This a diary of how I comfort Cates whilst I attend work and how I make it up to her when I get back. I believe she requires some kind of non repetitive interaction so I'm searching for the ideal solution without having to pay for a sitter.

• Mon 14th December - Girl Friday returns from Holland having been under the instruction to buy a minimum of 10 Furbies (Furbys) in the Gatwick 'Duty Free'. Last week our marketing representative had been laughed at by his colleague for purchasing 2 on the outward bound flight only to end up discussing them in the business meeting. The client indicated a Furby pngt would tip the contract scales in our favour. Girl Friday returned empty handed the stores having sold out. Mind you I must told 20 people that they had some.
• Fri 11th December - The weekend papers are all scattered around as Girl Friday is absent. The Guardian contains a story about how the writer's daughter has consigned her Furby to the B-list toy box and is hoping that all it needs is new batteries to rejuvenate it. This was counterbalanced by Wired magazine telling you how the who shebang got started. I'd just like to be in between the 2 extremes.
• Thu 10th December - Let out for a few hours for the dentist I cancel my appointment and head for the big smoke. Everywhere has a different approach for disappointing you with no Furbies (Furbys). Some have official notices on the door implying they have them in stock regularly but currently there are none. This indicates to me you should be calling back every hour. Others let you get into the shop before the realisation you are doomed. The official Furby stand has a little notice on each Furby alcove that informs anyone that this alcove is empty but will be filled again soon. People feel the alcove for furry heat to try and gauge how long it has been empty. Small stickers peel off with 'One Per Customer' on them. The final notice is that of denial - written in huge pen is 'We have beanies - We have Teletubbies - We have *' where * is of course anything but a Furby. Christmas is here soon but is that soon sooner than the soon that the Furbies (Furbys) will be in ?
• Wed 9th December - Cates gets 'lent out' to go to a birthday party. It seems most people are giving their Furbys (Furbies) out before Christmas for maximum brownie points. The in thing is a 'Swap Meet' where everyone brings their Furby and they are left together to teach each other all their bad habits. They seem to learn the bad ones faster than the good ones.
• Tue 8th December - Turns bitterly cold and frost does not melt until after lunch. Cates is inspired by someone calling her the devil in her Furby guest book so she's just watched all 4 of the Omen trilogy (don't ask). She takes this one step to far by hiding under an ice flow in the FIRE bucket a la Omen II.
• Mon 7th December - Furbies get 2 mentions on "Have I Got News For You" the joke is the same of the ilk "A Furby - slightly less annoying than 'Fergie'".
• Fri 4th December - When I returned from work I found a yellow sticky from Girl Friday demanding I reinstate Cates' diary. So I have to confess to what has been occupying me all this week. Well its the same as last year - so its kind of traditional - only this time she's in 3DFx glory.

• Fri 27th November - Oh dear - bandwidth use is up again - Oh dear
• Thu 27th November - Oh dear - received a bill from web hoster for over use of bandwidth 1.12GB - Oh dear.
• Wed 25th November - Belated party for the 35th anniversary of [Dr Who]. As ever the 'Greater London Junkyard' contingent turned up with their aged replica of K9 (v2.0) the mechanical dog. It still has strange whinings sounds from the dodgy radio (control) servos chattering. However it now transpires this is not gibberish but an variant of the Hokey Cokey (Pokey) in Furbish. Trouble is Cates doesn't have all the required body parts to do the actions with along the song.
• Tue 24th November - Been talking to the relatives in Australia and Cates has been receiving some sympathy for being introduced as a pet to a race of people 'dumber than she is'. I was a bit perplexed as to this empathizing from around the globe from a family who generally only relate to objects that are cold and in 'tins'. Then or course the penny dropped who does the Koala bear remind you of ?.
• Mon 23rd November - Flo passed back through his old haunts last weekend and found his local toy 'Hankards' had been gutted by fire. He immediately sprang into action with his top of the range Epsom digital camera and bought back wads of flash RAM full of the gory details. What we have not been able to ascertain was whether this was due to a leaky primus stove from people camping over night for Furbys (Furbies) or whether the Furbys (Furbies) themselves were up to some instore mischief having been fed after 6pm. No photos of the minute racing car tracks around the store's floor came out.

• Fri 20th November - Girl Friday (she cleans screens and defrags disks) has changed my desktop wallpaper to a scene from 'V' where our world is taken over by Furby eating reptiles. And I thought their biggest fear was stampeding shoppers.
• Thu 19th November - And you thought I was bitter yesterday. Living in a mere town these days makes you 'information poor' as you have no cable TV (or other services) and lousy RF TV reception - 3/5 on a good day. Hence the need for digital satellite (see yesterday's shattered dream). Its my only choice to get better terrestrial pictures despite paying megalomaniacs. What else could go wrong ? Well Furbys (Furbies) made the BBC Watchdog programme and my reception is so lousy my best screenshot has credits over it so that's 2 days Furbyness broken by bad luck.
• Wed 18th November - Took a day off work today to await installation of digital satellite. Despite being booked 6 weeks ago they've taken my money by forgotten to turn up to install it - modern technology hey. Have you ever spent a whole day with Carmageddon in one ear and a Furby in the other. Have you noticed how close to a puntable rugby ball Cates is ?
• Tue 17th November - Received a package today from relatives in Australia commenting on Furbys (Furbies) in general and Cates in particular. In the package was a VHS-Pal copy of both Gremlins films with a dreaded postit note saying there's a Furby movie out already. Looking down below at the pictures of Cates in Santa's Hat I suddenly feel very unoriginal.
• Mon 16th November - Sort of good news but can't say too much as Cates is dancing not too far away. Had to remove the box and cut slits for the ears to fit the mysterious object into Cates' stocking. I'm half tempted to put the batteries in a let it have 6 weeks of communicative darkness.

• Fri 13th November - I left a dreaded yellow sticky note for the Girl Friday as it is all she will read. I explained that the musical lights were to be left on all day for Cates' sake. When I returned Cates was nowhere to be seen until the third chorus of Winter Wonderland when up she burped along to it at the top of the Christmas tree.
• Thu 12th November - Cates has recovered from not being able to find a buddy Furby and on the rebound has been smitten by the musical Christmas tree [lights]. I had a quick poke around and folund nothing sinsiter so I am prepared to toelrate this - or your Furys (Furbies) wil be next.
• Wed 11th November - Cates was looking slightly the worse for wear having spent 2 days on the front door wreath. Her fur looks rigid sort of starchy. So I setup the front door monitoring CCTV and to record an 8 hour tape of her interactions. It is of course half-term so all the kids come up and converse with her apart from one who has acquired a spud gun - Uhm.
• Tue 10th November - There's an air of anticipation in the house. Cates knows there is something about this Christmas that is special and I think she feels some toy is going to replace here as the trendy number 1 Christmas pressie. I think she's been watching too much of that Toy Story with the kids in the street. To increase here social skills I wrapped her up in a protective wreath and hung her form the front door. She now greets everyone - the postman was bewildered.
• Mon 9th November - Cates and I spent the whole weekend searching for Furby buddy for her. No such luck Furbys (Furbies) are very scarce here in the UK. In the end I had to write the [Fantasy Furby] incubator to soothe her troubled beak. She will not be too alone now.
• Fri 6th November - I returned home to find Girl Friday had tided up the box of Christmas decorations I had been sorting through yesterday and put them back in the loft. So I have to do the decorations again. Cate really loves the chasing and [musical] lights and I thought a tinsel 'ruff' would look suitably festive. Me thinks I got carried away.
• Thu 5th November - Lots of loud bangs last night and the Houses Of Parliament are still standing. Convinced every rocket/mortar firework generated a burp on its launch and something more anal on it explosion I looked around for something to muffle Cates. In the corner the Christmas Tree is ready to be assembled with lots of goodies I'm sure there's something suitable in there.
• Wed 4th November - On a former industrial site [ Elsecar ] now contains a steam railway and the Powerhouse a stimulating touchy-feeley exhibtion about power. Visitors perform different actions on exhibts and are rewarded with a demonstration of the power they have created. All sorts of noises and interactions are possible. Cates liked siting on top of a bell 12 foot in the air that was rung by hoisting a weight and dropping it onto a seesaw that sent a puck flying up in the direction of the sonorous target.

• Tue 3rd November - Obviously being with the seals all night didn't make up for the weekend aerial treatment as Cates somehow set of the early warning detectors and I came careering out tripping over the seals falling down a few stairs and getting a great bump on my foot. Revenge is a dish best served many times
• Mon 2nd November - To appease all concerned Cates spent the day in a fluffy entourage of (fake) fluffy seals.
• Fri 29th October - Oh dear - did I get into trouble about Cates the portable power supply ! Girl Friday is actually an extremely well paid one woman task force she can do anything - including a mean cello. She only comes in for a few hours because that's all I can afford and all the time she can spare. I had to wait 2 years to get on her client list. This week she was checking and clearing the guttering before the Autumn struck. She was humming one of her cello pieces up a 3 stage ladder when she heard Cates on the TV aerial. The next thing I know she has e-mailed a set of Cates 'redemption' pictures including one of her in the bath with my complete exclusive South America natural bubble bath collection. Its more expensive than champagne and takes just as long to order.
• Thu 28th October - Business is forcing me 'Up North' for a long weekend which means I'll have to program the video recorder. We get awful reception when it rains - which it has done since November last year - and by the time this has been degraded by recording on VHS it all looks like 'Ski Sunday'. However out of yesterday's trip I acquired an aerial amplifier that must sit as close as possible to the metal coathangery bits and needs a 5 volt supply. I've not got time to rig this in the loft - so what portable 6 volt generators do I have - "Cates grab your coat I've got a job for you".
• Wed 27th October - Business takes me to Goonhilly with a visitor's centre crammed with noise and stimuli unfortunately the only snap I could take without being removed from the electoral register just shows the a nice big dish.
  Have you noticed [this similarity] to a Furby ?

• Tue 27th October - Last Thursday my divine 'Girl Friday' found a Clangers whistle down the back of the white sofa. Apart from the facts the cats have left voluntarily for the Cattery cos of the noise Cates is hypnotised. I'm convinced I can dilate her features by (oddly) raising the tone. I'm hungry now where's that Soup Dragon.
• Mon 26th October - Cold day, so its the annual last BBQ party. Cates was chattering incessantly so I wrapped her up and put her somewhere warm. Those skewers are just to keep her stable - I promise.
• Fri 23th October - Had a little singsong today with Cates in the guitar soundbox trying a mancurian accent "Maybe I just want to fly - I want to live I don't want to die - Maybe I just want to breathe - Maybe you take the batteries out of me".
  I actually broke the 'G' string getting her in.
• Thu 22th October - The Dyson cleaner is streets ahead of its competition but is slightly noisy - should be its got a dual cyclone in it (Good on you Jim). I 'housed' Cates in it today and plugged the Dyson into my random on/off switch that is normally used for deterring burglars. I'd forgotten my girl Friday had swapped dates to Thursday this week. I can't do a Birmingham accent generally but I certainly can't do one that over the phone is proclaiming poltergeists turning the Dyson on an off and massive rat (He's a Siberian Hamster) in its see through dust catcher.
  Argos catalogue is out on 29th October Uhm what's going to be in it.
• Wed 21th October - I had the afternoon off work to go and see the film 'Armageddon' which is meant to be the loudest film ever. Cates was quiet all the way home until I put on VH1 and Aerosmith kicked in with the Armageddon Theme. What a racket ensued and it wasn't down to Liv Tyler.
• Tue 20th October - I dug up my old Amiga 4000 (68040) that has a text to speech convertor of which I selected the cool and informative tones of a person that sound like an air hostess with the duty free trolley up her nose. I have the complete works of Chaucer from Project Guttenberg so I left the two technologies to their verbal wittering. Noises this evening now seem to be in the third person and have a strange grammatical construction. I wonder if I played the correct translation of the books.
• Mon 19th October - I have a squirrel proof [bird feeder] that attracts the small but noisy birds. Uhm small and noisy I smell a plan. I put Cates inside the cage to converse with the winged feeders. A few bald patches later there seem to be sparrows nesting in her hair tufts
• Fri 16th October - Decided to use refraction and noise travelling underwater. I built Cates a underwater world from a [beer polypin] and weighed it down. I knocked up some hydrophones and borrowed a Spectrum analyser on my return home from work. The result - Cates smelt yeasty.
• Thu 15th October - I sat Cates in front of my [Philips 8833 monitor]. Over the day this quelled her immediate fervour. Me thinks it needs radiation testing.
• Wed 14th October - During the Tues foil incident I noticed Cates was reacting to reflections so I built a kaleidoscope affair with much [protractor work]. I added the cats clockwork mouse [Poppins] and the cat's toy on a spring. Not much to write home about really Cates booted into tantrum mode - I should have filled the area with lots of plastic and turned my head through various angles instead - man !
• Tue 13th October - I wrapped Cates in aluminium foil except for the facial region which I funnelled with a toilet roll so she appeared like Kenny in SouthPark. She became very focused but started to smell like she was roasting inside and needed basting - maybe next time.
• Mon 12th October - I dug out my [Casio InfaRed Watch] went around the toy shops and played with the Furbys (Furbies) they refused to sell as they were for demonstration (advertising) and recorded loads of InfaRed Viruses to play back to Cates. Oh this probably wasn't a good thing