The story of Floda

This is Floda. Ok, it's not really Floda but does look like him, and that's actually not his name, but you'll understand all that in a little while.

When we were doing work on the house, I mean before we actually lived here since we're still and will forever be doing work on the house, we didn't mind visits from our local feline friends who we dubbed Jean-Claude (who we learned is actually named Sasha) and Floda, so named because of his reverse Hitler mustache (not exactly politically correct but look here for the inspiration).

When we moved in, and put up the bamboo barriers on the deck to keep our cats (and Suzanne in) and the local cats out, it created quite a stir. First of all, Sasha, Floda and the others couldn't get cross...for about 2 hours. Then we saw Sasha scale the bamboo, walk across the handrail tight rope style, and jump to the neighbor's roof. And this after he had already scaled his master's 10 foot high chicken wire fence. It was impressive to see this little monkey-cat in action and depressing to know that we could do nothing about it. But it was ok because Sasha is neutered and nice and has a home.

Then poor Floda, in an attempt to get to his buddy Sasha, tried different paths. We watched him one day jump up a 6 foot high brick walk. But then he got stranded on top and for about 12 hours he paced back and forth and couldn't figure out how to get down. A couple weeks later, we found him in our house and Jerome locked him in the basement, and starved him out after 2 days.

Now, these cats are more of a nuissance than anything because we can't leave the deck door open. Once in a while, we hear little feet on the stairs or crunch-crunching in the kitchen and know it's not one of ours. So they get spritzed with water (a trauma for Leon and Roger). And there are frequent moments of terror when I standing at the kitchen sink and look out on the deck at night and see a little white mustache and yellow eyes peering in.

But last night, Floda really did it. Roger was downstair sounding the alarm so I went down to check and there is little innocent looking Floda invading my house. I managed to get him outside in the garden, blocked off the kitty door, closed the garage door and went upstairs. At some point during the night, I hear banging and an unknown meow coming from downstairs.

When I check the garden this morning, Floda is nowhere to be found; the cardboard that replaces the missing window (which is 4 feet from ground level) is on the floor. That little fucker ('cause that's what I was screaming at him) managed to slip under the garage door, jump through the window and penetrate the house!

I went on a rampage, which Suzanne thought was funny, banging and spritzing all over the house. I decided I needed more light so went to open the shade when I see little white feet hiding behind the shade. I chased Floda with a chair back through the kitchen, under the table, where Suzanne was eating, and out the door. And in a very un-French moment, as he finally fled my deck, I screamed "don't come back you little fucker!" to the entire neighborhood.

I'm expecting Suzanne to add this word to her repertoire which already includes putain, crap and go away.