The chainsaw massacre birthday surprise that didn’t get my goat

THE great thing about the offspring’s visit this weekend was that it eliminated any possibility of reading newspapers, thereby removing the need to take a stand on Pat Kenny’s salary, John O’Donoghue’s expenses or Batt O’Keeffe being U-turned by the Green Party.

The down side of his impending arrival was having to corral the two cats into a locked room to prevent them encountering the golden retriever who travels with him.

After the last time they met the dog, Scruffy had stress incontinence for a week and Dino doubled the mouse supply, apparently in an effort to prove himself too valuable to be forced to share living space, even briefly, with what he clearly thought was a particularly vicious polar bear.