My cat just crawled completely into a shopping bag that was sitting on the bed. The bag has drawstrings, so it isn’t inconceivable that it will get tangled up, which would require human intervention for her to escape. At which point, of course, it will be time to let the cat out of the bag.

There’s something about my pets conspiring to create real-life clichés that makes me wonder whether I’m being surreptiously filmed for a reality TV show. I will have to wait until my dog progresses from middle age to being officially old before I will be able to test the "new tricks" hypothesis.