Messy waking service

I was dreaming something that involved big industrial spaces, and some strange manifestation of my kitchen, and probably lots of things I can't remember when suddenly I was woken up by the sound of the cat running up the stairs. That was directly followed by the sound of the cat running into the bedroom, but not just that! There was another sound involved. Some very energetic flapping. Oh dear. This was a bit more than I had bargained for, just a split second after waking up. I opened my eyes and saw lots of feathers flying through the bedroom. And then the flapping sound came past the bed in the other direction. She was taking the bird back out of the bedroom! And then she dumped it in the landing, against the door of the office. I saw now it was a pigeon. A pigeon? These are a big! And she must've dragged it through the catflap. Not trivial… but I had only just woken up, and I had a clanging headache as well (probably from the incessant student presentations) so I really needed a few seconds to come to terms with all this. I took the easy way out and just closed the door.

I gathered myself a bit, and put a top on. It was 6:30; my normal time for getting up. So at least it wasn't stupidly early. Then I opened the door again. The pigeon was still there. Was it still alive? I had a slightly closer look, and that immediately resulted in a clear answer. It started flapping again. At the same time, the cat appeared again, and together they vanished down the stairs, in another cloud of feathers. I followed.

I caught up with them again by the front door. I'm not quite sure if she had let go of the pigeon or whether it had wrestled itself free, but it was flapping underneath the tiny table by the front door. I saw possibilities! I quickly started closing all the doors leading into the rest of the house, and then I opened the front door. 

In spite of pigeons not generally being very clever, this one got the hint immediately, and vanished out the front door. I could hear it fly away. Problem solved! The cat looked a bit disappointed, but she would just have to live with this. I wasn't keen on a live pigeon in my house. And now I could just go and get myself a paracetamol. Then I removed all the feathers from the ground floor. And then I started the day as normal. 

There were no feathers downstairs; it was clear she had brought the poor animal straight up the stairs. Probably to show off! When I removed the feathers from the bedroom, she was sniffing them and purring  excessively. She looked so proud of herself! It was very cute. But I still hope she doesn't make a habit of this…

The aftermath