London - Working from home means you get to spend more time with your pets.
Sometimes, however, they can stop you from getting stuff done.
But one couple have devised a solution – a fake lap to keep their clingy cat happy while they work.
They made the lap using a pair of trousers stuffed with a duvet cover, with a heating pad inside. They even added a pair of trainers below.
Rebecca May, 29, and her husband Alex, 32, adopted ten-year-old Ziggy from a London shelter three years ago. She was shy at first but soon began demanding their attention.
%%%twitter https://twitter.com/hashtag/BBCBreakfast?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#BBCBreakfastwhere your cat likes to nap 😹😹 #FridayFeeling #FridayMotivation pic.twitter.com/uXEKBJ1yo8
— Patrick Kolipson (@PKT_develop)
May, from London, said: "When she bonds with someone it’s intense. She absolutely has to sit on you.
"She’s almost on you before you’ve even sat down – she’ll see that you’re near the sofa and her eyes go black, like you’re a target. Once you’re down, she’s there."
At first this was not a problem. But this changed after May, a freelance marketing consultant and her husband, a picture editor, began working from home.
She would climb all over May’s desk and laptop and interrupt conference calls. She tried shutting her out of the room but Ziggy gets "very stressed". And placing a cat bed on her desk did not work either.
Gonna build a fake lap. pic.twitter.com/0GFVM28BWX
— B o n g o 😸 & L u n a 😼 (@ForgedInFur) March 4, 2020
Mr May then came up with the fake lap for Ziggy to sit on. The pet took to it immediately, meaning her owners can work uninterrupted.
May said: "Alex thought that creating a decoy would be funny but I don’t think he expected it to actually work. They’re a bit too creepy to keep up all the time, so it’s currently on an as-and-when basis."