A little tale told by my French teacher tickled my sense of humour. We have all been caught out at one time or another, trying to translate English idioms into French. Jean-François’ story involved a friend visiting England, who tried to do the opposite. The expression, “vachement chouette” in French means “bloody great”. Translated literally into English, you get “cowly owl”. It may yet catch on in this household …

Having received the cats’ food supplement on Friday, I have finally plucked up courage to use the pressure canner for the first time. As I type, I have one eye on the pressure gauge and the other on the Munster vs Ospreys playing the first of today’s two Heineken Cup Quarter Finals. Harlequins are at home to Leinster later.

Bloody cats. Last week we came home from an evening out to find the kitchen floor awash with eggs. The place looked as if a bomb had hit it. The cats were immediately banished to the cold, dark, flat for the night, while I got busy with the mop. Yesterday we got home to find that the little monsters had been playing football with their new food supplement, which I had unwisely left, unopened, on the worksurface. Since it is chock full of vitamins, minerals and amino acids, I was initially worried that they had torn a hole in the bottom of the ziplock bag. Overdosing mineral supplements never does one any good. Luckily, the powder probably doesn’t taste very nice on its own. When I weighed the bag, only 15gms seemed to be missing – and I must have swept up twice that amount from the sitting room carpet.

Needless to say, Tigger and Foggy were again banished in disgrace. However, it is fair to say that this ‘punishment’ does more to pacify us than discipline the cats. It didn’t take Tiggy long to work out that, from the stairs, he could easily jump up to the internal first floor bathroom window, set, for privacy, about 8ft above floor level. One of the glass panes has been removed and replaced with a ventilation grille. With a bit of deft footwork, Tiggy was able to dislodge the grille and jump down into the bathroom. It wasn’t the alarm clock that woke me this morning, but the clatter of the bathroom cat-flap and usual morning cats’ chorus that lets us know that they think it is time for breakfast. Cowly owls, indeed!