MOAOW
My cat is stuck in a tree. It has been for two days now. It’s a spreading Scotts Pine, about 30 metres tall. The cat is just a normal black cat that drools.
The garden fence runs alongside the tree and there’s about three metres to the lowest branch from the fence. The cat often walks along that fence and I can guarantee it looks at that tree and thinks, “I bet I can get up there.” To be fair to the cat, it’s right – it can get up there. But running up a tree trunk to a thick branch is an entirely different proposition to sitting on that same branch and looking down three metres to a thin rickety fence. That’s the type of jump that you get wrong and you spend serious time in the cone of shame.
My children think I should rescue the cat. When they go into the garden the cat alerts them to his predicament with a loud MOAOW. He’s not usually the chatty-type, so it’s very noticeable. Especially as he doesn’t just say it once and allow you to digest his message. He repeats it:
MOAOW
MOAOW
MOAOW
MOAOW
MOAOW
MOAOW
“Shall we forget the barbecue and just cook inside?”
MOAOW
MOAOW
MOAOW
MOAOW
MOAOW
MOAOW
“Yes.”
The children think I should get a long ladder and put it up against the tree. My children think I should climb the ladder and coax the terrified little kitty over and gently scoop him up and tuck him softly but firmly under my arm and slide down the ladder, thus returning him to terra firma. My children are eejits.
I know that my cat is not stuck in a tree. I know this because I know my cat. For the sake of clarity let’s replay that previous paragraph and see what would happen in reality. I would get the long ladder. I would place it against the tree. I would climb the ladder. I would coax the terrified little kitty over. The terrified little kitty would not come over. The terrified little kitty would sit on the branch and look at me with an expression of victory on his face. He would know that he had won. For once it wasn’t him chasing the little red laser dot along the floor. It was me.
I haven’t rescued the cat because he’s an arsehole. Not me.
MOAOW.