This Saturday I´m hoping to adopt a young cat from my local branch of Cats Protection. A couple of months after Scarlett died, I realized Monty was still missing her and I put my name down at several rehoming centres in case a young female Burmese or Burmese cross came in and needed a home (I was very keen to find a rescue cat rather than get a kitten from a breeder). I was amazed that within just a few weeks Cats Protection rang to say that they had a stray to rehome who looked like a lilac Burmese. I met her a few days ago and she did indeed look like a beautiful, but very traumatised Burmese. (Check out the picture of her in my photo album). Someone from Cats Protection is coming on Friday to do the home visit, and if they are happy, I can collect her on Saturday. I hope she will settle in - it´s hard to work out what happened to her as she was found just wandering the streets in Canonbury and despite advertising no owner has come forward to claim her...

I adopted Monty exactly two years ago from Cats Protection - best thing I ever did.

Scarlett is over 17 years old, so I know I won´t have her forever. However I am feeling very relieved as I´ve just heard that the lesion in her mouth is not cancer. During dental treatment the vet found a lesion which was biopsied in case it was a squamosa carcinoma, a highly painful and invasive tumour often found in cats. But she´s clear and the vet says she may still have a few good years!

I realized at the weekend that a full year has gone by since the day Monty came home with me.  Cats Protection initially let me take him on a foster-to-adopt arrangement, and it became very clear early on that I was going to keep him and adopt him formally.  He settled in very quickly and now has a close relationship with both other cats.  One of the best decisions I've ever made was to adopt Monty.

Isaac is my nephew and, like me and all my family, loves animals. He has a dog called Biba and a cat called Violetta who both live in Italy. But his favourite animals are meerkats!

I've just come back from another weekend riding out onto Exmoor from Knowle Manor in Somerset.  My riding friends and I liked it so much that we booked to go again.  It was just as much fun this time and Exmoor looks even more beautiful in Autumn than it did in late April.  This time I rode Blossom, a large bay mare, although I did spend some time catching up with Aztec, the great horse I had ridden in April!  We rode all day on Saturday (which involved a lot of wind and rain and some very dramatic scenery) and had a much more laid-back morning ride in bright sunshine on Sunday.

A few weeks ago a whole group of us who ride together at Lee Valley booked to go away to Knowle Manor (near Taunton) to ride on Exmoor for the weekend. Knowle Manor is a rambling Gothic pile on the edge of the moor, with a choice of almost 80 beautiful horses to ride out on. We rode all day Saturday and half of Sunday. The weather was perfect and the landscape stunning. In fact, the weekend was such a success that we have just booked to go back in September!

I have had Monty for exactly three months today. He looks great now that he has acquired some muscles from his new active life. He also seems calm and happy, and there has still not been any sign of his bowel problem. So I think I've been very lucky - I was so worried that the bowel problem would be a nightmare or that Leo and Scarlett wouldn't accept him. Now it seems like he's always lived here.

I just want to say a quick word about how helpful a kind woman called Sheena from the MPB was on the night Monty was missing. First of all, she calmed me down by telling me that 80% of missing pets are found if their loss is reported and dealt with early enough. Then she gave me some helpful tips to give Monty more chance of finding his way back or to encourage neighbours to look for him in their gardens, garages or sheds. When he turned up, she urged me to get him to the vet (based on the fact that his claws were gone and therefore he was likely to have been hit by a car). Sheena's advice might well have saved his life if he'd turned out to have internal injuries - Monty was lucky to escape a ruptured diaphragm. As it was, he was suffering from shock and needed fluids, yet my instinct was to leave him at home so he wouldn't have to face any more stress. This would have been a risky decision. Thank you, Sheena!

Monty spent the weekend at the vet.  He had to have scans to check for internal injuries and fluids for the shock, but is now almost back to normal and back at home.  Phew!  I  just hope he has learned to be more cautious...

Last night Monty didn't come in. He has only been going outside for a couple of weeks, and is always indoors and ready to be fed by 7-ish. So by 9pm I was desperate. I went out time and time again to call him, walked up and down my road, talked to neighbours and even rang the Missing Pets Bureau (who were very helpful). I couldn't eat or sleep but at about 4am I felt something jump on the bed, reached down and felt his silky fur. I was overcome with relief, after hours lying in the dark thinking that the poor little cat was only going to have had two months of a decent life. But in the morning I looked at him and realized his face was scuffed and all his claws worn down to nothing - a sure sign he'd been hit by a car. He is at the vet now, who has reassured me that his injuries are highly unlikely to be life-threatening, but he will still have to have a scan under anaesthetic in case his diaphragm has been ruptured. I hated leaving him at the vet, but at least know he got very prompt care and also that he does regard my house as home and will return even when disoriented and in pain - his prognosis might not be nearly so good if he had hidden away after the accident instead of returning home.

I had no idea it was going to be so satisfying to adopt Monty.  I've never had a rescue cat before - only kittens from friends or from breeders.  It's great to see how happy and energetic he is.  He now goes out in the garden for a couple of hours every morning and is learning lots of cat climbing and jumping skills (when he first arrived he had no motor skills at all and terrible balance).  Then he comes in and falls asleep on his back with all four legs in the air.  At night he sleeps right next to Leo.  I'm happy knowing that I've been able to give him a home.  It proves what a great job Cats Protection do in matching cats and homes - Monty has arrived at the right place.

Monty will have been living here for one month this Friday. I assumed he would just about be comfortable with Scarlett and Leo by this point, but that they would all still be very wary. I quickly realized that he and Leo were bonding, but understood that Scarlett, at over 16 years old, would be disgruntled. But that's all in the past now - in the past 24 hours he and Scarlett seem to have become firm friends. Yesterday evening she went to sleep on the sofa next to him, with her head resting on his flank. This morning she cleaned his face for several minutes, and this evening they have spent most of the evening curled up together. I wish I knew more about Monty's past, and whether he has ever lived with other cats.

This morning was Monty's fortnightly check-up.  I can't believe he has only been with me for just over two weeks - he is so relaxed, and Leo and Scarlett are so relaxed with him, that it seems like he has been living in my house for months.  Chris at Dragon Vets was very pleased with his progress, and has reduced his steroids from one tablet every other day, to one every three days.  We both noticed that Monty has started to develop some muscle tone from running around playing chasing games with Leo, and from learning to jump up on high surfaces!  I gave my weekly report to Cats Protection who are delighted that he has settled in so easily.  I know there is always a risk of anthropomorphising, but I think Monty knows he has found somewhere he is happy to live: this morning he struggled ferociously against being put in the cat basket, but once back in my house and let out of the basket, he rolled around purring and rubbing his face on everything, signalling to me at least that he was very happy to be home!

Yesterday I had my weekly telephone conversation with the manager at Cats Protection http://www.northlondoncats.org.uk - they take great care to make certain that their fostered cats are settling in.  It made me realize how very quickly Monty is finding his feet at my house.  Cats Protection expected him still to be very shy and timid after less than two weeks with me, and perhaps not even to have ventured out from under the bed.  Instead he is marching around demanding food and attention, or climbing straight onto my lap the moment I sit down at my computer or in front of the television  Leo is very rapidly teaching him how to play, and also how to jump up on forbidden surfaces, like kitchen counters and bookshelves.  I think Monty's growing confidence is coming from watching the two other cats' behaviour - he is exceptionally curious about everything they do.  I have to take Monty back to the vet next Monday for a check-up, but I feel it's looking likely he will be able to stay here with his new Burmese family.  My guess is also that if Monty were to be given the choice, he would vote decisively to stay put!

Now here's a strange thing... Aren't cats supposed to have a period of hostilities when they first meet? Even if it's only a bit of hissing and growling? Leo dashed under my feet and into the spare room when I was going in to see Monty on Sunday night. They touched noses, sniffed eachother, and then sat down a few feet away from each other looking perfectly calm. I separated them, but on Monday the manager from Cats Protection suggested I allow Leo back into Monty's room for another brief meeting. This has now happened every evening and by tonight they were sleeping curled up together on the bed - I have photos to prove it which I will post soon!

This morning I went to Cats Protection and signed all Monty's foster papers, then picked him up from the vet, and he is now settled into my spare room! He is wildly friendly with people and seems eager to meet Leo and Scarlett whom he can sniff at through the gap under the door. He also seems to love catnip and has been rolling around on the bed with the catnip mice I bought for his arrival...

The cats won't actually meet each other for a couple of weeks, by which time Monty should smell less like the vet's and more like they do - he will exchange bedding with them. This is one of the many helpful tips Cats Protection give you.

I met Wendy and Sykes at the vet - I just recognized him from Petstreet! He had been bitten by a terrier in Highgate Woods, so I hope both he and Wendy are feeling better now.

This could be quite a momentous week for Scarlett, Leo and me. Monty arrives on Friday morning. He is a small, beautiful brown cat, almost certainly Burmese, and he is currently at the North London Cats Protection shelter. He has had a dodgy start in life, and has a stress-related gut problem as a result.

I am actually very nervous about his arrival, as I have no idea how Scarlett and Leo will react, or how long it will take them to settle (or not). I am nervous about feeding him his special diet and about whether I will provide him with a good enough home. Also, up until a couple of weeks ago when I saw him online, had no intention of getting a third cat!

But once I had seen his entry on the Cats Protection website, and especially once I had met him, I felt compelled to try to offer him a safe and happy place to live. My first two Burmese cats were brown males, and they were so affectionate and sociable (both with humans and fellow cats) that my instinct is that Monty must be need companionship rather than kennels.

I am hoping that once things settle down here his health and confidence will grow. I think it must be one of the main reasons people take on pets - to have the satisfaction of trying to give them as good a life as possible.

If I'm wrong about all this, and he isn't happy here, he will return to the Cats Protection after a couple of month's trial - he is coming to me on their special foster-to-adopt arrangement.

So please watch this space and if anyone has comments or tips, I would love to hear from them.

According to the BBC's website, Rusty the obese labrador (no long quite so fat, thanks to the RSPCA) has been allowed home.

I really hope his owners have learned something from the RSPCA's intervention, but I do feel concerned because they showed so little comprehension that allowing him to reach that weight constituted cruelty.

I guess this time the RSPCA will step in if Rusty's weight starts going up again...

Today the newspapers have been full of the reaction of the owenrs of Rusty, the grossly overweight labrador, to their conviction for cruelty after a prosecution brought by the RSPCA. They show no sense of responsibility for allowing their poor dog to become almost four stone overweight - weight which he lost in the RSPCA's care - and are sounding off against the 'fat police' and acting as though this case is the result of some lunatic version of the nanny state.

I hope the RSPCA will continue to bring cses against owners who let their pets get too fat. And I'm afraid that includes me. Freddy, my beautiful brown burmese, died in 2001 of diabetes. Had he lived he would have been 16 this week. It is partly my fault that he developed diabetes. He was never grossly overweight, and stayed active and mobile, but he was carrying extra weight and this was almost certainly a factor in his illness.

I am now very careful to measure Leo's food and to do everything I can to stop him raiding Scarlett's meals.

I hope other cat and dog owners won't have to learn the hard way, as I did, about feeding their pet into an early grave.

I don´t just want to own a dog, I need to own a dog. Today I went out for a walk in Highgate Woods. Every other person I passed was with a dog. The thought came to me that the one section of the UK population who definitely got some exercise on Christmas Day were the dog owners, motivated by their own canine personal trainers. It doesn´t matter whether it´s cold or wet or Christmas - a dog needs to have his daily walk. It doesn´t matter if you are tired or ill or busy - the excuses which might cut you some slack with your human personal trainer won´t convince your dog to let you off the hook. Some day soon I am going to sack my personal trainer and will rely on a dog for motivation!