I got a cat.  I know, just what I need, another lot of responsibility.  Not only did I get a cat, I got a skittish anxious cat!

He sleeps in my bedroom.  Well, by sleep, I mean he overnights in my bedroom.  He sleeps all day under my bed and then at night comes out to protect me from all of the demons that might have the idea that they want to harm me in the night.  Demons such as plastic bags and bits of paper.

Two nights ago he spent much of the early morning protecting me from a piece of wrapping paper (that I had failed to dispose of at the time, a fact I regretted at early o’clock)

SOLUTION!  REMOVE THE WRAPPING PAPER!

Yesterday I went to my room to remove the offending piece of paper, thereby protecting myself from being protected by him.  I got distracted before I got to the paper and sat on the side of my bed for a few minutes.

Let me back track.  In the evening before the wrapping paper incident I had moved some things around in my room and ended up with a clothes airer that had 1 wire coat hanger on it.  The airer had previously been covered so the hanger wasn’t visible.

While I was sitting on my bed I witnessed my cat leap into the air and hang onto the hanger with his claws.  As the airer started to tip towards him due to his weight hanging out of the hanger he let go of the hanger and fell to the ground, landing roughly on the wrapping paper and then fighting with it because it made noise.

SOLUTION!  REMOVE THE HANGER!

I removed the hanger (and the paper) and the problem was solved. 

If I had simply removed the paper, he would have continued to leap up to the hanger and I ran the risk of him tipping over the airer and waking me with a crash.  As a result of getting distracted from solving the problem (making noise with the paper) I ended up observing the actual issue (the attractiveness of the hanger which moved every time he walked by the airer). 

Needless to say he found something else to protect me from last night, but he reminded me of the value of stopping to observe before leaping to solution.