Pet Cemetery

Our cats have insisted on bringing several presents into the house this morning. It started with a large dragonfly. I use the word 'large' rather loosely. Had it been alive and challenged me to a fight, I would have lost. Less of the fly, more of the dragon bit. I saw it delivered gracefully as an offering onto our hallway carpet and wondered exactly how far our cats has travelled to get it. I was assuming the Lost World or perhaps that island King Kong is from. This dragondragon was then followed by a tiny baby bird. I'm ok with our cats killing dragonflies as I've never been a major fan. I wouldn't protest to save the dragonfly. Much in the same way my mum told me yesterday that daddy longlegs were dying out. Couldn't care less. Horrible gangly legged flying idiots. What have they contributed to the world? Nothing, except disproportionately limbed insect mayhem. But a dead baby bird is a bit sad. I was in the shower and Layla ran in screaming because of this second, rather more cute and sad, offering. I had soap in my eyes and so could do little help, and while I showered as quickly as possible, Layla managed to wrench it from Rosie's jaws and put it in a tupperware box. Not so it could be reheated you understand, just so it was away from cat evil. We debated what to do with it, and between putting it in the bin and the garden, we opted for the more organic process of garden. Realising that the cats would just get it again if it was so nearby, I decided we should lob it into our neighbour's unkempt jungle instead. I lobbed the bird out of the tupperware box as hard as I could.


Unfortunately, I throw like a girl. A girl with a broken arm and crossed eyes. The bird's carcass lifted into the air and landed straight into the rose bush, impaling itself onto a thorn and its head wrapping around the branch like a morbid Stretch Armstrong toy designed by H.R.Geiger on his happy day. Suddenly I had gone from being the preserver of dead birds, the avian Anubis, to a horrible horrible bird mauler. I failed to mention that I was in my dressing gown so it was down to Layla, in her wellies, to unwrap the birds head from the branch and rethrow it next door. Rosie and Bella are still mieowing and searching everywhere for the bird. It must feel like how your Nan feels when you unwrap that jumper at Christmas and straight away, without trying it on, say 'sorry doesn't fit me'. I have no sympathy though. I am scared that the presents will keep getting bigger and bigger, ranging from a rat to a rabbit, until one day I come home and find a dead bear in my lounge. Why can't they understand I am not a fan of these things. There are bloody loads of Xbox games I want, or even on a day like today, a cold beer. They really aren't very thoughtful at all.


The cat I had from age 1 to age 19 was called Claws, and she was a legend of gruesome dead pet gifts. We would often come home from a holiday to find 20-30 decapitated rats lying in the garden in neat rows. The heads all places to the left of the bodies and big, black, furry Claws sitting proudly infront of them mieowing in pride. It was often greeted by a 'for fuck's sake' from my Dad and Mum, followed by two hours of burying them all in the back of the garden. It became so regular that the area in which they were buried became like a tiny hill. I like to think that one day Time Team will travel to the area of Finsbury Park and discover these 400 rat skeletons and believe they were either a rat emperor's army, buried with him for the war. Or that there was some sort of cat Fred West living in the area.


Me and Layla watched The Reader last night. I thought it would be all subtitles, but it wasn't. Poor jokes aside, it was a pretty damn good film and made think that Kate Winslet is less of a dick for her crying speech. She was very good in it. So good infact that even though she plays an evil Nazi Auschwitz guard, you have some sympathy for her. Now this worried me a bit. Nazi sympathizers are usually very frowned upon. There was a lot of boobs in it too. Kate Winslet has become quite well known for just getting nekkid at every opportunity. I sat wondering if all the Nazi boobage would make this film a favourite of Max Moasley. A man for whom race issues mean two different things. Still overall a good watch, ruined only by turning over afterwards in time to see Big Brother. Its like the entertainment equivalent of someone reading a book then putting their face into a pile of horse shit.