Oops. So much to do at the start of term that I forgot to post yesterday evening. Here’s a beautiful photograph of Willow taken by Isobel, who started at secondary school yesterday. More later.
Sent using BlackBerry?? from Orange

A day of drama cat-wise. I warn you, I have splurged in this post.

We discovered this morning that Willow was missing. As we backtracked, we worked out that he must have sneaked out of the front door last night, when John was helping Teddy look for his football captain’s armband by torchlight on the grass outside the front of our house. 

The children and I went out immediately to look – they looked in gardens and under bushes and I surreptitiously checked all the gutters for cat corpses. Our first search was a failure, so I came home and made posters and flyers, while Isobel knocked on doors and Teddy cruised on his bicycle.

We hit all the local shops and lamp-posts with posters then the printer went on the blink (see this rude link for how I felt), so I couldn’t print the mini-leaflets for letter boxes.

When Teddy came back, he was so optimistic that we’d get Willow back, that I was persuaded to be more sensible. Ted also made us sandwiches for lunch and while we were eating, a neighbour came up the path and told us she’d seen Willow in her back yard.

At this point, I wish I had made a video; the three of us chased him around the neighbourhood for about 10 minutes in the manner of the Keystone Cops, before fearless Isobel grabbed him from under a bush and I took over. We both have lacerations and Willow yelled all the way home. The poor cat was terrified. 

After all was settled, Isobel and Ted went and took down all the posters – that’s today’s picture.