There is a danger to believing in signs; you know the thing that happens that tells you are on the right path. Or worse, investing in signs. On my thirtieth birthday I went to the beach with some friends and a kite, which failed to get airbourne (a terrible omen for that decade).

Then this year at Hogmanay (New Year) I specially ordered Chinese lanterns to set off on the hill to take our wishes hopes and dreams off into the new year.

Of course what happened was that the wind was well over the 5 mile per hour and below that was recommended for lighting them. The first one tore, the second one was only lit after using up ALL the matches in the box. Smokers never around when you need them. It bobbed up but to our horror hugged the side of Salisbury Crags, narrowly missing people and coming down on a bush, which started to burn merrily. My friend B well used to taking charge ran after it and put it out by stamping on it. My friend S sarcastically ‘Look stamping on our hopes and dreams for the new year’. B came back and reported that the people nearby had stood about like nanas saying things like ‘look its on fire’.

However the official fireworks were lovely and we ended up the evening having a cup of tea and a long chat before rolling home at 3am.

However last week there was the most wonderful sign.

My street is infested with cats. I live in the street of cats. One Archie lived two doors down. Last year he started to come into my house. I’d turn around working on the computer and find him lying on the bed. His demeanour was a bit like the Dude in The Big Lewbowski. He just lie there all comfortable like and you could see ‘Hey man’ in a large bubble above his head. I loved Archie but he at Frida the resident cat’s food and then started to be very very rude to her. So I installed a high tech cat door, which read Frida’s chip and prevented Archie-the-archnemisis from coming in.

Then to my horror I saw a sign attached to the bus stop saying he was missing in the autumn. His humans were asking us to check sheds and basements. Weeks past and no sign of Archie. The signs got ripped down. And we resigned ourselves to an Archieless street.

Last week I saw an Archie-alike on my windowsill. It didn’t surprise me as last year to confuse matters Archie had a mini-me following him about. I thought mini-me may have grown up. So a few days ago I saw Archie’s human in her garden and I remarked on seeing the Archie-alike.

And she said ‘He’s back’.

I was stunned. This was the Christmas Miracle!

Apparently he’d been found in Inverkeithing hanging about the Civic Centre being fed by locals. He eventually got into the hands of the Cat Protection League who discovered his chip and returned him home. She thinks he may have got into a van and been transported over to Fife. There was a lot of work on gas mains last year in local streets. She said that for her 2011 was such a shitty year she could not wait to see the end of it on the 31^st of December.

I was overjoyed to hear this good news. Yes I thought 2012 will be a good year. And I hurried home to pass the good news onto all my friends who had been entertained by the saga of Archie over the past few years.