Barry is our new cat and he came to us unexpectedly in November 2004. It's a bit of a yarn but since Barry has his own page, we've got room to recount the event.

Jhodi had not long had her dog MacKenzie and visited the local vet to have her registered. While she was there, there were two cats at the vet. One was most unfriendly but the other, a nine-month old black and white male, came and jumped up on her knee and was immediately comfortable with her.

Jho enquired about the cat and it turned out that he had been in an accident (probably hit by a car) and had major surgery on his hip. But no one had claimed him, and it had been some time. Since no one seemed to be coming forward, the vet was planning to put the cat down but hadn't had the heart as yet. This reminded me of the Dread Pirate Roberts in Princess Bride telling Westley "good night Westley; most likely kill you in the morning"!!

By this stage, Jho was smitten and immediately adopted the poor moggie and took him home. What she didn't realise, however, was that MacKenzie thought the new cat (now known as Nureyev after the Russian ballet dancer) was her own personal living toy. And since Mac was by now about five times bigger than the cat, this was not the most fortunate thing ever to happen to him.

Jho would get home from work, often to find that all hell had broken loose in the war between cats and dogs and that Nureyev was usually to be found hiding somewhere from its very large and heavy, albeit well-meaning, nemesis. And one day, MacKenzie even ended up with a bloody nose from the horse-play. Eventually, Jho decided the only thing to do was to take the cat back to the vet.

But she had a cunning plan: the cat could not possibly spend one more night at her place, so before taking him the vet the next day, he would have to find lodgings for the night - enter Bryn and Karina, cat-suckers-r-us. We agreed to look after the cat for just one night but inevitably, we fell in love with him right away and before the cock crowed thrice, he was our new pet.

We quickly found that Nureyev was a very difficult name to call a cat when trying to get it to come to you. We needed something that rolled off the tongue a bit easier. So I suggested Baryshnikov, after another Russian ballet dancer and that soon became shortened to Barry.

So he's been with us for a few months now and we're really glad he came to us. He's great company, especially at night when he snuggles up in front of the TV with us. He's really friendly - one of the friendliest cats I've ever met - and loves to clean your hands and legs with his prickly tongue.

He spends most nights outside (so we got him a bell to warn the wee creatures) and sleeps all day in the games room. He's an Aquarius, and his hobbies include playing with his mouse toys and hiding in small spaces such as the bath, drawers and empty wine boxes.