Thursday 12 March 2009

TEACHING A CAT ABOUT THE BIRDS AND BEE'S.

Unable to find my door key in my multi coloured handbag, I squeezed through the letter box and entered the living room with a yell of, "Geronimo!"and a hop, skip and jump. Tommy, my cat, who was sitting on his "lazy Boy" chair, reading the garden supplement from the Dubai Gazette, looked up and yelled. "Well, bust my britches and call me Derek, that was some hop, skip and jump!" "Yes, it was," I said proudly, "I learnt how to hop from Howard the frog, how to skip from Prudence the kangaroo and how to jump from the management and staff of Centura Foods Ltd, who reside at, Blessington Road, Tallagh, Dublin 24, where they make BISTO, the original gravy powder, that can be used in roasts, beef, lamb, pork and-not forgetting-chicken." "Aah! BISTO!" said Tommy. "Aah! BISTO yourself!" I replied. In the short pause that followed, I wrote a book, chronicling the 5000 types of plums that are to be found in a small orchard just outside Kinshasa the capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo. I then sat down to read it but it was rubbish, no plot and the characters were mere cardboard cutouts. "No substance!" I muttered, as I threw it from me in loathing and disgust. "Who writes these things?" I said, as I picked up my fiddle and had a quick plink. A good plink relieves tension, as long as no one is watching and the wind is coming from the right direction. I felt--uneasy, there was a strange feeling in the air, it was too quiet. I gently opened the window, stuck my head out and yelled, "WAAAAAAAH!" A police baton struck me a whack on the side of the head, drawing dandruff. I gently closed the window again. Everything was back to normal.
Suddenly, and with out any reason or prompting Tommy leapt out of his "Lazy Boy" recliner and yelled, "It's no good! I have to tell someone. The guilt is driving me mad. MAD! I tell you," he screamed, as he stood before me, a poor, shivering, trembling quivering feline. "Tommy lad," I yelled. "What's up lad? Is there-trouble at mill?" "It's worse than that," yelled Tommy, "Far worse. You know Florence the tabby cat next door, well I've got her in trouble." I lost the head. I ran round the room in an anti clock-wise direction yelling, "I'm going to need some clean sheets and plenty of warm water!" I came to my senses, by running head first into the wall and stood with my hands on my hips glaring at the reprobate that was Tommy cat. "You dirtee little cat," I screamed. "What have I told you about staying out late at night? But would you listen? Would you heck as like! And I blame her too. I blame that Florence next door, wiggling down the street, with her tail curled up in the air. And now look at you," I screamed, "going to be a daddy at your age. Well I warn you Tommy cat, no one from my side of the family will come to that kittling. How are you going to cope?" I screamed "Have you seen the price of Kitikat recently? "And there you stand," I screamed, "bold as brass, for that's what you are Tommy cat, bold as brass, telling me that you're going to be a-daddy." I collapsed in a chair and pulled the national flag of Burundi over my tear streaked face. "But I'm not going to be a daddy," said Tommy. I leapt up, grabbed the poker and shrieked, "Don't you dare ,Tommy cat. Don't you dare stand there and have the bare-faced gall to tell me that you're not going to be a daddy. You will be a daddy, or by the sacred simmet of Mark Durkin, I'll bend this poker over your feline skull." "I'm not going to be a daddy," said Tommy, "but I did get Florence in trouble. When the police caught me jay walking, with a jay bird I had caught, I panicked and instead of giving my name, I said I was Florence a tabby cat." Oh the relief. Oh the relief. No kitten sitting for me or changing nappies. No getting up at 4 o'clock in the morning, to open a tin of sardines. "Well, let that be a lesson to you," I scolded. "You got off easy this time." Tommy and I gave a hop, skip and jump, as someone knocked at the front door. I ran to open it and wee Ronaldo Smith stood there, leaning heavily on his zimmer frame. "Ronaldo, my old pal," I yelled ,"how's she cutting?" "I'll tell you how she's cutting," croaked Ronaldo. "I'm pregnant, up the duff and I'm blaming-YOU. You were the only woman I went with after my hernia operation." I looked at Tommy, I knew what was coming, Tommy looked at me with revulsion and said, "You dirtee little woman." Then he turned his back on me and walked away with his nose in the air.
But I don't believe Ronaldo. Tomorrow I'll go down to the dole office and demand a DLA test.

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