Why

Even when you have been awake since 01:48 and 3 hours later you have just managed to drop-off, Rez feels it is important to poke you gently with her tiny paw, make a loud pitiful call and let you know she has returned from an early morning reconnaissance mission.

Even when you managed to get off to sleep at reasonable hour with Rez's small, very black body sleeping peacefully at the bottom of bed, Rez feels it is important to poke you gently with her tiny paw, make a loud pitiful call to remind you that she is there.

Even when you were poked and awoken a mere 22 minutes ago, Rez feels it is important to poke you gently with her tiny paw, make a loud pitiful call just to remind you she is still there.

Mr Big Lou's preferred method of nocturnal distraction falls in to 3 main categories.

• There is the heavyweight jump from the windowsill onto the bed and/or its occupant(s). The recoil from the immense force of his landing has been known to lift the mattress from its base.
• Method 2 is slightly more subtle in that he diverts some of the blame to poor Rez. He will jump on the bed, purring very loudly rather bizarrely, and appear to nestle down for a sleep. However he has cleverly plonked his huge frame down across one of poor Rez's tiny limbs and proceeds to gently nip her. Rez of course takes a large slice of umbrage at this and leaps up noisily. Thus the effect is the same.
• Finally, Mr Big Lou's favourite method is to destroy cardboard boxes by chewing them loudly. Being woken from a sound sleep to this noise is often so disturbing that further sleep is impossible.

By way of revenge I spend much of the day waiting for the cats to drop-off before waking them with a gentle poke accompanied by a song. The songs are personal to each of them. To Rez I sing, quite loudly sometimes, "Le chat noir, sans giblet" to the theme tune of the television series of Spiderman. Mr Big Lou's tune, and I do use the term loosely, is as repetitive as Rez's tune and goes:

How are you Lou, how are you

How are you Lou, how are you, you you

How are you Lou, how are you

How are you Lou, you Lou, you Lou

Lou, Lou L-Lou-Lou

(Back to the start)

The tune for Mr Big Lou's song is the Indiana Jones theme tune.