Today’s Cat of the Day is Lucy. I just remembered as I was writing this that I forgot to give her her pill this morning. Oops.

The pill is for a heart condition. Other than that, she’s perfectly healthy, in contrast to Charlie and Bella. Lucy’s most apparent quality is her hatred of cats - whenever the others go near her, she moans and hisses and growls, and generally makes it known that she’d rather be left alone.

But despite her curmugeonly, misanthropic exterior, a couple of years ago she performed an act so heroic as to destroy her cat-hating reputation forever.

It’s a pretty straightforward story. Bella was lazing about in the front garden when a man walked past with a big dog. I don’t know what breed - most probably a rottweiller or a pit bull terrier or something. Whatever it was, it was obviously quite stupid, because it decided that Bella would make a good meal - if you saw her photo yesterday, you’ll probably agree that she doesn’t really look too appetising. But this dog, as I say, was quite stupid, so he tried to eat her.

So there they were - a massive, sixteen stone rottweiller with Bella, the timid old lady who can barely climb into a chair, in its mouth. Luckily my dad was nearby, and on seeing this scene did his best to seperate predator and prey - but with little success.

It wasn’t looking good. But then… what was this, racing to the scene? Is it a cat? Is it a plane? Well, no, obviously it isn’t a plane. You were right the first time - it’s Lucy, who threw herself at the dog and tried doing to it what it was doing to Bella.

Weight for weight, she didn’t stand much of a chance. But apparently the dog was so taken by surprise that it dropped Bella in astonishment, and she was whisked away to safety.

For this act of bravery, Lucy earned two things. She earned the nickname Lucy Braveheart, though for some reason no one but my mum is prepared to use it. And on top of that, she won an award, given by a dog food company, for which the prize was a year’s supply of dog food.

Here are my mum and dad accepting the award from no less a celebrity than ex-Blue Peter presenter Simon Groom:

I should add that the story of Lucy’s brave deed comes on the authority of my dad, who witnessed the whole thing - but recently, whenever the episode has come up, he seems to be playing down Lucy’s part. So either he’s trying to steal her glory, or he made the whole thing up to win the dog food.

I’ll let you decide.