Monday, March 9, 2015

The Cat and the Fire Department

This morning on Liar Liar I partially told the story of the time I called the Fire Department to rescue my cat off the top of an apartment building.  First, I would like to state that I have nothing but respect for Firemen everywhere. Here's the rest of the story I didn't have time to tell.

We lived across the street from an apartment complex and all the kids there LOVED my cat.  He roamed around the neighborhood freely but at least twice a week some cranky mom would pull into my driveway with a car full of kids; one of them holding my "lost" cat.  They were so proud of themselves so I never bothered to tell them that he always made it home.  (Until he didn't, but that's another story).

One day some kids ran over to tell me that my cat was stuck on top of one of the apartment buildings and he was crying.  I still don't know how he got up there, though there was a very large tree next to the building and Barney WAS quite the daredevil.  I called the Fire Department, who gave me the run around for a while but eventually agree to come rescue him.  

It was right after school, so a group of kids gathered around as the firemen set up a ladder and climbed to the top of the building.  My cat ran to the other side of the roof.  The fireman came down and said "Even if I catch him I can't carry him down the ladder."  Without a word an eight-year old girl opened her backpack, dumped the contents on the ground, then handed the empty bag to the fireman who reluctantly went back up the ladder, chased down my evasive cat and stuffed him into the backpack.

He climbed down the ladder and handed the backpack to me.  I pulled Barney out and noticed that he had something stuck in his paw.  I showed it to the fireman and said "I think he couldn't come down because of this."  When I got home I realized he didn't have something stuck IN his paw, he had one of those sticky things from a cotton weed tree stuck TO his paw.  Still, it helped me save face a little.