Milking It

Thug (aka Drang, aka the Purring Death) continues to visit. He dropped by on Sunday afternoon whilst we were out, sitting in the sun, watching out for the fox that has been killing our chickens. It was a nice day – perfect to set up the chairs, the camping table, have lunch, read a book...

Then Thug arrived, and all other cats vanished. As always with a cat, given three chairs, one of which was empty, he came and sat on me. Attention is required, and stroking, and my nose needed some firm adjustment upwards and to the left... no, upwards and to the right...

And then he moved on because my partner’s nose clearly needed adjustment.

What he really wanted was food. This option is not available. Adorable as Thug is, he is not allowed in the house due to his predilection for visiting violence on the other cats. Likewise, feeding is also not allowed, because it encourages him, so no food. Sorry. Being adorable is just not enough.

Thug jumped up on to the ageing camping table, but the plates were empty. Normally we would intervene – cats are definitely not allowed on the table – but encumbered with books, laptops and a joint curiosity over what he would do, we watched...

He inspected the tea-tray - nothing there except the milk jug. Small, glass, a bit of milk in the bottom...

He stuck his nose in, just enough to get a sniff. This has echoes of Tigger, a cat we had many years ago, and one of the first things he did was try to get his head in a large blue ceramic milk jug. He couldn’t actually get in, but Tigger had a purr designed to register on the Richter Scale, which reverberated inside the jug. Thug was working on a really small jug, so just the tip of his nose fitted in, and with no interesting sound effect.

So Thug did an Arthur. That probably doesn’t mean anything unless you’re old enough to remember adverts for wet cat food with a white cat eating from the can with his paw. Thug did just that, dipping a paw in the milk and licking it off. It would have taken him a while to get all of it but he chanced on an even better strategy – he tipped the jug over, into the tea-tray. Clearly if people will not put milk in a saucer, Thug will improvise.

Thug is a bright cat. I fear he will rule the world one day. Now that he knows how to milk a jug, there will be no stopping him.