My old friend Thomas the cat was 20 years old when he died in Halifax, before we moved south to Norfolk.

I missed old Thomas, my cuddly companion, so when we finally got into this house at long last - it took ages - we went down to the Cats Rescue League in Dereham and adopted another. Happy day! there he was waiting for us! Yes, he knew we were coming because I'd talked to spirit about the right sort of cat, and they told us when to go and get him, we had to wait a month or two 'till he got there. Freddy was his given name already, he was then about 6 months old, and had just arrived from another rescue shelter on the south coast somewhere, they had no other details.

My daughter has 2 cats that are very shy - they were half wild when she got them from the same shelter in Dereham - and she calls them Onyx and Obsidian because they are all black, but ... she calls our Freddy "That spoilt Fred-Bo"..!  due to my preferring a softy old lap-cat myself.

Don, her step-dad, has always teased her about the posh names - he calls Onyx Nick, and Obsidian Sid !

Anyway, when we went to the Vet to register Fred a rather snooty assistant asked his name and I said 'Fred-Bo' - 'cos her name for him had just seemed to have stuck.

Her eyebrows went up as if to say ..."Fred what?"

So I said the first thing that came into my head by way of an explanation ... "Actually it's Fredrick Beauchamp - that’s French!" 

Time goes by and I forgot this.

Months later our daughter comes home one evening and is outraged...!

Fuming with indignation...! 

"You've got a nerve" says she...

"After all that ribbing about my cats names being posh ... you call your old Fred ...  Beauchamp..!!!"

How did she find out I'd "gone posh" too? 

She'd been to the Vet's and because we all live in the same house they looked up the address and thought she was me!

You might say ...

... wait for it ...

....that let the cat out of the bag !

Hubby Don thought it was hilarious, after all it was he who started the whole thing with Nick and Sid!

Now its 'Beau' this ... and its 'Beau' that all the day long .... serves me right for doing the 'one-up-manship' thing!!

Stella