scourge of Ocado delivery drivers.

  • Ni manger, ni vivre (Partie 9)

    Saint Jésus, if I’m not being screamed at, I’m being INVIGILATED whilst I cook. I bet the contestants on Masterchef don’t have to put up with this kind of thing:

    I blinked first.

    Louis Catorze has never, EVER sat like this in the kitchen before, but he’s doing it now. I might have understood had I been preparing cheese, but this time I was cutting onions and garlic. 

    Cat Daddy, without looking up from the football: “Give him a bit of something awful to teach him a lesson! Turmeric, maybe. Or chilli.”

    I wavered momentarily on that fine line between “This will teach the little shit a lesson” and “This could cost us dearly at the emergency vet” but, eventually, I settled for the former. I held out a piece of garlic and Catorze almost knocked it out of my hand in his haste to get to it. Then, when he smelled it, he changed his mind. 

    I had hoped that he would leave me alone. However, I only succeeded in making him more angry because I’d tricked him. 

    Cue more creepy-staring and screaming and, when they didn’t work, he went to Cat Daddy and lunged for his (plain, unbuttered) piece of flatbread. 

    May our old life rest in peace; we will remember it fondly, with tears in our eyes. This is the new normal – if, indeed, anything about Catorzian life can be called “normal”.

    For more Catorzian capers, please visit http://louiscatorze.com

  • Conversations entre amis

    Cat Daddy returned home from his trip at the start of the week, and Louis Catorze’s screaming has been absolutely off the scale ever since. Every time I think it can’t get worse, the little sod proves me wrong.

    During Cat Daddy’s absence, Catorze wouldn’t leave me alone; he clung to me like a limpet and followed me everywhere that I went. Now he’s dropped me like a day-old bagel (thank you, Kate, for teaching me this phrase!). 

    So part of his rambunctiousness is down to pure joy that his favourite human is back. However, it’s also been raining a lot; as you know, Catorze LOVES storms and is always more excitable during them. Also, Cat Daddy’s sister is staying with us for a few days, and Catorze is making the most of having an extra spectator for his dramatic skits. 

    All these factors work together, like the ingredients of a magic spell, to form an unbelievably bouncy, loud Catorze.

    Backlit Roi.

    Cat Auntie talks to Catorze a lot. So most of our evenings have gone like this:

    Catorze: “Mwahhhh!”

    Cat Auntie: “Hellooooo!”

    Him: “Mwah!”

    Her: “How nice it is to have a cat who wants to come and say hello!”

    Him: “Mwah!”

    Her: “You’re very noisy, aren’t you?”

    Him: “Mwah!”

    Her: “When I speak to your daddy on the phone, I can often hear you in the background, can’t I?”

    Him: “Mwah!”

    Her: “I know, I know.”*

    Him: “Mwah!”

    *What does she know? How does she know? And how is it that, despite living with Catorze for all these years, WE STILL DON’T KNOW? 

    Although I appreciate our guests engaging with Catorze, unfortunately I think it’s making him worse, a bit like arguing with that person looking for a fight instead of taking the wind out of their sails by ignoring them.

    Oh well. Sa Maj is happy, and that’s the main thing. 

    Here he is on his favourite lap, demonstrating that, unlike most cats, for him, a slappy tail is a happy one: 

    Daddy’s home.

    For more Catorzian capers, please visit http://louiscatorze.com

  • Nager vers de nouveaux horizons

    Cat Daddy was stuck behind a bus in a traffic jam the other day, and this ad caught his attention:

    Doggie WHAT?

    I can’t think of anything more fun than observing such a thing. We don’t have a dog but, whilst I figure out how to get one just for the day, I have many questions about this place. Most of them could be answered by Googling it, I’m sure. But it’s more fun just to pointlessly ponder them, non? (Fun for me, I mean. Probably not for you.)

    1. Is there a list of Pool Rules? 
    2. Do dogs have to shower first, and/or walk through one of those foot bath things? 
    3. Do dogs have armbands? (On all four limbs or just the front ones?) 
    4. Is there a lifeguard? (And are they human or canine?) 
    5. What happens if your dog starts a fight? Do you, as the Responsible Human, have to wade in and stop it? 

    There are also the predictable, low-brow questions involving, erm, the bathroom situation. But, just as it’s ultimately humans who are responsible for dogs toileting where they shouldn’t, it wouldn’t surprise me to learn that humans are the only creatures who would think to use a swimming pool as a toilet.

    As ever, this spurred my brain to think about an equivalent place for cats. Obviously a pool wouldn’t work, since cats – apart from Louis Catorze and those Turkish Van cats – hate water. Is there a type of place where they could go and mingle with like-minded felines and indulge in a fun activity? What do cats even like to do? Despite having lived with them since the age of ten, I still don’t know. 

    I wonder if any of the following ideas would work: 

    1. A mouse pit, which is exactly as it sounds: just chuck the cats in and let them fill their boots. 
    2. A shisha lounge, with feline patrons huffing catnip from a hookah on a table before knocking the hookah to the floor.

    Sadly, my vision of being a spectator at a doggy swimming gala seems as unlikely as that of creating either of the above places for cats. Disco the dog doesn’t like water so it’s a nope from him. And Puppy Mamma says I can take Nala and Gizzy but she refuses to come with me – as in, I WOULD BE THE SOLE RESPONSIBLE HUMAN – so it’s a nope from me. 

    Meanwhile, Catorze will await the launch of a men-only cuddle club. If nobody has invented such a thing yet, he’ll just wait here until someone does: 

    Dreaming of Boys’ Club becoming an international brand.

    For more Catorzian capers, please visit http://louiscatorze.com

  • Ni manger, ni vivre (Partie 8)

    What are you doing this evening?

    I dunno … eating my dinner alone in a locked room, like a prisoner in protective custody?

    I’m not sure whether to be more shocked that we are now up to Part 8, or that Louis Catorze has just eaten something unthinkably bizarre from my almost-empty bowl. 

    Mesdames et Messieurs, I give you: kale pesto. It tastes exactly as it sounds. And it wasn’t regular, crowd-pleasing Sacla; it was some artisan vegan brand, so it didn’t even have any cheese to cheer up its tongue-searing bitterness. (Apologies to any Italians reading this.)

    Incidentally, I bought it first and read the ingredients later. If you’re buying fancy pesto, I would recommend that you do these things in reverse.

    I should have whipped the bowl away as soon as he went near. But I let him get on with it in the hope that, as soon as his tongue touched the pesto, it would teach him a lesson and he would never food-bully again.

    The more the little sod licked the bowl, the more I thought, “Anytime now, he’ll realise his mistake and bolt/puke.” He didn’t. My plan massively backfired and, before I knew it, he’d licked half of it.

    Merde.

    VEGAN PESTO?

    Also in the bowl were the dregs of mozzarella, avocado, apple cider vinegar (!), raw red onion (!!), sundried tomatoes and avocado. I accept that the mozzarella would have been the main draw, but the pesto, the vinegar and the onion really ought to have cancelled it out. 

    They didn’t. In fact, after I finally whipped the bowl away, Catorze even jumped up onto the worktop, where he isn’t allowed, looking for more pesto. Then the screaming started.

    Cat Daddy: “See what you’ve created? All this is because of that salmon that you gave him from your plate*. He’s realised that there are better things out there than the dried shit** we give him every day.”

    *This isn’t remotely how it happened, but tant pis. 

    **That dried shit is the best food on the planet and costs us a fortune, but tant pis again.

    Meanwhile, Catorze is officially on hunger strike (again), gazing sorrowfully at his bowl and wishing some good soul would swap the Orijen for vegan pesto.

    Cat Daddy: “Feeding him pesto would be cheaper.”

    The picture is terrible because I took it hurriedly in the dark, but the disappointment is clear.

    For more Catorzian capers, please visit http://louiscatorze.com

  • Réensauvager la terre

    After the council spent the whole summer on their project of rewilding the pavements of TW8, with autumn approaching they have finally decided to dewild them again. Clearly they realised that letting our streets overgrow until they turned into the I Am Legend film set wasn’t a great look. 

    At around 8am, they came to dig up the various plants and shrubs that had started to flourish in the cracks between the paving slabs. This was Louis Catorze’s reaction to their presence:

    Shits given: 0.
    Now they’ve stopped scraping and started sweeping. Shits given: still 0.

    Were it not for the fact that there is sound, one would be forgiven for thinking that these were photos, non? Having seen cats react strongly to passers-by and unexplained noises from the street, my brain cannot deal with one who just. Does. Nothing. 

    I even wondered if the little sod might be turning deaf in his old age; it would certainly explain the increasingly louder and more frequent screaming. However, as soon as I stopped filming, I accidentally clattered a teaspoon against my cup and that sent him fleeing for the hills. So it’s not that.

    This response very much reflects the general Catorzian outlook on external forces:

    Things that could kill him (other cats, foxes, dogs, implement-wielding strangers outside) = either no reaction whatsoever or extreme aggression, despite being a fraction of their size.

    Utterly harmless things that nobody notices or cares about (teaspoons clattering, ice cubes placed into his water on a hot day) = abject fear. 

    In my last post I had wondered whether, as he grew older, Catorze would finally become more like a normal cat. I guess it’s an emphatic “No” to that.

    Enjoying the last few days of summer.

    For more Catorzian capers, please visit http://louiscatorze.com

  • L’art de se détendre

    How do you relax?

    With this going on? Erm …

    Imagine coming home from work to this. Actually, no. Don’t imagine.

    For more Catorzian capers, please visit http://louiscatorze.com

  • Qui vole un œuf, vole un bœuf 

    Zoom in for the evil staring eye.

    The other day I was preparing a beef wellington for Louis Catorze’s Cat Uncle. He is seriously ill in hospital, and beef wellington is his favourite thing in the world. This was what I had to endure after giving the little sod a few scraps of jambon de Bayonne, which I had used to wrap up the wellington:

    The tongue at the end. Ugh.

    I’ve always known that Catorze liked jambon de Bayonne. That’s no secret. But this level of screaming, and the scary sweeping of the floor for stray scraps like a land mine detector, were downright unnecessary. 

    Oh, and, later that evening, when the wellington was resting on the worktop, the little sod jumped up and lunged for it. Luckily Cat Daddy was facing that direction and was able to stop him before he was able to wrestle it to the floor. (It probably weighed more than him, but this wouldn’t have stopped him.)

    Trying to steal the lunch of a terminally-ill man is deeply ungentlemanly, even by Catorze’s already low standards.

    I am back at school this week, with a few staff training days before the kids return at the end of the week. I was about to say “It’ll be a relief to be around surly teenagers instead of Catorze” but Cat Daddy is away for a few days. So it’ll be surly teenagers by day, then by night I’ll be home alone with a bored, unstimulated, unhinged hell-beast. 

    Oh. Mon. Dieu. 

    For more Catorzian capers, please visit http://louiscatorze.com

  • Voler mon rayon de soleil

    When it’s 27°C outside – yes, even though it’s SUPPOSED TO BE SEPTEMBER – and you’re a black animal covered in fur, the sensible thing to do would be to keep out of the sun, non? 

    Well, NON. Whilst Cat Daddy and I slow-cooked to death on Sunday afternoon, feebly sipping ice-cold drinks, Louis Catorze decided to sunbathe, on hot paving slabs, with no shade. 

    (We do have shady spots aplenty in the garden. He just didn’t want them.)

    We have lived with him for long enough to know what a weirdo he is, so this didn’t come as a surprise. However, what did was when he pitter-pattered indoors, after charging himself up in the heat like a small, screaming branding iron, to roll the heat off onto us. 

    He tried first with Cat Daddy (rejected), then with me (rejected). Eventually he settled for using his papa as a pillow, flicking his contented tail against me. 

    Bit too hot.

    Even like this Catorze radiated heat, so we tried to cool him down with a freezer ice pack thing, like the ones that athletes wear (well, ok, nothing like those ones, really). He appeared to enjoy it for a short while, then shook it off to go back outside and sunbathe again. 

    Bit less hot.

    Cat Daddy: “I give up. Maybe we should just shear him in the spring, like a Highland sheep? We could leave a few bits on, like his face and tail, otherwise he might look stupid.”

    Right. 

    Anyway, there’s no sign of Catorze now, so we’re hoping he’s suddenly had a common sense transfusion and found some cool shade somewhere. 

    Meanwhile, do you have eyes on your furry overlords? Can you rely on them to be sensible in extreme* weather? 

    *27°C is extreme for us Brits.

    For more Catorzian capers, please visit http://louiscatorze.com

  • Toujours mieux quand on est ensemble

    What brings a tear of joy to your eye?

    Louis Catorze does. Well, sometimes. When he’s not being a massive arse.

    Cat Daddy: “I was reading that.”

    When Cat Daddy and I decided to sit outside and enjoy an ice-cold matcha latte in the garden, Sa Maj squeezed between us. There wasn’t really room for him, but he didn’t care; his need to be with us was greater than the need for anyone to be comfortable.

    Cat Daddy is usually quite cutting and rude when it comes to all things Catorzian. However, on this occasion, he said, “I don’t think we will ever have another cat who just wants to be with us all the time. Make the most of it.”

    I like to think that I do.

    Catorze is the person – if, indeed,  one can call him a “person” – with whom I spend the most time. He has his own blog and visitors’ book, and we celebrate him not only on his birthday of 30th April but also on two Black Cat Days (17th August and 27th October – no, I have no idea why there are two or what the difference is, but tant pis), the summer solstice (after all, he is the Sun King) and throughout the whole month of October. 

    I’m not ashamed to say that I sometimes decline invitations because I’d rather spend time watching horror with Catorze on my lap. Since this is my favourite thing to do, why would I choose less fun things in favour of this?

    Cat Daddy: “You shouldn’t put that in your blog. Friends will read it and stop inviting you to things.” What, so I’ll be stuck at home, alone, with my cat? Oh no, not that! Anything but that!

    Catorze is still as active as he was when he was younger. However, when he jumps down from heights, he reaches down with both front paws before launching himself. And he’s covered with an ever-increasing scattering of old-man white hairs. This reminds me that the little sod’s best years are probably behind him, but he neither knows nor cares and still conducts himself with all the exuberance – and the volume – of a whole litter of kittens.

    Meanwhile, we will continue to appreciate every minute with him, And this video shows that, on some level, he can put aside his psychopathy and his narcissism and appreciate us, too: 

    Happy purrs.

    For more Catorzian capers, please visit http://louiscatorze.com

  • Par mandat royal

    Interview someone — a friend, another blogger, your mother, the postman — and write a post based on their responses.

    We approached Ocado for their comments on life servicing the household of Louis Catorze, but they’re not replying to our emails. 

    I wonder why? Could the reason be this? 

    Or possibly this?

    Perhaps I’m overthinking the whole thing, and it’s simply an especially busy time for Ocado.

    I’ll wait. 

    Le Roi can’t wait to hear what Ocado drivers think of him.

    For more Catorzian capers, please visit http://louiscatorze.com

  • Le plancher est de l’eau

    A couple of days ago I saw Louis Catorze sitting at the back door, screaming, because he couldn’t get in. And, when I say, “couldn’t get in”, I mean that the cleaner had just mopped the floor and he didn’t want to get his feet wet. 

    I know. 

    So he just sat at the back door, screaming himself senseless, presumably until either the floor dried or someone picked him up and brought him in, whichever came first. I would have videoed it had I not been mortally embarrassed because the cleaner was there. (And no, I refused to pick him up.)

    No less than twenty minutes later, Cat Daddy cleared some fox poo from the garden, then poured water on the area so that we would know not to tread there. (It’s just non-stop glamour here at Le Château.)

    You know where this is going, don’t you? 

    Oh yes: Catorze happily walked through the fox-shitty water without even flicking a whisker. He then tried to settle first on my lap (denied), then on Cat Daddy’s (also denied), and finally had to make do with here: 

    Don’t come any closer.

    So, a clean-but-damp floor: non.

    Fox-shitty water: OUAIS. 

    The thought of Catorze in my bed with those gross feet makes me want to die. Not as much, however, as the thought of the YEARS he’s already spent in my bed with those gross feet. But what can we do about it, other than investing in a cat-sized one of those germ-zapping foot baths that you walk through before getting into the main swimming pool? 

    For more Catorzian capers, please visit http://louiscatorze.com

  • Ni manger, ni vivre (Partie 7)

    In today’s edition of Things We Used To Be Able To Eat But Now Can’t: sea bass rillettes. 

    I thought I was so clever, waiting until Louis Catorze had gone outside before deciding to have sea bass rillettes for lunch. But, as soon as I opened the jar, I heard the telltale click of the cat flap and the little sod was at my feet, screaming and screaming. It was then a race against time to dollop the rillettes onto some bread and then dart into the living room ahead of Catorze. 

    If you’ve ever been in the presence of a cat who wants a closed door opened, you will know how torturous it is. The sound of his screaming grated on my soul like metal scraping against metal. All the while I was hurriedly shovelling down my lunch, knowing that I would end up with indigestion yet preferring that to even another a second of screaming.

    Then, the screaming stopped. I didn’t know why, nor did I care. I was just grateful to be able to eat my lunch in peace.

    When I went into the kitchen to put my plate into the dishwasher I found him there, eagerly licking something on the floor. In my haste to dollop the rillettes onto my bread, I had dropped some on the floor … and Sa Maj had found it. 

    This was absolutely the worst outcome imaginable, because then Catorze knew exactly what he was missing and wasn’t satisfied with just that tiny morsel. Cue headbutting, manic sweeping of every last centimetre of the floor in case another stray blob had escaped, and, of course, more screaming. Oh dear God, the screaming. 

    The worst part of the story is that the rillettes weren’t even that nice.  So I have stirred up an already-psychotic cat, all for the sake of something that wasn’t really worth it. 

    What next? Will we only be able to eat fish in peace at restaurants or at friends’ houses? 

    Next time he might pair some good wine with his fish course.

    For more Catorzian capers, please visit http://louiscatorze.com

  • L’orage après le soleil 

    You know this already, but I had to post about it again because it never fails to blow my mind. And I’m sure this won’t be the last time. Louis Catorze will do it again and make it even weirder, I’m sure of it. 

    We’ve had a lot of rain this weekend. In fact, yesterday morning I came down to a lake of water all over the kitchen floor because the windows had been left open all night. Most cats don’t like rain. Catorze, however, begs to differ. 

    Catorze was on his papa’s lap, ready to watch Aston Villa v Arsenal, when we were struck by a particularly heavy deluge that battered down on the skylight and the Velux windows. Catorze’s ears pricked up at the sound, and Cat Daddy said, “Do you want to go out, Louis?”

    What happened next was quite strange. 

    Catorze replied to his papa with a “Mwah!”, jumped down from his lap and RACED outside as if the devil were chasing him (not the best analogy, since we all know that the devil is already inside him and residing there quite happily, but you know what I mean). 

    We have always known how much he loves the rain, but we have never seen the little sod so instantly responsive to it. It’s both cute and utterly freakish. 

    Here he is, sitting in his favourite place and loving every minute of it:

    The eye of the storm.

    For more Catorzian capers, please visit http://louiscatorze.com

  • Ni manger, ni vivre (Partie 6)

    Tell us about the last thing you got excited about

    PART SIX. WHAT IS HAPPENING?

    Well, this prompt is easy for Louis Catorze for answer: it was salmon. Yes, again.

    Remember when I told you that we could no longer eat smoked salmon in this house ever again? Well, it seems that not even bog-standard canned salmon is safe; I have just been subjected to the most terrifying screaming and physical assault because Catorze wanted my dinner and I wasn’t giving in.

    First his head swivelled round and round like Regan from The Exorcist, trying to find the source of the irresistible smell. Then, when he realised it was me (well, not ME – you know what I mean), that was it: I was stomped upon, headbutted and screamed at. A couple of times, he took a break from his attack to go to his own bowl. But, when he realised that it only contained plebby Orijen, he came back to ambush me again.

    Cat Daddy: “See what you’ve done?”

    Me: “WHAT? I’m just sitting here trying to eat my dinner!”

    Him: “You left that smoked salmon out. You put out a bowl for him, in his room*. You’ve created a monster.”

    *This is the first time I’ve heard that the living room is Catorze’s room, but tant pis.

    Saint Jésus et tous ses anges: smoked salmon and canned salmon are not REMOTELY the same thing! However, what matters is that nobody has told Catorze this. And, if we try, he just screams more loudly, in a “Laaa laaa, not listening!” kind of way. 

    I was able to get some small snippets of the drama on video (not an easy feat, when also trying to keep an irresistible plate away from the attacker):

    Make it stop.
    MAKE IT STOP.

    And there was also this face:

    Fangs.

    I managed to eat my dinner – just about – but, in my haste to do so, I gave myself awful indigestion afterwards.

    I shall say it again: this is our life now. And that’s a very scary thought indeed. 

    For more Catorzian capers, please visit http://louiscatorze.com