The World According to Bob

don’t know how old he is and know nothing about the life he led before I found him. Unless I did a DNA test on him, I’ll never know where he comes from or who his parents were. To be honest though, I don’t really care. Bob is Bob. And that is all I need to know.

    I wasn’t the only one who had learned to love Bob for being his colourful, unpredictable self.
    It was the spring of 2009 and by now Bob and I had been selling The Big Issue for a year or so. Initially we’d had a pitch outside Covent Garden tube station in central London. But we’d moved to Angel, Islington where we’d carved out a little niche for ourselves and Bob had built up a small, but dedicated band of admirers.
    As far as I was aware, we were the only human/feline team selling The Big Issue in London. And even if there was another one, I suspected the feline part of the partnership wasn’t much competition for Bob when it came to drawing – and pleasing – a crowd.
    During our early days together, when I had been a busker playing the guitar and singing, he had sat there, Buddha-like, watching the world going about its business. People were fascinated – and I think a bit mesmerised – by him and would stop, stroke and talk to him. Often they’d ask our story and I’d tell them all about how we’d met and formed our partnership. But that was about the extent of it.
    Since we’d been selling The Big Issue , however, he’d become a lot more active. I often sat down on the pavement to play with him and we’d developed a few tricks.
    It had begun with Bob entertaining people on his own. He loved to play, so I’d bring along little toys that he would toss around and chase. His favourite was a little grey mouse that had once been filled with catnip.
    The mouse had ceased to have any trace of catnip a long time ago and was now a battered, bedraggled and rather pathetic looking thing. Its stitching had begun to come apart and, although it had always been grey, it had now become a really dirty shade of grey. He had loads of other toys, some of which had been given to him by admirers. But ‘scraggedy mouse’, as I called it, was still his number one toy.
    As we sat outside Angel tube he would hold it in his mouth, flicking it from side to side. Sometimes he’d whirl it around by its tail and release it so that it flew a couple of feet away and then pounce on it and start the whole process all over again. Bob loved hunting real life mice, so he was obviously mimicking that. It always stopped people in their tracks and I’d known some commuters to spend ten minutes standing there, as if hypnotised by Bob and his game.
    Out of boredom more than anything else, I had started playing with him on the pavement. To begin with we just played at shaking hands. I’d stretch out my hand and Bob would extend his paw to hold it. We were only replicating what we did at home in my flat, but people seemed to find it sweet. They were constantly stopping to watch us, often taking pictures. If I’d had a pound for every time someone – usually a lady – had stopped and said something like ‘aah, how sweet’ or ‘that’s adorable’ I’d have been rich enough to, well, not have to sit on the pavement any more.
    Freezing your backside off on the streets isn’t exactly the most fun you can have, so my playtimes with Bob became more than simple entertainment for the passing crowds. It helped me to pass the time and to enjoy my days a little more too. I couldn’t deny it: it also helped encourage people to buy copies of the magazine. It was another one of the blessings that Bob had bestowed on me.

    We’d spent so many hours outside Angel by now that we’d begun to develop our act a little further.
    Bob loved his little treats, and I learned that he’d go to extraordinary lengths to get hold of them. So, for instance, if I held a little biscuit three feet or so above him, he’d stand on his hind legs in an effort to snaffle the snack from my hands. He would wrap his paws around my wrist to steady himself, then let go with one paw and try to grab it.
    Predictably, this had gone down a storm. By now there must have been hundreds of people walking the streets of London with images of Bob reaching for the sky on their telephones and cameras.
    Recently, we’d developed this trick even more. The grip he exerted when he grabbed my arms to reach the treat was as strong as a vice. So every now and again I would slowly and very gently raise him in the