The unlovelier aspects of cat-keepership include:

Discovering the first flea of the season on your freshly laundered, air-dried white sheets. Round them up (the cats, not the fleas), liberally apply Frontline Spot On (Ad US. Vet.) and with a prayer and crossed fingers, it will be the last.

Realising upon awaking that your two-legged bed mate has already left for work and the boy-cat has plonked himself down on his pillow and wiped his bottom on it. It is directly in front of your nose.

The little love tokens they thoughtfully deposit in the hallway for you to tread in en route to the bathroom in the dark. It’s as if they’re saying “Feeling peckish? I’ll save you a trip to the fridge! Here! Have a squashed toad! Or would you like half of my disembowelled dormouse?” (When you dispose of the mice, dor- or other, whatever you do DO NOT fling them over the hedge by their tails – the tail will snap off, you will squeal loudly and look a right tit.) Ask Mountain Man to explain the difference between a frog and a toad (remember, I am the woman who for years failed to recognise that the neighbourhood cockerel was in fact a gander).

“Erm… a toad is larger, uglier and has warts,” he says. (I am disappointed – I was expecting a scientific treatise.)

Finishing off the wretched creatures they lost interest in and left convulsing in death throes. Phone Mountain Man.

“Throw it on the compost.”

“No! The cat will get it back, or another cat, or it will be eaten alive by worms!”

“Hit it with a shovel, then.”

So I do, and I close my eyes a split second before the shovel makes contact and miss. Repeat.

And then there was the time when a Canary was sitting in the apple tree, and two of the cats were stalking it from different directions. “Do something!” I screeched at Mountain Man. He chased the cats away and chirped away at the Canary, who chirped cheerily back at him. They chatted a while and Mountain Man persuaded the Canary to hop into a Pampers box and phoned the Bird Man. (Mountain Man knows all the relevant people and all the relevant people know him – he’s that kind of guy and we live in that kind of place.)

The Bird Man collected the Canary – an escape artist of some notoriety – and returned it to its owners. A week later it was back again.

Lessons I either learned this week or am attempting to learn eventually (the hard way) or will never learn.

Not to buy Klorane wax strips because your usual brand isn’t in stock. They’re crap. The strip comes off, the wax remains on your leg and you spend twenty minutes, a bag of cotton wool balls, half a bottle of oil and a protracted swearing session removing it. Some of your skin will come off, too. Their only redeeming feature is that they save exfoliating.

Applying red toenail varnish over existing chipped coats because you’re too lazy to strip and apply a fresh coat. This is a reprehensible, unforgivable act of ill-breeding and sluttery and you know it and will pay the price (see above; substitute oil with nail varnish remover). But you just won’t learn, will you? Slut!

Eating those little savoury puff pastry goodies at the fortnightly wine & slander evening with your best friend. You know refined wheat makes you bloat and feel teary and sensitive to touch. It obviously doesn’t make you feel ill enough. And no – it’s NOT the wine.