Hit the water already swimming and everything will be alright

Brig is washing the floor today.

"You're okay," she says as the mop wends its way closer to all this computer equipment resting on the bare boards. "You don't have to move."

I give her a sideways look and say:

"I feel like I should start making swimming motions. Like when you go to lower the dog into a bath?"

We laugh at the mental picture. Each of us has owned various styles and temperaments of dogs down the years and they all invariably started swimming in mid-air as they were being lowered into the bath water. Front paws doing the crawl, tail twisting about to act as a rudder. It ain't called the "Doggy Paddle" fer nuttin'.

I've promised today to tend to the cat litter trays as soon as it rains.

"What do you mean, 'As soon as it rains'?"

"It's obvious, really. With rain forecast, I could jump to the chore like Superman and it would piss out of the heavens. If I leave it an hour, it will stay dry until I go outside and then piss out of the heavens."

I notice the sound of big fat raindrops falling on our black bags of recyclable beer cans as Brig takes a cigarette break on the back doorstep. Point proven.

On the positive, I've put off sweeping out the shed that our two semi-outdoor cats call home for the past few weeks and there is a definite surplus of discarded cat biscuits and cast-off fur on the Axminster carpet floor that needs attention. So I'll do that chore today as well.

Yes, our cats have a fully furnished home of their own.

We bought it a year and a half ago, to make up for the loss of their indoor lifestyle. Being young and inexperienced in the ways of we monkies, they thought it quite natural to climb up curtains and widdle in plant pots. Our raggedy old furniture made for perfect scratching posts.

With a house loan under our belts and some major remodelling and decoration, including new furniture and carpets, there was no way these moggies were going to carry on as before. So I forked out for a smallish garden shed, and insulated it with off-cuts from our new carpets, with the result that these two have a pussy-cat paradise in which to preen themselves. It has carpeted floors, walls and ceiling. It has a shelf installed so they can take turns sunning themselves at the window. I even put a miniature pussycat door (not a cat flap) in the bottom, so that I wouldn't have to leave the usual shed door propped open during the day and maybe cool down their boudoir.

The fact that there is a weights training bench in there has nothing to do with the cats. I just needed somewhere to put it after it went out of fashion in another part of the house. I don't think the tomcat pumps iron over the long nights lying awake in his cell block. He might though. He is getting very big.

I shall ponder this as I shovel shit.