My absence excuses

I admit that I have been missing from the blogosphere for a bit lately, for no reason other than I have been otherwise engaged with this and that, and that and this.

There was my birthday weekend during which both my darling daughters came to visit. This was a three-pronged event – celebrate mama’s birthday, chief bridesmaid and bride to practice bride’s hair and make-up for the big event in September, and mother to practice the cake-making for the centre piece. To say the kitchen was inundated with cake was an understatement of gross proportions. And that was without the required 30cm chocolate cake (due to the tin not arriving in time) so a 23cm and 7cm duo were prepared instead. And there was birthday cake! Ah a sponge addict’s dream.

Then there was the ill-fated rainy day trip to the supermarket. This was to be no Asda amble, but a stick-to-the-list dash in order to facilitate the exit of the premises as quickly as possible. Although this was accomplished with a certain amount of panache, the whole exercise was somewhat spoilt by the fact that the oaf behind me had reversed into his/her spot and parked almost bumper to bumper with the CFZ vehicle that the opening of the boot was somewhat of a squeeze. I did think of stamping a foot, blowing fire from my nostrils and moving our car with great theatrics in order to enable the boot to swing open to its fullest extent, but came to the conclusion that, as the offending driver was nowhere to be seen, such a potential Oscar-winning performance would be wasted on an otherwise uninterested car park. So I loaded the boot from a strange angle, and just as I was lifting the large package of cat food I felt a ping in my left side and realised that the next few days would be spent in a half-crone position. I would, in other words, be doing a pretty good dramatic impression of the wicked old hag in Hansel and Gretel.

Then came Hopalong Cassidy in the shape of my not-so-often-mentioned tortoiseshell cat Poppy McGregor. She is not mentioned much in the daily goings on around CFZ HQ because she is, and always has been, a wanderer. She goes missing on her jaunts for days on end throughout the year and does not get up to so many antics (at least not for our entertainment – who knows what she gets up to on her travels) as her errant brother Spider McGraw (aka the ginger cat). However, she came in with her left front leg dangling in a most peculiar fashion and was spotted first by Helen, our housekeeper. It became apparent, upon closer investigation, that she (Poppy that is, not Helen) had somehow got her collar caught under her leg and was obviously under much discomfort; a state gleaned from the sounds of her hissing and growling as we tried to remove it. In the end, it was a job for the scissors, but we could not get the collar to move from underneath her leg – it seemed to be stuck, and there was no way we could just pull it off at that particular moment as she was getting extremely agitated with all the attention (she is not one for attention at the best of times – unless on her own terms). I was fearing the worse that she had perhaps got a nasty oozy infection from a cut made by the collar, but it came off shortly afterwards and she was, thank goodness, none the worse for wear, and she is now back to her usual self.

Then came Biggles and his odd turn that Jon wrote about on the blog. That was most peculiar. He had been fine all day and had been curled up asleep until it was time for his night-time visit to the garden before going to bed. It was when he went outside that he became obviously out of sorts – likened to someone who had over-imbibed at the pub, and had suffered that horrid effect of the air hitting them when they left the bar’s cosiness to go home. It was a night of no sleep for me whilst I lay on the floor with Biggles until he went to sleep and then kept a careful eye on him throughout the night to make sure he was OK. By the end of the next day, he was basically back to his normal self. I am assuming that he must have eaten something that he shouldn’t – as Jon wrote, he did have an unhealthy eye on a toad the other night so perhaps whilst under cover of darkness, and while we were not watching, he managed to grab one after all.

Added to all these ‘events’ there have been several peculiar and tiresome episodes such as the leak in the bedroom ceiling dripping annoyingly into a bucket all night and the occasion when Helios 7 came in squeaking and mewling with excited anticipation for instant attention on account of her returning home with a dead mole. I am not too sure why she should feel so proud of herself under such circumstances, but then she is a cat, and they are such odd individuals at the best of times. Looking at the departed creature, I could not help but think of Moley in The Wind in the Willows and became rather melancholic at the thought of the poor little beast’s demise at the jaws and paws of Helios.

And there you have it – a short précis of the events that have occurred during the past weeks. It looks to be a busy couple of weeks coming up too, but I shall endeavour to try my best to update my blog a little more regularly than of late.