So you already know about J and myself. And our two kids, The Wast and Little Dinosaur. But we have two other well-loved family members, nicknamed Fluff and Squeak.

Fluff is a blue-point Ragdoll, a grumpy and morose cat with an unhealthy attachment to J. Despite his lack of any sense of humour, Fluff has earnt his place in the family by rescuing The Wast from morning after morning of screaming fits when our son was three years old. Driven to distraction, we introduced the Ragdoll kitten and The Wast was transformed. Fluff let himself be dragged from place to place, hoisted onto bunk beds, buried under blankets at night, all with incredible good grace. The Wast settled down and the screaming fits ended.

Squeak is the Maine Coon we introduced to keep Fluff company. We called him that because he couldn’t meow properly as a kitten. Now, however, he can Maine Coon trill with the best of them. If Fluff is the grumpy one that prefers to fall asleep on J’s feet, Squeak is the life of the party, carrying his favourite toy in his mouth as he moves from room to room, and noisily and enthusiastically playing with it when he reaches a spot he likes. For all his overt cockiness, however, he’s a shy and surprisingly timid 7-kg ball of fluff. He loves the kids, often sitting on a bed and keeping them company while they play, and they love him. The idea of him keeping Fluff company didn’t work out so well (Fluff being a sullen bastard at the best of times), but Squeak’s an entertaining and intelligent cat and we’re happy we got him.

We keep both cats indoors and are lucky enough to have a walled courtyard garden here at Lotus Street, so they can get some fresh air and munch on leaves (then throw up on the tiled floors * sigh *) while still remaining safe and not harming any of the local squirrels or bird life. I’ve read that, here in Malaysia, keeping smaller cats indoors is also recommended due to monkey kidnapping! It appears that, if you live near a tract of established trees, monkeys have been known to drop into a garden and make off with the family pet. Knowing monkeys for the deliberately ill-mannered and implacable animals that they are (I’d much rather keep a pet snake than a pet monkey), I can imagine what fate await the poor, stolen felines.

And there’s some human-initiated kidnapping of pets that I’ve heard also happens, although I don’t know what happens to the victims in such cases. (I know what you’re thinking. As a riposte, I can relate an anecdote about my (Eurasian) mother, after coming back from her first grocery shopping trip in Australia. “These people eat cats!” she wailed. “I saw them skinned in the butcher’s shop!” Further investigation led to the conclusion of rabbits rather than cats, but she never went back to that shop again.)

So, Fusion Despatches would like to extend a warm acknowledgement to the existences of Fluff and Squeak, as I join the legion of authors who keep cats instead of dogs.