It was my fault – a combination of an open bathroom window, and a door that hadn’t been properly closed – but it meant the little sod was out’n'about. She’s not used to it – we live near a very busy road, so the cats don’t go out as a matter of course – which meant I was pretty worried about her all told.

Thankfully, the back of the house rolls onto field, hedgerows, trees and the like, so the odds were that she’d stay on that side – and hopefully not stray too far in the interest of finding other New Fun Things.

We went out several times to try and see/find the little bugger, but with no real joy. Lots of bird alarm calls around the place, but no sign. At night I went out with a torch, and could see her eyes reflecting from way inside some of the undergrowth, but she wasn’t coming back ’til she was good and ready.

She did eventually come back – at 1am – and all’s been well. She spent most of Sunday trying to get out again whenever possible, but that’s no surprise.

Evil little sod

The incision’s pretty much healed up, and the fur’s growing back, so all’s good.

And she’s a lot more relaxed again now, thankfully.

Cricket and Madgit, asleep and intertwined

She’s yowled all round the house, sprayed, yowled, had the shits, and generally been deeply unhappy. I’ve found it really upsetting to see her handling it all so badly, and it’s not something I want her (or, selfishly, us) to go through again.

So today she’s at the vets, getting ‘done’.

Of course, that involves getting her into the cat carrier. Which, with a Bengal, is a bit of a struggle.

The first time round, she escaped from M’s arms, ripped all the way round M, and disappeared.

Second time, I got her, and held her tight while we got her into the cage. Her back legs were down by my right hip, and she was held tight. Somehow, she ended up twisting round and I now have a deepish cut from her back claws in the left side of my neck, and other clawmarks all round my left shoulder-blade. Impressive.

She’s at the vets now, and I’m half expecting a call saying “Can you come and get your cat out of the ceiling tiles”. She is emphatically Not Happy. And Very Sharp.

Cat Activity Centre

The layer at the top is all padded as a cat bed, but for whatever reason Cricket never used it. Bizarre. Mind you, cats are never good at doing what they’re supposed to.

Anyway, I brought the stand back into the living room this weekend (it’d been on the stairs for while I was out at work) and she’s been on the sleeping pad ever since.

Cricket on the cat stand

I don’t know why she’s suddenly realised it’s comfortable and warm on the stand, but it’s definitely suddenly flavour of the month.

Cricket

She really is utterly beautiful, and beginning to like me enough to come and sit on me. With Bengals (as Fabulous Lorraine says here in a fantastic post) affection is very much on their terms, like it or lump it. Cricket’s starting to trust and accept me, and that is A Very Good Thing.

David Attenborough

I often get letters, quite frequently, from people who say how they like the programmes a lot, but I never give credit to the almighty power that created nature. To which I reply and say “Well it’s funny that the people, when they say that this is the evidence of the Almighty, always quote beautiful things. They always quote orchids and hummingbirds and butterflies and roses”.

But I always have to think too of a little boy sitting on the banks of a rier in west Africa, who has a worm boring through his eyeball, turning him blind before he’s five years old. And I reply and say “Well presumably the God you speak about created the worm as well”.

And now I find that baffling, to credit a merciful God with that action.  And therefore it seems to me safer to show things that I know to be truth, truthful and factual, and allow people to make up their own minds about the moralities of this thing, or indeed the theology of this thing.

Upside-Down Basset Hound

I just love it.