YOU can hire a suicide bomber costume for your cat.

This is weird to the power of at least four.

Lets start at the beginning.

First, having pets. I know Im in a minority with this, but I never did get the idea of pets apart from newts, and that, as they say on Father Ted, would be an ecological matter.

Why anyone would want to bring an essentially wild creature into their home is a mystery to me.

We do our best to rid our homes of mice, silverfish, cockroaches, bed mites and greenfly on the petunias. And these are tiny.

Why then welcome a great big flea-ridden incontinent scratching chewing mammal over the Welcome mat?

Doesnt that cancel out all your efforts in the greenfly and mouse departments?

Second, fancy dress. I have difficulty enough dressing normally. There are, somewhere, pictures of me dressed as a hippy and an RAF officer, but the less said about these embarrassing lapses the better. Dressing up is for thespians.

Third, fancy dress for your pet. Animals dont like dressing up. Generally speaking, they will not volunteer to be dressed. They have more dignity. Dressing your animal up, therefore, is animal abuse.

Fourth, choosing a suicide bomber costume for your cat. How is this amusing or entertaining?

I would think it would be offensive to genuine suicide bombers and we have to think of their feelings, if only briefly.

With all that Semtex around its middle, its not going to get through the cat flap. And if it does, and starts roaming the neighbourhood at night and they call in the snipers and bomb disposal squad how are you going to feel when they return to you the remains of Mr Tibbs for burial?

If you absolutely have to, why not doll your mog up as Puss In Boots? Try as you may, though, youll never get Mr Tibbs to speak like Antonio Banderas.