Biggles in a mis-adventure with cat escape routes

As you will have read on the CFZ blog, Biggles outdid himself late yesterday afternoon by letting his excitement get the better of him. Graham was tinkering around with our new back door, which involved the necessary, if not rather loud, use of various power tools. Biggles tends to think that anything that makes a loud noise, be it a vacuum cleaner, drill, TV, hi fi or similar, is something that needs his undivided attention, accompanied by loud noises of his own.

Therefore, as Graham was doing what he had to do, Biggles was doing what he felt he had to do. Unfortunately, sticking one’s head through a cat flap is not the best outlet for undivided attention, but this is what Biggles had discovered he could do, and was doing it with gusto.

It so happened that Jon and I had visitors yesterday afternoon, and after spending a good few hours in the kitchen preparing the evening meal, I had at last managed to get into the sitting room to sit with our guests and relax a bit before the time for supper arrived. Well that is what I thought at any rate.

I had been sitting for about 5 minutes when Ross came in and said that Biggles had cut himself badly on the cat flap and was bleeding everywhere. Upon reaching the kitchen, there was the unfortunate hound sitting dejectedly under the kitchen table with Oll administration first aid by stemming the flow of blood that was dripping from Biggles’ nose. On closer inspection, it was evident that Biggles had lost the top layer of skin and more besides.

It was clearly a job for veterinary expertise, made even more obvious when he began to lick his wound after given those parts of his anatomy, which we don’t mention, a thorough investigation. It was clear that he would need a course of antibiotics, and I had the sneaky suspicion that stitches under general anaesthetic would be required.

While Jon stayed with our guests, Graham took Biggles and me to the vet. She confirmed my thoughts about the stitches, so we left him on the understanding that he would probably be able to return home in a couple of hours if all went well.

And, thankfully, it did all go well and we were able to pick Biggles up later yesterday evening, together with some antibiotics and pain relief. As was to be expected he was extremely dopey – and, to a certain extent, still is today – but he has been half-heartedly chasing the cats, so presumably once he has got over the ‘excitement’ of yesterday he will be back to his normal self. The vet did a marvellous job on his wound – she has stitched it up beautifully, and reckons that a faint pink scar should be the only sign that remains of his escapade with the cat flap. I must add here that he has eyed up the offending gap in the door several times today (the broken offending article was removed last night). I am not sure whether he has been trying to work out what the hole is or whether he is planning some kind of retribution.

I am not sure, either, if it has marred his boyish good looks in the eyes of the ladies of his species – who knows, perhaps they like their blokes with the odd scar?

However, something tells me that Biggles and the local veterinary surgery will become very familiar with each other in the coming years.