What, Still No News

No News is, well, no news. Cuddesdon News has been off the air for several weeks now and it could be assumed that there has been no news-worthy events to report from Cuddesdon. Nothing could be further from the truth........

There has been:

• The Cuddesdon Fete, most notable for Fillipa's "Pissed as a Parrot" speech.
• Another parcel for Mr Big Lou.
• The wipper-snipper gang.
• Mr Big Lou's name change.

To name but a mere selection of events/scenes. Over the next few weeks I shall attempt to get things back up-to-date.

The Cuddesdon Drug Scene

I have just seen one of the funniest things I have seen for ages. As a close friend once said "I laughed so much a little bit of wee came out". (Nice).

During a recent visit to chav central The Ring Master and I were trolling down the pet section when The Ring Master came upon a new cat treat called "Good Girl Catnip Treats". Allegedly made from milk derivatives, whatever they are, they also contained catnip. We threw one packet into our basket and made for the exit.

Now Rez, as I have reported previously is a fussy eater who only imbibes on alternate Wednesday's. However, on occasion she has been known to push the boat out and eat random crap just to keep us on our toes. Thus it was no surprise when Rez tucked into the new Good Girl Catnip treats with gusto.

Historically, we tend not to tempt Mr Big Lou with snacks-in-between-meals as his interpretation of the word snack is not the same as ours. However, on this occasion I thought I would try him with one of the new "treats". I placed a couple of the green drops on the carpet in front of him and stood back as I expected him to wolf them up without so much as a by-your-leave. Instead, he sniffed them and immediately dropped to the ground and rolled his fat face across the treats. As he did so a look of demonic pleasure came into his eyes and he repeated the action several more times. At this point I was falling about the room laughing uncontrollably and even though he hated me for it he could not resist the catnip treats.

I have now tried this on 3 separate occasions and each time Mr Big Lou has demonstrated the same loss of self-control. It is so funny I am planning on setting up demonstrations for friends and family.

Catnip is surely the cocaine of the cat World.

Cirque de Chat Noir

Rez possesses a natural grace and moves around with the ease of a ballet dancer. Her jumping is both accurate and stealthy and she can jump from the windowsill to the floor without making a sound. Last Saturday she decided to climb one of the tall flimsy trees that resides in the back garden and as usual she did this with a lithe beauty that was a joy to behold. Using almost imperceptible shifts of weight to each of her paws she was able to move in any direction. When she decided that she had seen enough she simply and calmly traversed down through the branches to ground level.

Sitting under a bush on the opposite side of the garden, observing Rez's high altitude antics was Mr Big Lou.

Now fast forward to this morning. I was about to get in the car when in my peripheral vision I caught sight of a tree, shaking violently. Even though it was incredibly windy at the time the alarming degree of movement was, I feared, too much for natural causes . My gaze then moved up the tree to a point four fifths of the way to the top where a very large black furry creature was swaying back and forth in the wind. My first thoughts were of bears or maybe gorillas although I dismissed this quite quickly as I did not think there were any native to South Oxfordshire. I decided to get closer and moved to the base of the tree and looked up again. This time I instantly recognised the source of the wildly waving tree, it was none other than Mr Big Lou. Apparently he had been entranced by Rez's airborne feats at the weekend and felt that it was well within his capabilities to emulate. He had also been egged on by Damian, one of the evil Tabby's from next door, who could be glimpsed at the far end of the drive with a smug grin etched upon his evil, lip-less mouth. Lou also reasoned that it would enable him to take his conservation work closer to the birds he had sworn to protect.

Had it not been so precarious, Lou's predicament would have been funny. At no point could he ever have been accused of being at one with the tree or the stunt. Each of his huge paws were straddled across different branches, one of which was in an adjoining tree. He made several attempts to regain his composure but unfortunately lost his footing/pawing each time. When this happened he moved in a style that I think he believed was controlled falling. My own view is that it was simply falling. I tried coaching him down but as we all know he is unable to interact with me during the hours of daylight and ignored all of the advise I shouted to him. After several more attempts of uncoordinated, gravity-driven lurches Mr Big Lou was suspended by his back legs, his face looking directly at the ground.

Suddenly a sharp crack was heard and one of the flimsy branches gave way under the weight of Mr Big Lou. Down he came, headfirst, taking out several more branches on the way. With an almighty thud he lands, completely ungainly on terre-firma and much to my relief, not to mention his own, he walks off, apparently unscathed. I can only hope that the lesson he will take away with him is that Rez moves on an entirely different plain to him and he must not try to copy her.

Only time will tell.

The Story of The Strange Millie-Type Cat

The story of the Strange Millie-Type Cat is fast becoming one of the legends of the Shires. Millie first came to live next door with the nice man and lady who have now gone and allowed the freaks to move in. I'm not bitter you understand. She was what is commonly known as a rescue cat, which incidentally are Mr Big Lou's origins. Apparently his parents were feral and roamed freely across North Oxford posing as panthers. This was until they were captured by a "do-gooder" who arranged to have them "snipped" and the fruit of their loins taken from them. Lou's parents managed to escape back into the wilds but Mr Big Lou was not so lucky. That was until Fillipa decided to have another stab at adoption.

However, back to the Strange Millie-type Cat.

Millie was quite possibly, with the exception of Trotter of course, the most deranged creature to have walked this island Earth. Her life had been somewhat traumatic and quite sad. Her first companion was a very elderly who frequently forgot that she lived with a cat. When this happened she would forgot to feed Millie. On other occasions when she would make a frail attempt at feeding the poor cat but would do so from a can of cat food that had been opened for a number of weeks. Eventually the elderly lady was considered to be a danger to herself and was taken to a sheltered home to see out her days with some other bewildered people. Unfortunately the day of her departure coincided with one of the lapses in memory that removed the existence of Millie from her thoughts. Consequently Millie was locked in the house by herself.

Millie's incarceration lasted for 7 months, 3 weeks, 4 days, 13 hours and 22 minutes until she was finally released by prowler. Upon breaking into the derelict looking old house the intruder was confronted by what he thought was a ghostly wailing banshee as he forced his way through the backdoor. It was of course Millie who followed the terrified scumbag out into the fresh night air.

This marked the start of Millie's time in Guilford where eventually she was befriended by a kindly old lady who would give Millie sardines and pilchards when she visited. As the friendship developed Millie would go into the kindly old lady's kitchen where she would take supper. Interestingly she would only eat food from a bone china plate and only if the kindly old lady handed it to her. Under no circumstances would Millie stay in the house during the hours of darkness. Instead she would sleep outside in a discarded kitchen cupboard that had been crudely fashioned into a type of kennel.

Sadly the kindly old lady passed away leaving Millie once again wondering why her companions kept abandoning her. After a few days of freedom Millie was captured by a cat rescue team and transported to Marlow where she moved into a house with a 3 legged cat called Arthur. This was not a happy home for Millie. It transpired that Arthur was in fact a terrorist and had spent the last 2 years hiding behind the oven. It was impossible for Millie and Arthur to be in the same room as each other and so it was decided to split the house in two. Millie would live exclusively on the upper floor whilst Arthur would remain on the ground floor. To the bottom of the stairs a high security door and alarm system was fitted to ensure that the 2 cats would never meet again. This new arrangement appeared to be working well until the day a visitor to the house accidentally left the door at the bottom of the stairs ajar. Millie immediately made good her escape hissing loudly at the evil Arthur as she shot past him and out in to the back garden.

Unfortunately Millie's latest break for freedom was short-lived. She decided to lay low in the shed and await the cover of darkness before hitting the highroad. This was a mistake as she was spotted going in by a nosy neighbour who closed the door behind her thus trapping poor Millie once again. After Millie was returned to her upstairs prison her mood did not lift and the sight of her forlorn features became too much to bear. Being too frightened of the evil Arthur to attempt to move him it was decided that a new home should be found for poor Millie.

Into The Story of The Strange Millie-Type Cat steps the nice lady from next door, who for several months had been "borrowing" Rez, Charlie Fuckwit and Channel on a regular basis and had developed a hankering for a pussy of her own.

Thus one dark and windy evening a posh wicker travel box turned up containing one well-travelled black cat, somewhat dishevelled in appearance and presumably to provide a degree of continuity in the wretched animals life she was delivered with an old kitchen cupboard that was unceremoniously dumped in the garden.

To say that Millie was anti-social would, I'm afraid, be an understatement of the highest order. Her first evening in Cuddesdon, post the forced extraction from her travel box, was spent under the table staring at the wall. When she did finally move it was to hide in the bedroom under the bed. She ensconced herself at the exact centre thus being unreachable from all sides.

What followed over the next few days was, in hindsight, an early sign that Millie was indeed a very scared and strange. Endless bouts of cat-n-human were played as she resisted all attempts to make friends and more importantly to feed her. However, the nice lady was not deterred and persevered where lesser mortals would have given up and sent Millie packing back to her cold discarded kitchen cupboard. Eventually a glimmer of a bond was established and Millie let the nice lady feed her and rewarded her by permitting the nice lady to stroke her under the chin.

And so for a few weeks an air of normality descended upon Denton Hill. Millie even began to respond to the nice man as well as the nice lady, although it has to be said he was sometimes a bit loud and boisterous for her. Then, very gingerly, Millie took her first steps into outside space and everyone worried that she would make good another cunningly planned escape, but she didn't and as time went by at its usual village pace routines began to develop.

On the surface Millie began to show real affection to her new caring companions and would purr loudly during the night when she slept on the bed with them. However, it now seems that deep down poor Millie was still troubled. Try as hard as she might she could not overcome her fear of being locked in again and was spending more and more time outside. She even took to sheltering from the rain in the shabby old kitchen cupboard that had been left in the garden. Over a period of several weeks Millie went into the house less and less until one day she disappeared completely. For days both myself and the nice lady walked up and down the village rattling boxes of catty nibbles and calling in impossibly high voices for the missing cat. At dusk we would equip ourselves with high powered torches that we would shine along the edges of the road and into the surrounding fields. All to no avail, she had gone.

However, it would appear that the story may not end there. Recently, a strange black cat has been seen passing through the garden. Both myself and Mr Big Lou have mistaken it for Rez and have both been surprised when we have discovered that it was not, Lou more than myself. He runs away whilst I run towards but to date I have failed to get close enough to ascertain the visitors true identity. My own view is that this strange and elusive creature is in fact Millie who, whilst relishing her freedom occasionally thinks of the few short weeks when she lived with companions who loved her and she loved them. So whenever she is in the area she drops by in the hope of seeing the nice lady once more and thanking her for her kindness and letting her know she is alright.

Faster Than a Speeding Drag Queen

At this precise minute Fillipa is flying through the Oxfordshire countryside in her new convertible. Within 20 minutes of taking delivery of the beast the top came down, a CD went in, leather driving gloves were donned along with a silk scarf and sun glasses and without further ado she was off.

Its difficult to keep up with her exact movements due to the gay abandon with which she has attacked this inaugural expedition. However, I do know that she has taken on her first chauffeuring engagement and is due at Preachers Lane within the next hour. From there she will be speeding with outrageous style to the Gate where she intends to drive up and down the road outside at approximately 6mph for most of the evening.

Please, if you do see her, do not step in front of the vehicle, it is highly unlikely that she would stop. Do however feel free to wave. I know that Fillipa has high hopes that her fantastic new automobile will turn out to be a "right old knob magnet".

I Don't Understand

Mr Big Lou spends most of his waking hours being scarred of me. He is sometimes too scarred to come into the house when I open the door for him, unless of course its teatime. Even then, once he has had his fill he scurries away, cowering as he goes. To a casual observer it could easily appear that Mr Big Lou was subjected to daily thrashings with a large stick.

If he sees me moving towards him he will find an escape route that avoids any contact. He never comes in when I call him and has never, ever sat on my lap. Many times when I enter a room he immediately shoots off at high speed.

Very occasionally and without warning Mr Big Lou will jump on the bed at night and lay down as close to my side as he can. Through the duvet I can feel him pushing his weight against me with quite some force. He then lets me stroke him and scrunch his fur in a rough but tender manner. After a few minutes he has wrapped his big forelegs around my arm and is gently flexing his immensely powerful claws against my arm. He does this without ever being too rough or scratching me. Sometimes he will pull my hand towards his huge mouth in a way that most cats do when they want to "play" bite. Not Mr Big Lou, as my finger reaches his powerful jaw he simply licks it. All the time this is going on he is purring so loudly that I fear he may wake the house.

Then, again without warning, he leaps up heavily and is gone. I remain and wonder if I had been dreaming but then convince myself that sometimes even Mr Big Lou needs to be loved.

Road Traffic Warning

After several days of deliberation and deep, deep thinking then more deliberation, Fillipa finally took the plunge today and purchased a new automobile. Make no mistake this is no ordinary car. It is drop-top, high power sports car and it is definitely not a tarts car.

The decision making process has been both exhaustive and exhausting for all those caught up in it. On balance it appears that the most significant justification for the extravagance of this purchase, is the fact that Fillipa will only be young once. (That however remains to be seen). The final piece of the jigsaw fell into place this morning during a test drive to Great Milton. It turns out that there are only 2 pedals in the car which leaves slightly more room for Fillipa's feet. Being of a larger shoe than most this feature went immediately onto the plus side of the equation.

With respect to to the mechanics of driving the beast, the nice man who accompanied Fillipa on this death defying speed test took a line directly from his handbook of "Condescending Saying's for the Car Salesman of the 1980's";

"Just push that lever to D for drive, and don't worry your pretty little head about all those buttons on the steering wheel".

Twat!

At this precise moment the aforementioned vehicle has been removed to a secret workshop for some necessary modifications prior to its delivery. These include stiletto-proof stainless steel plates being welded to the foot-well. The attaching of a pink faux-fur trim around the leading edge of the windscreen that is designed to "pop-up" when the roof is removed. Finally, the rear-view mirror along with both wing mirrors have been extended and welded into a position that ensures Fillipa has a 360° view of herself from the driving position. The final part of the "pimping" involves extending the space in the glove box to include a chiller for Clinique products.

Delivery is anticipated for Friday afternoon or Saturday morning. Plans are being made to close the access roads to the Village in order for Fillipa to practice getting in and out of the low profile seats without revealing too much under-carriage.