Top Cat

The early rhubarb is enjoying the sun

I have to make a small confession. The title of this blog is now slightly out of date and has been for a few weeks, as I am currently living very conventionally on-grid. Yes the joys of a warm house, a fully equipped bathroom and mains electricity are once again mine. The house in question is the home of my girlfriend, conveniently situated just four miles from my land along an A road, which most days I cycle along to and fro on my Trek bike (when it hasn't got a puncture or some ailment with its derailleur, as has been the case recently.)


Of course I still have the potential to live offgrid, and in fact will do so on occasional nights throughout the week, especially as the days lengthen and I can work later into the evening. Then, it'll make sense just to cook a meal and crash for the night in the caravan. The solar panel is still keeping the battery charged and the lights on. The compost toilet is still in functional order. The propane has yet to run out.

So the question is whether you'll allow me to keep the name of this blog as is, or if you think I should make a new one - MattSwanSometimesOffGrid perhaps? Answers below the line.

Half my garden, looking a little bare - give it a couple of months though and it'll be bursting with life.

Perhaps in the meantime I can distract you with the tale of my new cat. Well, hardly my cat, I suppose, but then it's probably more mine than anyone's. It's a fairly hefty house cat, more white than black, but no longer lives in any house. It's taken up residence in my greenhouse where it (he? she?) can be found snuggled in a dent of its own making in a straw bale that I ordinarily use as a low table. When I approached it at first it bolted off like a shot, but now I can come right up close and let it sniff my finger. It hasn't let me stroke it yet.

I'm going to need the greenhouse soon for my seedlings as my polytunnel is getting pretty full of them, so I may have to block up the hole where it's sneaking in and deny it its comfy bed. Seems mean but the risk of it knocking over (or eating? or defecating on?) my precious little plants is too high.

Potted on the first batch of tomatoes. They're sat on the window sill.

Sometimes I've seen it curled up in one of my firewood stores, basking in the sunshine while I worked the soil, so it has somewhere else dry to sleep. Just outside the store, a wobbly contraption made of pallets with a shower-door as a roof, there's a pheasant carcase which I've seen it gnawing, so at least it is getting something to eat. There are probably enough dead pheasants and live mice around to keep it satisfied.

So what should I name it? Answers below as well, either male or female please till I have somehow established the gender!