We’d planned to go to Cracker Barrel for breakfast, but just as we were about to leave, I realized I hadn’t seen Kara at all in the half an hour or so since I’d gotten home, and thus began the search.
“What does she look like?” Liz asked.
“She’s a brown tabby,” I said.
Liz grinned. “I don’t know what a tabby is.”
“Kind of tiger stripe-y” I said.
“Is that her?” Liz asked.
“No, that’s Mister Boogers,” I said.
“Oh, there’s one. Is that her?”
“No, that’s Tommy.”
And so on. I went outside and called for her in that special cat-calling voice (oh, don’t look at me, you do it too, you freak) and walked all over the property, and came back inside the house and looked in every nook and cranny, and finally I decided we should just go ahead and go have breakfast, I’d leave the back door open, and if she showed back up, she’d be able to get inside.
When we got home, she was in the house. She looked a little freaked out, so I figured she’d gone outside, gotten a little lost, found her way home, and was freaked out about it.
Thursday afternoon we watched the Sex and the City movie (just as good the second time around!) and hung out and we were sitting on the couch talking and I was trying to decide if I smelled cat pee when I glanced over at the fireplace at the other end of the front room. Just in time to see Kara.
DISAPPEARING UP THE CHIMNEY.
“Oh my god!” I said, getting up and running to the fireplace. “Oh my god! She went up the chimney! SHE WENT UP THE CHIMNEY!”
“Should I get Fred?” Liz asked.
“Um… yeah!” I said. Liz ran to the back of the house to call Fred, and I pulled the pillows out of the chimney.
The chimney that belongs to that fireplace had, at one point, a cap over the top of it to prevent birds from building nests inside the chimney, but the cap blew off at some point and calls to the chimney sweep company who’d done the work were fruitless, since the number had been disconnected. So to stop feathers, bird poop, and pieces of nest from ending up in the front room, I stuffed a couple of pillows up there, and so far it’d been working pretty well.
When I grabbed the first pillow, a cloud of dust and soot came out. When I grabbed and pulled the second pillow, a bigger cloud of dust and soot came out, along with Kara, who raced across the room and hid behind the couch.
So it appears that while I’d been frantically calling for Kara that morning, she’d been hanging out up inside the chimney (there’s a ledge inside the chimney right over the fireplace, but then it smooths out, so I don’t think she could have climbed up the chimney, at least not very far). I guess she wanted a little alone time.
We ended up keeping the pillows out of the chimney and just sealing off the hole with brown paper and duct tape, which I believe you’ll agree adds an elegant and classy finish to the front room.
Maybe duct tape should be my decorating statement piece.
Previously
2007: No entry.
2006: This can’t end well.
2005: Nas. Tay.