So the cats have been going outside for about 4 or 5 weeks now, and I've just been leaving the window open in the kitchen for them to climb in and out of.

After a few false starts and accidents*, I've managed to get them pooing and peeing outside as well, under the conifer tree, which is bare earth and suitable for a toilet.

Since they've taken to leaving decapitated toys and scraps of paper at the threshold of my bedroom every night, I've been fairly apprehensive about them starting to bring mice and birds in. I wouldn't have thought there'd be many vermin around our area, since it doesn't back on to any woods, and there are so many cats in the neighbourhood - I've never seen a bird in the garden the whole time I've been here.

So on Saturday night I went into the kitchen to give them their bedtime treat, bent over to pick up their dish from the floor... and found a horrible big slug underneath it. Argh! I shrieked in horror, but luckily didn't drop the plate (or I'd have had two messes to clear up... nice.) I eventually got rid of it with the aid of some newspaper and a fork (no I didn't spear it! just used the fork to flick it onto the paper) and threw it out the back door. Whilst shouting "Do! Not! Want!" at the cats... maybe they'll get the message. (Yeah right!)

Sarah has been almost unbearably cute recently. She likes to lay on her back and have tummy tickles, then she puts her soft little paddy-paws up to my face and pats me gently. She also likes to play fetch, which I have never known a cat to enjoy before. She brings me her mouse toy to wherever I'm sitting and then waits for me to throw it, then she leaps after it, grabs it, and brings it back for another throw.

Scamps isn't so interested in toys, but will go crazy trying to catch any flies or moths that come into the house. She also tries to pat my face sometimes, but unfortunately she often leaves her claws out!

*Sarah took a shit in the plant pot holding my one remaining house plant, a young ficus tree. Unfortunately it was a sloppy one and I ended up having to junk the whole plant. So my house is now plantless, and I don't want to tempt them by buying any more. I think I'll wait until they're a bit older.

Hey nonny nonny, nearly two weeks without an update, but nothing has really happened!

I took a couple of days off work since I was feeling a bit poo after taking Simon back to his dad's after Lucy's wedding. My boss has been really supportive, which is nice. So I just took a couple of days out, to chill and relax and catch up on sleep (not been resting very well.) Am now feeling much more with it and sleeping better again.

Re-read my way through the entire Sandman series, which as always helped me feel more grounded and centred. Which is passing strange for a fantasy series which has some of the most surreal and dreamlike imagery and storylines in the medium, but there we go :-)

Also managed to overcome my neurosis about letting the kittens go outside. I was terrified one or both would wind up running away and either getting hurt or killed, or never coming back. Really quite an obvious sublimination of my loss of control over Simon's parenting and anxieties thereof. Once I realised that, I was much more calm about things, and I took the big step a couple of weekends ago.

They both came out kind of nervously, and they were sniffing away like mad at everything they could reach. I had to clean the existing crap from neighbourhood cats off the lawn before they would go near the grass, but once I did, they decided they liked it. They even said hello to next door's dog (through the fence) and although they bolted inside when he barked, they came straight back out again and went on making friends with him. (He was not barking aggressively, just in that "Hello I'm friendly and very over-excited. Let's play!" way that dogs do.)

I also managed to teach them to climb in and out of the kitchen window so I don't have to leave the back door open. No, of course I didn't teach them by example... LOL. I accomplished it by means of calling them from the window, and brandishing bits of crabstick (their favourite treat) out of the window at them. Scamps got the idea within a couple of minutes, but Sarah, being a bit more "intellectually challenged" than her sister, took about 20 minutes to work out how to get in. She also has a very strange technique: rather than leap up onto the window ledge like Scamps does, she kind of jumps on her hind legs and hooks her front paws over the sill, then just hangs there for a couple of seconds before hauling herself up, pushing with her hind paws. I swear she looks like someone just threw her at the window and she splatted there :-D I have to get some video footage of her doing it but so far, no luck!

Also, their feeding habits are making me go "hmm". I kept switching their food around because they were leaving large amounts untouched, and I stopped buying the Sainsburys really-basic-and-cheap catmeat, because it smelled utterly foul (and I normally quite like the smell of catfood) and they weren't eating it at all. but I was determined not to get into the "Oh no, my babies aren't eating! Let me try a more expensive brand!" thing, because ultimately you end up giving them smoked salmon and caviar... while you're eating Tesco Value noodles :-p But having received some vouchers for free samples of Whiskas dry kitten food and Whiskas pouches, I thought I'd get some. Well, at first they were yumming the pouches down, and I bought quite a lot, because I had a discount code for bulk purchases which made them cheaper than the supermarket stuff. But then after about 5 days they stopped eating it again! So this weekend I thought Bollocks, and I just bought the Morrisons bog standard one. I opened a tin this morning and it looked FOUL and I thought, bloody hell, there's no way they're going to eat this... but they polished off the lot!

In other news, it was Simon's birthday on Sunday. For some reason, my mum decided to send her card, Grandma's card and Aunty Sally's to my house so I could send them on. But she didn't post them until Wednesday. In normal weeks I might have still been able to repost them with my package, but the Post Office had chosen to call a 24-hour strike last week on the Thursday evening. In addition, the gift I ordered for him over a week ago still hasn't arrived, despite their terms being delivery within 3 days. So unfortunately he did not receive his cards from me and mine until Monday, and won't be getting his actual gift until I've had it and sent it on. GRR. :-( Still, he sounded pretty chipper when I spoke to him on Saturday; they'd gone out to eat at Old Orleans and he'd polished off a full rack of ribs! He is also now minted with the amount of spending money he was sent, so I told him he can take ME out when he comes up in the Summer hols!

Speaking of which, only 4 weeks now until I can pick him up and we get a whole week together :-) With any luck the weather will be somewhat improved - so far it's been the wettest June and July on record in Sheffield, even without mentioning the floods - but even if it pisses down every day I know we will have lots to do and just enjoy being together again :-) I only wish we had more than a week, but I couldn't get any more time off work - one of the drawbacks of a small team with every member being a parent: everyone wants the school holidays off! And as the newest team member, I don't get first pick...

Lucy and Rhandolph are back from their honeymoon with loads of great photos which has made me really, really want to go on holiday again. Haven't been away since I went to Mallorca last May with Pat in our sort-of last-gasp attempt at reconciliation, which wasn't exactly relaxing. And prior to that, we'd not been away for 3 years.

Mum and I had been planning to go away together this year, but then Grandma fell and broke her wrist, and of course since then Mum has been looking after her all the time. So there's no way we can get away until we get Grandma into residential care, which the council aren't exactly falling over themselves to arrange. Trouble is, it's hard enough getting people into residential care because they're physically disabled, but the places for dementia cases are even rarer. Lucy and I have told Mum that she'll have to give the social a deadline - just say "I'm going back to work on X date, at which point there will be nobody to look after my mother, so pull your finger out and find her a place, or I'll be leaving her on your doorstep." It's horrible, but she's looking at getting repossessed if she doesn't sort things out soon.

Of course I could go away on my own, but then I'm essentially paying (more) money just to be hotter - I might as well just take a week off, stay at home, and book a sunlamp session.

Also considered taking Simon away (if Pat would consent) but I couldn't afford to go during termtime, and his schooling has already been disrupted enough. Also, he'd want to be in a resort with other kids around to play with, and I don't think I could handle being stuck with pikeys for a week, which is always a risk in a family resort.

Anyway, no point talking about it for now, what I'll do is research average costs at various resorts and times between this autumn and next Summer, try to save a little wonga, and then see how things pan out with Grandma.

Best get back to work for now...