It’s the summer solstice, and today is Cat Daddy’s favourite day of the year because of the almost-everlasting light. This year it’s mid-week, which isn’t ideal for me, but the fact that Cat Daddy is retired means he can enjoy it to the maximum without having to worry about going to work the next day.

Sa Maj also loves this time, because he is usually in peak health and there is always plenty of Important Cat Business for him to do.

After the squirrels chewed through our last set of solar outdoor lights, Cat Daddy bought not one but THREE new sets: a string of lights that glimmer softly across the green roof of our shed, half a dozen individual bulbs attached to the wire fence separating the Zone Occupée from the Zone Libre, and a quintet (?) of what look like fireflies in jam jars. When dusk falls, the garden comes alive.

Louis Catorze loves nothing more than to sit outside and take in the light show which, I’m sure, he thinks has been prepared in his honour. He settles in the garden long before sunset, after going about his Important Cat Business in the Zone Libre and his Rodent Duty, and he remains there long after dark, for much of the night. Sometimes he is even out all night.

Cat Daddy didn’t create the light show for Catorze. But it’s funnier for people to think that he did, so that’s what I tell everyone. And it’s certainly what Catorze believes, irrespective of the truth.

Here he is, enjoying his spectacle de lumière and wanting to be part of it. Happy Solstice to you, and I hope you enjoy your day as much as the little sod is enjoying his life.