The cat has a new game he likes to play: One of us (usually me) tries to go to bed. The other then sneaks outside through the cat door and lets loose with a shocking and bewildering array of nocturnal noises, concluding a few plantive mews at the bedroom window. The one in bed then cries out “be quiet kitten, that won’t work this time.”

“That’s right,” says her boyfriend. “You’d better not let him make a habit of this.”

The one outside then proceeds to make a few more intermittent mews, mews with just enough time elapsed between them to allow one to (theoretically) begin to drift off. The one in bed’s boyfriend may have gone to sleep by this point, or may be off getting a glass of water, or maybe it’s one o’clock in the afternoon, and only those who have trouble sleeping nights are abed. Anyway the mewing continues. And the one in bed’s willpower crumbles, and the window is opened, and purr purr purr purr purr, the cat was never cuter.

And then the window is closed, the cat runs outside, and the game begins anew. Finis. (Except not really).