Room to swing a cat

People are forever musing on here aren’t they. You can’t swing a cat without encountering musings of one description of another.

Not that I would advocate swinging cats.  I would not.  I don’t even know where that saying comes from.  Perhaps it was an old way of measuring things?   Now again I repeat that I would not but if I were to swing an animal then it would probably be something a little more manageable like a tortoise or a guinea pig.  Cats are notoriously averse to being swung and have far too many sharp and pointy bits to be buggering around with trying to work out how wide your living room is to see if your new sofa will fit.

If I absolutely had to know whether the new 3 piece would squeeze through the door then I would punt for a measuring tortoise.  They are a bit short of  purchase points though so it’s probably wise to put it in some sort of cloth sack to swing it thereby reducing the chance of losing one’s grip and sending the measuring tortoise soaring through a window.  Last thing you want is glass all over and having to use something a little smaller to then measure the window so you can order new glass.  If you were in need of measuring a window though, and again this is just hypothetical, then I reckon a squirrel would do the job.  Red though not grey, the grey ones are a a bit feisty.  If you cant get your hands on a squirrel then maybe try a hamster.  A red squirrel is generally equal to 2 hamsters.

Just for reference the Tortoise in the picture above is equal to 7 red squirrels, so 14 hamsters.  Or is that a turtle?  Doesn’t matter they are pretty much interchangeable.

Oh and for those living in hot countries, do not use a lizard because we all know their tails fall off and the sight of the orphaned tail wriggling about will likely upset the kids.  Unless of course you can get your hands on a chameleon they work really well as they move pretty slowly though can be a bugger to find once you’ve put them down.  A friend of mine who lays carpets swears by chameleons but goes through two or three a month.

Not that I would though.  What a ridiculous and rather cruel idea.

Besides, everybody knows the old fashioned way of measuring things was by swinging small soot faced children, recently emerged from cleaning chimneys or making smocks and bed caps.

Author: Michael

Husband, dad,(ex)programmer, comic collector and proud Yorkshireman. I have no idea why im here or why im writing but i rather enjoy it. no great fan of punctuation; View all posts by Michael