After one week we were forced to move out of our motel room and into the hospital accommodation. This was simple to say the least. Situated in the hospital grounds in near proximity to a house for criminals/drug addicts that were being re-introduced into the community. Lighting was minimal so it had a kind of eerie atmosphere. It came with a shower less powerful than the stream of urine from a man with prostate problems and a nice layer of grime over everything. Needless to say, our aim was to spend minimal time there.

Luckily, within one week of working Greg's consultant had already asked him to move in, what a charmer! She was going away for a week and needed someone to stay at her house to look after her cats. In her own words, "they're like my children". Alarm bells ringing we agreed to move in for the week, anything was better than the hospital accommodation. Before doing so, Greg was given the grand tour and introduced to the cats. Firstly there was Pumpkin, he lives outside. He had been left with them while her brother went to Europe for 6 months. That was a few years ago now and there didn't seem to be any plans for him to come and reclaim Pumpkin. Greg couldn't help feel that Pumpkin was the Harry Potter of her children and, if possible, would have been kept under the stairs. Next was Dobby, he was the independent one who knew how to work the digital cat flap and could therefore come and go as he pleases. Finally was her pride and joy, Qsenia (or 'Q' for short). She was definitely the lady of the house and was only able to work out how to go out of the cat flap but didn't know how to get back in. She would therefore need to be let in every evening. Easy enough, Greg felt, three cats...Claire can handle that.

The following day we moved our possessions for the second time to our next temporary home and were greeted by three sides of A4. A portion of which was instructions for the TV, bins etc, however the majority were personalised care plans for each cat. Where and when to feed them, when to let them in/out, their curfew (7pm) and their likes and dislikes. Claire read this thoroughly and Greg decided that they were cats...surely they don't need all that attention. That night Claire went to work for a night shift and Greg decided it was time to get into bed. Dobby had followed him upstairs and as soon as Greg pulled back the covers up he jumped and nestled in exactly where Greg was planning on getting in. What followed was a mighty struggle of wits. Greg would pick him up and move him out of the way and turn back to get into bed only to find Dobby had somehow jumped back onto the pillow. At one point Greg simply locked Dobby out of the room, but the noises he made on being shunned would have woken the entire neighbourhood and so Greg was forced to let him back in and begin the bedtime dance all over again. Finally Greg outsmarted the cat and managed to get in bed. He fell asleep fuming at the arrogance of cats, he is clearly the dominant species but they didn't seem to realise nor care. The following morning Greg woke up with a cat sitting on his face. This was going to be a long week.

It was our second evening in our grand new abode when we realised that the curfew had come and gone and there was no sign of the cats. The search began, and unsurprisingly finding a black cat in the dark of night was near impossible, what was even more surprising was that finding a white one proved even harder. Dobby, the black cat, was soon found. Panic started to set in, we'd checked the cupboards, drawers, bean bags, chairs, circled the perimeter of the house multiple times and still no sign of Q. Greg decided to go outside to look one more time, and in doing so let Dobby back out. After about an hour of hunting, Q finally, casually, strolled in, fuelling Greg's cat annoyance even more.

We made use of the facilities the house had to offer, had a dinner party, used the spa bath multiple times, had a nespresso or two and even chatted to the gardener. The real surprise to us both though, was that by the end of the week Dobby and Greg were best buds, inseparable, wherever Greg went, Dobby followed and if Greg had been out, the first thing he did on returning was to find Dobby. It was a sad goodbye at the end of the week, when we departed to our new home with Greg asking Claire "When can we get a cool black cat?"