Thursday, August 21

I had an unbroken night's sleep last night. Now, that's not normally thought of as a rare event, but usually there is at least one disturbance. During the evening, as is normal, all was mostly quiet, although there was some banging-around going on in our bedroom while we were watching "The Sixth Sense" (Netflix!) in the den. Then, when we went to bed there was the usual growling and thumping-about downstairs, to the extent that I was about to go down and bash the heads of both feline protagonists.........when silence reigned.

I woke to find Bessie by my feet, as has become a more usual occurrence of late. Also routine these days, she keeps me company while I'm getting ready in the bathroom. When will she ever learn that she's supposed to use only the sink under the window and leave me the other one! Come to that, when will she learn that my making the bed is not to be seen as an occasion for her to play thereon? She sees the billowing of the sheets as an opportunity for her to dive-bomb.

When I was a child in London, a kid that here would be called a "vilde chaya" would be called a "lobbus." That's what Bessie is: an absolute minx, albeit an adorable one. You never know where she's going to turn up and she delights in darting out from wherever she's been hiding, to grab your leg or ankle. I have some scars to prove it! Not that she means to do harm, it's just that she certainly has sharp teeth and claws.

Daddy has been reduced to eating his breakfast while barricaded by cereal boxes, so that Bessie will not poke her nose right inside the bowl. I hold my hand over my yogurt and try to avoid the face that is poking right into mine. She knows that I'll let her lick out the dregs and I don't eat fast enough to her way of thinking. Daddy scoffs at the idea that I'm a real disciplinarian.

Bessie loves to climb onto Daddy's shoulders, drape herself around his neck and proceed to lick his ear, which Daddy hates! And he can't just shuck her off; he has to go over to the sofa in the den and shake her down. She only tried that once on me, luckily, because she scratched my back when she jumped off.

Making my lunch sandwich is a chore, in that I have to drop her off the counter several times. She's like a yo-yo: up, down, up, down, etc. The other day, she even absconded with the (luckily closed) bag of smoked turkey slices, jumping down off the counter and running away dragging it behind her, with me hot on her tail, literally.

She has a new favorite spot: At the kitchen window to watch me washing the dishes, and even at the sink, trying to get in to lick the water.

I love how she comes running to greet me when I get home in the afternoons. We're really going to miss her, although Cinnamon won't! He doesn't get on with her at all, but I truly believe that all Bessie wants is to play with him. He views her as a Dennis-the-Menace type and his age really shows. She loves to reach up to the sink when he's in the bathroom and bop his tail. Then he'll turn and hiss at her before diving off the sink and back under the bed, where she'll go for him at the bed-skirt (although never actually under it) and they'll have a set-to. Cinnamon has spent all these weeks mostly under the bed and I'm sure he's counting the days until she leaves. He's such a wuss!