I was awoken this morning by a sound of muffled distress. I stumbled into the kitchen, barely awake, and was greeted by the sight of my furry pal with a helium balloon pretty much stuck to his face

Initially amusing, until I realised that he'd eaten all of the string up until the balloon. That's roughly seven foot of string

He was clearly panicking, so I went to pull the string out of his mouth. Only it wasn't budging. I didn't know whether to pull it harder or not, as I was worried I might pull out a liver or something equally gruesome with it

I weighed up my options, and decided to yank. The god-awful wail that greeted my tug will live with me forever more. I'd closed my eyes, and was afraid to open them for fear of seeing both a dead cat, and also the innards of said cat

But it clearly wasn't his time to go, and he lived to fight another day

I just got home from uni and he had began chewing the same string again. With hindsight, I probably should have put it out of his reach this morning. It's now on top of the fridge

Cats, eh?