Helena Handbasket

By Tivoli

Meet Othello

Inspection suggests it stands a very good chance of being female.
I heard it mewing in the street below my window last night. I looked out and was sorely tempted to go down immediately to give it a little cuddle, but my sensible head told me to leave it alone in the hope that it would find its way home. One full length feature film later and there was still a lot of mewing, so this time I did go down.
We are not allowed to keep pets in these flats and I certainly don't need any claws scratching all my stuff, but I did think the cat might be better off in the back garden than in the street. So I went downstairs with the intention of coaxing it into the garden. When I got downstairs I realised that this is not a cat, it is a kitten. It is absolutely tiny. I picked it up and made a fuss of it and it purred immediately – certainly not a frightened little thing at all. But the security lights did not come on and I couldn't see the key pad for the garden gate so after a couple of attempts I gave up.
I watched another film and could neither hear nor see the cat so presumed it had gone off somewhere.
But early this morning I could hear mewing again so I went down to investigate and sure enough, there it was, a little more timid than it had been prior to spending a whole night out on the street.
This time I did manage to coax it into the garden. I gave it some oat milk in a dish that had previously contained something meaty and it was happy with that.
There is a fair amount of stuff in the back garden left over from various building projects and so the first thing I did was made it a little house out of slabs of foil-faced roofing insulation boards which I weighed down with compacted root-and-compost from the bottom of plant pots (extra) and then I sat on a chair with Othello on my lap making her feel safe and secure.
Later I went round town to see if I could find an appropriate cot blanket to put inside the little cat house and found this (extra) too adorable and cheaper than dishcloths.
I also bought a few sachets of food suitable for very young cats, but when I returned to the garden one of my neighbours called from their window that they had already begun feeding it. I'll be more than happy to share responsibility for a community garden cat.
She is not a prisoner here, I built the little house in a shady spot where the garden fence is lowest so she should be able to hop over easily into the bowling club whenever she wants to explore.

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