Happily Ever After
Life in The Rural Retreat with a beautiful wife, three cats, garden wildlife, a camera, a computer – and increasing amounts about running
Earlier posts can be found on Adventures of a Lone Bass Player, where this blog began life. Recent entries can be found here.
Bandits, Twelve O'Clock High
by admin - 16:55 on 28 August 2010
The birds who frequent the feeders scattered around the garden with no thought for financial consequences have grown used to Bess.
She watches them; they ignore her. Now and then she'll attempt a half-hearted stalk but no-one's fooled by the moggy who's usually seen asleep in the shade or curled up in the middle of the lawn.
Other birds are less sanguine.
Bess was in an active mood this morning when Matchgirl and I accompanied her up the lane beside The Rural Retreat. Not only did she amble all the way to the top – only the second time since her Near Death Experience just over a year ago – but she also turned the corner towards the steading, where her attention was taken by the battered orange digger left there.
She explored for a while, then turned for home, unaware of the consternation her presence had caused.
The first house martin, watched with noisy approval by members of its colony, swooped at her a few yards away from the digger. A second did the same a little further on.
Bess bore their attentions with fortitude. She did pick up speed after the first attack but was too proud to run from the harrying. She reached the corner without further indignity, after which she was left alone.
Her pace was noticeably quicker on the way back; she didn't even stop to examine the shattered tree limb, fallen in the last day or two, that had taken her interest on the way up. Matchgirl's cruel sniggering may have had something to do with this.
Food helped restore her spirits. It takes more than house martins to keep a cat from her bowl.
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