Norman, as you might know, is my cat.  Norman, is rather old, grumpy and terribly demanding these days.  He is soon to be 14 and while I know many cats live much longer, none of mine have.  So, I’ve been ready for the inevitable for a while, every time he behaves out of character.

Now, as older people can – intentionally or not – Norman can be a bit of a manipulator.  He sets things up to get Percy into trouble.  He refuses point blank to use the cat flap if he suspects anyone might be available to open the front door for him (he miaows, mimicking a REALLY irritating car alarm at a pitch that can we heard through all walls and doors until someone gives in).  And he will refuse to be moved from my pillow if he has decided it’s his for the night.

Right now, I am away with Mr R, the stepsons and the in-law Rs.  We are having a lovely time in a surprisingly sunny Norfolk.  Norman is being fed by a neighbour’s daughter.

About a week before we left, Norman decided to refuse to eat.  A few days before we left, – two days running in fact –  he fell off the windowsill of the front room where he sits doing his car alarm impression every ten minutes to be let in the front door.  Before waiting approximately seven minutes before doing his car alarm impression to be let back out.  And so the cycle continues.  And the day before we left he started walking strangely up the stairs, like one side of him wasn’t working right.  I jumped to the conclusion (which I don’t think was that extreme with the family history) that he might have had a stroke.

You need to know here that the thing Norman hates more than Percy and all the other animals he tries to take a swipe at as they walk past the end of our drive is going in the car.  I decided after a particularly harrowing trip a while back that unless he needs to be put out of any misery, Norman will not be visiting the vet again, as it does genuinely terrify him and takes him a few weeks to trust me enough to come anywhere near me again.  So, I wasn’t going down that route and knew the vet wouldn’t have time to do much before we went away anyway.

I hand fed Norman tuna in an attempt to restart his hunger.  He ate some, then just looked at me, in a sad sort of way.  Although when I left the container near him and walked away, I did see him help himself which made me a little suspicious, but mostly I was just happy that he’d eaten something….

Ultimately, I took what I thought was the most pragmatic option.  I was honest with the neighbour whose daughter is feeding Norman and explained that there was a small chance Norman would be falling off his mortal coil in addition to the windowsill ledge before we got back.  I said if this happened I would totally understand and there would be no blame whatsoever in their direction.  And then I had the really difficult part of the conversation:

Her: What do we do if that happens?

(We have no grass, just three tonnes of pebbles in our back garden, really rubbish soil that’s impossible to dig…and a very active foxes den the other side of our fence. I had anticipated this question.)

Me: Could I leave you a black sack and the garage key and pop him in there?

(She is very down to earth and we discovered we’re thankfully on a similar wavelength)

Her: Umm…yes, no problem.

But it turns out that the master manipulator has struck again and had been playing a long, complex game this time, because yesterday I got this:

I’ve always said it:  It’s a blimin’ good job Norman doesn’t have opposable thumbs or we’d be in all sorts of trouble… 🙂