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Si on donne un poisson à un chat …

~ iamthesunking ~ 35 Comments

If you are British, over a certain age and a follower of this blog, you will, no doubt, have spent New Year’s Eve exactly as we did: at home, TUC, watching the London fireworks on television and muttering things like, “What a waste of money” or “I bet Sydney’s were better”.

Louis Catorze ended last year, and began this one, doing what he does best:

1. Hunting*.

2. Playing with the motion-activated catnip fish that the Dog Family gave him for Christmas. He absolutely loves it.

When in motion, the fish’s tail makes a kind of yappy-slappy sound. This doesn’t bother us in the slightest when we know that Catorze is playing with his fish. After all, if he weren’t, he would be demanding play from us. And, when you’re still seeping flu from the eyeballs, a cat wanting relentless play is like watching a performing artist who requests audience participation.

However, if we happen to be walking past the fish and glance it very slightly with half a toe, that’s enough to set it off. And don’t even get me started on how scary it is when you’re home alone and the yappy-slappy sound starts up from another room. I daren’t even go and check whether it’s Catorze or a poltergeist, although there are times when I wonder if the latter would be less stressful than the former.

If we try to take the fish from him, he hangs on with his claws and not even an atomic bomb would shift him. Let’s hope that le poisson will make a dent in his excess energy, and give us all at least a few minutes of peace in 2023.

“MON poisson.”

*Oh yes, we had another mouse on New Year’s Day morning, and this time Catorze was sitting proudly by his victim, tail swishing menacingly, looking thoroughly pleased with himself. And, would you believe, on that day, of all days, the park bin was overflowing. So I had to tip Mousey into the park’s undergrowth and hope not only that Foxy Loxy would get it, but also that none of the neighbours’ Ring doorbell cameras caught me. The last thing I want is That Neighbour and the rest of the Neighbourhood Activist Committee admonishing me for dumping random shite in the park.

Le jouet du moment

~ iamthesunking ~ 21 Comments

Louis Catorze is overflowing with energy at the moment.

My friend: “It’s probably because of the steroid shot. He’ll calm down.”

Me: “He hasn’t had his shot yet. He’s having it on Tuesday.”

[Silence, tumbleweed, crickets.]

He is also obsessed with his new toy. We play with him every night for about twenty minutes, in the hope that it will wear him out and that he will calm down during the night as a result.

It doesn’t work.

We are the ones who are worn out by the play, and Catorze is almost as much of a nuisance through the night as he is when he doesn’t have play. (Granted, his new-found love of his igloo helps in that respect, but he’s still utterly unhinged.)

One night, after TWO evening play sessions of twenty minutes each, I awoke to hear him downstairs, scrabbling around with his toy, having dragged it out of the hiding place where we’d put it because we don’t trust him alone with it. When all eventually went quiet, I didn’t know whether to be relieved that we finally had some peace, or concerned in case he had hung or impaled himself. (I’m not sure whether any vampires throughout history have managed to do THEMSELVES in with a stake through the heart but, if anyone’s going to do it, it’s him.)

At 5am, when I decided that I would go down and check on him, Sa Maj appeared upstairs. Then the screaming started, which was when I discovered that, even whilst asleep, Cat Daddy is capable of Unrepeatable Expletives of the Worst Kind.

Here is the little sod, enjoying one of many play sessions that he had with our friend Emily recently. Yes, he is responsible for the white stringy bits pulled from the red rug. And, no, he never poses like this for me.

Having fun with one of his favourite people.
Bit of fang.

Les liens qui nous unissent

~ iamthesunking ~ 17 Comments

Louis Catorze has just tangled himself up in his new toy. (See photo below – and, yes, I did deliberately choose pink.)

Obviously we would have untangled him had he been in distress, but he wasn’t. In fact, he didn’t seem to notice that the cord was wrapped around him. Cat Daddy and I watched him at length, giggling a little and saying, “Any minute now he will realise.”

Nope.

The little sod took a break from play, went for a casual wander around the living room, then settled down on Cat Daddy’s lap, all the while remaining entangled and dragging the stick behind him. How on earth it could possibly have been comfortable is beyond me, but then we have never understood this beast and it’s unlikely that we will start now.

Here is Sa Maj, blissfully unaware of his entrapment:

Yes, that’s the wooden stick under his rump.

Psycho kitty, qu’est-ce que c’est? (Partie 2)

~ iamthesunking ~ 17 Comments

Louis Catorze is bringing psycho back. Not that it ever really went away. 

Latest habits include: 

  • Screaming when he wants to be stroked 
  • Screaming when he wants to play
  • Screaming when hungry
  • Screaming when not hungry
  • Forcefully headbutting hands that ignore the screaming 
  • Stomping around the house at night (a small cat can be surprisingly noisy on wooden floorboards) 
  • Bouncing around on our bed whilst we are trying to sleep, doing that closed-mouth whine which is softer than a scream but which still wakes us up
  • Knocking things off our bedside tables in the middle of the night 
  • Demanding wild play at times when we are busy doing other things and, when we finally give in and do the Dark Lord’s bidding, deciding that he no longer wants the play and walking away

Cat Daddy had the genius idea of taking him to the vet, but they’ll only say that there’s nothing wrong with him and that he’s just enjoying life. 

Sadly we’re not – in fact, we are being run ragged with his behaviour – but, as any cat owner will confirm, it’s not about us.

L’homme fort cherche le danger

~ iamthesunking ~ 3 Comments

Louis Catorze and Cat Daddy have had to review their Boys’ Club rough play sessions.

To an outsider looking in, these sessions would look rather like animal cruelty: Cat Daddy flings Louis Catorze up in the air, throws him around and digs hard into his belly, with Catorze squirming and squeaking throughout. But, as soon as he lets him go, the little sod shakes himself down and goes back for more.

A couple of days ago, however, when Cat Daddy flipped him upside down and slammed him onto the sofa like a pro wrestler (sounds bad, I know), Catorze let out a sad whimper. And, this time, when he limbered up for Round 2, his poor little left knee gave way under him.

Cat Daddy was absolutely distraught that he’d hurt his boy. Fortunately the knee popped back into place again and Le Roi forgave him, coming back immediately for (gentler) cuddles. But Cat Daddy is now very nervous indeed, not so much about Boys’ Club shenanigans – which are easily controlled – but about the petit filou potentially hurting himself when we’re not around to help him. I reassured him that Catorze doesn’t wander far enough to get into proper trouble and that, in the unlikely event of him being stuck somewhere and unable to walk home, the whole darned neighbourhood would hear his screams for help.

So it looks as if our complicated boy is going to need some extra-special care from now on. Luckily we saw this coming, and we’re ready for it.

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Protéger et servir

~ iamthesunking ~ 5 Comments

Cat Daddy and I are going on holiday in a few days’ time, and we have a friend coming all the way from Paris to look after Louis Catorze in our absence. Oui, Mesdames et Messieurs: Le Roi is going to have an ACTUAL French person as his full-time, live-in majordome/esclave.

“Do you speak French to him all the time?” she asked us. “Because I intend to. So, by the time you come back, he won’t take any notice of anything you say.”

Louis Catorze, not following instructions? Whatever next?

Anyway, Cat Daddy and I are currently putting together a set of manuals for her reference. The Château manual was complete some time ago, and contains the following sections:

1. The Sonos multimedia system
2. The kitchen appliances
3. Local places of interest

The Roi manual, which is proving to be rather more of a lengthy task, contains the following sections so far:

1. Food
2. Drink
3. Play
4. Catnip (for medicinal purposes)
5. Nocturnal gadding about
6. Brushing
7. The vet
8. Dog warfare
9. Prey, dead
10. Prey, living
11. Prey, partially-living
12. Lockdown at The Front, and how to manage escapees
13. Health and safety drill for Ocado delivery drivers

“It’ll be fine,” said Cat Daddy. “What’s the worst that could happen …?”

[Silence, tumbleweed, crickets.]

He continued: ” … Apart from us returning home to find the place knee-deep in dead vermin like some post-apocalyptic horror film, and our poor friend crying in the corner?”

Right. Où est ma valise?

You will notice that there is no “Medication” section in the Roi manual, and that wasn’t an oversight: notre cher ami has officially been given the all-clear from his favourite vet, who is back from her travels for a short while. No more Gabapentin! He has had no relapses at all during his tapering-off detox programme and, whilst we will miss the little sod for the next couple of weeks, we know that he will be fine and that our friend will look after him wonderfully.

We just hope that he will be equally considerate in return.

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Peins-la en noir

~ iamthesunking ~ 19 Comments

Cat Daddy and I have spent a disturbing amount of time monitoring Louis Catorze to try and understand his tail-chasing habit. And, yes, this has been just as dull as it sounds, with the exception of the unsettling moment when he actually HISSED at his own tail.

The strange thing is that Catorze doesn’t appear to be going for his tail in response to anything physical. It seems that the SIGHT of the white bony bit – which stands out against his black fur – is what triggers him, perhaps because he thinks something is stuck to his tail, or because he thinks the white blob is a worm or a bug. And this is most odd as he’d surely have had to go for the tail a few times in the first place, in order to thin the fur and expose the white bony bit?

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“Which do you think came first: the tail-chasing or the white bony bit?” I asked Cat Daddy.

“I don’t know,” he replied curtly, not even looking up from his laptop, “but I bet historians and scientists the world over are agonising over it.”

Sigh.

“It’s right up there with all the other ‘Which came first?’ debates: the chicken or the egg, life on earth or a habitable environment …” Cat Daddy’s voice trailed off, his eyes remaining down.

I thanked him for his insightful comment and bade him good day – although I couldn’t resist Googling both the chicken and the egg and the life on earth thing, as soon as I left the room.

The question now is: what do we do about it? Short of colouring the white bony bit with black marker pen – Cat Daddy’s idea, and he wasn’t joking – we can’t think of a single feasible solution.

Are there any historians or scientists out there? A little help, s’il vous plaît?

Tromper, jouer, trahir

~ iamthesunking ~ 5 Comments

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We are still reeling from the vet’s revelation that Louis Catorze has resorted to eating his own body parts because he’s so bored. Cat Daddy, in particular, has taken it quite badly.

“I don’t have a problem with being called boring,” he said, “but … too boring for him? FOR HIM? He’s the dullest cat ever! He does nothing! What does that make us?”

He has a point.

I attempted a play session this morning, as advised, but the little sod just sat with his arms/front legs folded, tail flicking away, and made zero effort to join in. And, in a creepy sort of way, I had the feeling he had the upper hand and that he was playing with me, not vice versa.

I went berserk with the feather on a stick, trying desperately to elicit some sort of reaction, and Louis Catorze just stared back as if to say, “Danse, mon petit singe, danse!” Then, after I gave up and discarded the toys, he went out to chase some leaves. Oui, Mesdames et Messieurs: EVEN DEAD LEAVES ARE MORE FUN THAN ME.

I don’t know where we go from here. M’aidez!

Nous sommes trop ennuyeux pour notre chat

~ iamthesunking ~ 2 Comments

It seems I have written a new instruction manual on how to be the worst person on the face of the planet. It goes something like this:

1. If your cat chases his tail, laugh at him.
2. If he keeps doing it, laugh some more.
3. If he does it for several hours through the night, curse him for being such a shit.
4. Don’t bother to actually check his tail unless he bites it so hard that he yelps, at which point you may discover that he has eaten it down to the skin.
5. Make an appointment at the vet’s, then get home late due to an accident on the motorway and miss the appointment.

“Don’t worry,” said Cat Daddy. “I’m sure he still loves you as much as he did before. Mind you, that wasn’t really a lot, was it?”

Silence, tumbleweed, crickets.

Anyway, we finally made it to the vet this evening, and the good news is that she found no sign of injury. “He doesn’t seem to be in pain when I touch the tail,” she said. “He’s yelling a lot, but then he yells a lot when he comes here, anyway, doesn’t he?”

More silence, tumbleweed, crickets.

We were advised to keep an eye on Louis Catorze’s tail over the next few days. The vet then shocked the life out of us by telling us that, in the event of it not deteriorating physically, the tail-chasing was more likely to be boredom-related and that we were to give Catorze more stimulation.

This hit me and Cat Daddy like a punch in the guts. So … we are not interesting enough for Sa Majesté.

To make matters worse, I know that, when I attempt to play with him, he declines in favour of toys that he can use on his own. So it seems that Louis Catorze has been trying to tell us for some time that we’re dull, and now we have just paid £25 for the joy of being told the same thing again.

We’re too boring for our cat. What d’you think about that?

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Santé!

~ iamthesunking ~ 7 Comments

Do cats have an OFF button? Or, at the very least, a LOW POWER button? Louis Catorze is driving us crazy with his naughtiness at the moment.

His lust for play has reignited, and he’s started to let out little “Waaah!” sounds as he chases his toy. If he sees us in the kitchen through the patio doors, he refuses to use the cat flap and screams to be let in. He can be frighteningly convincing, pawing at the glass and looking utterly fearful for his life yet, if we ignore the little weasel for long enough – usually a minute or two – he will come in of his own accord, up-tailed, chirpy and smug, as if saying, “Et voilà! I didn’t need you after all.” He’s also starting to go out for longer at night, as his big brother Luther used to do, and rolls in just before my alarm goes off, soaking wet, shrieking in my ear and with that vile, stomach-churning wet dog smell. Yuck.

His eyes now look exactly like the eyes of a normal cat, with no leathery, bald bits. The horrible under-chin scabs are disappearing, with fur growing back. And I suspect his annoyingness is down to the fact that he’s happier and feeling much better. So, in all, things are looking up for the little sod.

This time last year he looked like crap and was sad, and the year before he was even worse, so I’m excited beyond belief at the prospect of Louis Catorze’s first festive season, to my knowledge, in good health. Here he is, drinking to that!

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Le Roi est gros: vive Le Roi!

~ iamthesunking ~ 4 Comments


Louis Catorze is chubbing up a bit (although the picture is a week or two old, as his more recent ones look awful). He’s definitely not a fat cat – in fact, he is some way off being even average-sized – but there is clear evidence of chubbing having taken place: his neck is thicker, and his belly is rounder than it was before (so says Cat Daddy, who can’t seem to stop calling him “meaty” these days). Now, I wonder what could possibly be the cause?

  • Too many treats / too-big meals from us: no, because he doesn’t like food
  • Stealing food from other cats: no (see above, plus he hasn’t yet made any friends from whom he can steal)
  • Lack of activity, due to spending all day under the bed and no longer having 2-metre fences to climb as he did at Le Palais: VOILA

So, what to do about it? Well, given that he’s not overweight – in fact, if anything, this extra poundage probably brings him up to a healthy weight – I’m leaning towards doing nothing. But, with Oscar the dog living to our left, and Bert the dog on our right, I suspect Louis Catorze isn’t going to be doing the level of exploring that he did in the dogless realm that was Le Palais, so we’re going to have to ensure that he gets off his lazy arse and does some exercise. This will be tricky as he’s very all-or-nothing when it comes to play, either really annoying me with his relentless demands or just not bothered. (Mainly not bothered, though.)

Medicating him is the perfect activity for making him run, especially as I only have to think about it for him to take off and therefore it requires zero investment from me. But, as others have pointed out in light of his midnight bubble wrap habit, he could be in need of more play to tire him out. So, when he made his evening appearance yesterday I tried my luck with his fish on a stick.

After 15 minutes of trying, I eventually registered 2 minutes of very mild interest before he got fed up and left the room. It certainly wasn’t enough to get him moving. However, I took the fish to bed with me so that it would be on hand quickly after morning cuddles, and that was rather more successful, with Louis Catorze even managing a few leaps. And is it too soon for it to be having an effect? He spent the morning sitting on the flower bed watching the world go by, & he’s just greeted my mum, who’s come to stay for a few days, with a meow and a roll in the dirt. This is progress!

I am determined to do this again and somehow enforce some compulsory fun, just like they do at those team-building days out at work. He WILL join in and he WILL enjoy himself, or else.

Le papier bulles

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Dear God. Yet another night of disturbed sleep, because a certain someone decided to break into the cupboard under the stairs and pop bubble wrap (again) at some hellish early hour. Now, I don’t know if you have ever been woken from a deep sleep by the sound of bubble wrap – probably not, as I don’t imagine you share a house with the sort of inconsiderate shite who would do such a thing – but, believe me, it doesn’t sound like bubble wrap. It sounds like gunshots. So, rather than waking up cursing that inconsiderate shite, you wake up terrified for your life and reaching for the nearest weapon with which to defend yourself (in my case, a tube of Dermalogica moisturiser).

Cat Daddy got up between around 3am and 4am to go downstairs and haul Louis Catorze’s arse out of the cupboard. I was mildly perplexed that he chose to say, “Louis! What are you doing?” rather than just getting on with the hauling out – after all, Louis Catorze wasn’t about to reply – but I guess it was still better than having to go down and sort it out myself. After much scrabbling around I eventually heard the cupboard door close, followed by, “You’re putting on weight. You’re so MEATY!” Then there was Cat Daddy’s stomp-stomp back upstairs followed by a gentle pitter-patter of stupid little paws after him. Finally Louis Catorze jumped onto our bed, stretched out across both our stomachs and went to sleep on top of us.

WHY IS HE BEING SO ANNOYING? I suspect that, if we were dealing with a child, Mumsnet and their sort would be instructing me to wear the little sod out with relentless activity during the day in order to make him sleep at night. Louis Catorze sleeps under a bed from about 9am till after dark and barely moves a whisker during daylight hours; could it be that I need to kick his lazy behind into some sort of action? It seems rather mean to wake a cat from his sleep, but surely it can’t be good to go through a whole day without a spot of sunlight touching his body; maybe a bit of vitamin D could be good for his immune system?

I guess these are questions I could ask the vet when I book the appointment, although if any of Le Roi’s loyal subjects have any suggestions, I would love to hear them.