h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

And the craziest bit is I missed it all!

I was at work, an hours commute from home, and just about to start a meeting with the client and my boss. And my son calls, to say that he can't find the cat, and she might have fallen from the window in his room, which is upstairs.

She had been chasing flies, he had his back turned, and suddenly she wan't there. So I told him to go down and search. Even if she wasn't straight below the window, she could have crawled away to hide in the hedge if she was injured or scared.

But no find.

He called and texted a few times, and I was already in the meeting. I did apologise, and texted him to call my R, and my parents, who are about 30 minutes away.

And just as the meeting ends, he calls, and the cat is found and rescued. She had probably gotten out on the windowsill, and made a neat little jump to the gutter, which comes out not below the window (straight wall down, there...) but perhaps 30 cm out and to the side. The window is sticking out with its' on little flatter roof, and the rest of the roof is 45 degrees. There must be a word for that sort of thing.

Anyway. They all went out to look for her, and the training has been successful - she responds when you whistle. There she was, on the sloping roof, over on the neighbour's side. When they whistled, she eeped, and came closer. My son climbed the fence (which is 2 m high, and about 2 cm wide, only it's not solid top but two rows of planks....) stands up on the edge and reaches up, to get her from the gutter.

So by the time I was home, there was no trace of anything exciting. Although, she was very alert and kept running around playing all the evening.

(the fence is not 2 cm wide. It's 12 cm wide)

Kitty!

I never knew you could train a cat to come to you if you whistled. She sounds like a real live wire then.

Glad she's safe! But what will her next trick be?

The last cat and this one know that whistles mean come here.
I whistle "calling" signal when I feed her, and now it works on calling her indoors too.

I learned this from a friend. And it's great, whistling carries further than voice and is easier on your throat.

Next trick? I think she may climb a chandelier or something.

Nice one.....

a L O N G time ago....when I was just newly married, settling down, new house and two new kittens... aaahhhhhh!

They used to chase each other around the house continuously, much to everyones amusement....

One sunny afternoon, the doors and windows open I suddenly realised that I was missing two cute kittens...oooppssss!

After a bit of wandering around and whistling outside I heard a faint mew Looking up into two enormous horse chestnut trees opposite the front door, I spotted two cute kitttens looking confused (well I thought they looked confused) I got out the ladders, but they just kept shooting upwards futher and further away til eventually they were swaying in the breeze right at the top of these blummin' trees. The squirrels were a bit confused as well!

Panic had now set in...they had been up there ages, a crowd was gathering, then finally I had the brainwave to phone the fire brigade. They have long ladders and you read all the time how they rescue poor little cute kittens...

The phone call went something like this:-

"Hello, sorry to bother you, but could you send someone round as I have two beautiful cute kittens stuck up a horse chestnut tree, they've been there all day and can't get down"

The very nice man on the other end of the phone said, "I'm sorry Miss, but we can't send anyone round to rescue two cute kittens from your tree, but rest assured, in all my years experience of being a Fire Officer, I have yet to see the skeleton of a cat up a tree"

some time later...

both cute kittens came home for their tea!!

Both of these stories made me laugh!

My kitties don't come when I call, and I am physically incapable of whistling. Once in a while, one of them might look in my general direction if I am calling, but usually all I get is a twitch of a single ear or a tail.

Neither of these cats has ever escaped to the outdoors, thankfully, though they've both tentatively followed me out on to our back balcony before being shooed back inside.

When I was a little girl, though, we had a cat who once disappeared for the whole day. My mom called, shook the food bag and the treat container, and he just did not respond. As soon as I got home from school and he heard my voice, though, he started mewing. He'd climbed into a dresser drawer to curl up in some clothes and was shut inside when the drawer was closed.

Done that - kitten in a drawer, sleeping all day behind closed doors.

And our previous kitten was lost overnight when we visited friends in their summer house. Next morning a neighbour informed us that she had shot out from the firewood shed... she had managed to get shut in tight and safe alright

They are so sweet, and cause so much bother....

...agreed....

but you wouldn't be without them!!

Exactly!

I have heard that fireman's answer before and he is right, of course

I was once sat at the window of a flat on the fourth floor when my landlady's persian cat suddenly jumped up on my lap and straight out of the window

my landlady was quite calm though and showed me the cat sitting neatly on a kind of projection just beneath the window

She (the cat) returned in her own good time. Cats do that, as you will know

Lanzababy, I hear the people on La Gomera communicate over long distances (valleys and the like) by whistling, is anything like that happening on Lanzarote as well?

not on Lanzarote, I have heard bits of the whistling language on the tv, though, so it is true.

Okay, thanks, Lanzababy

Now back to the kitty at hand

Speaking of that: I once had a kitten who climbed up a ladder and sat on the top of our house when we were doring repairs on the roof.

I climbed up to the very top of the ladder and finally lured the cat near enough to catch her with my free arm

But as I lifted her off the top of the roof she got scared and sank her nails into my wrist and I really had to pull myself together and and carry her all the way down to earth before she let loose and I could treat my wrist with iodine

Dad did something similar for a kitten of ours, high up in a tree on Grandfathers farm. Got the ladder out, climbed very high (and he doesn't like heights) and got the kitten. The kitten somehow ended up on his back, for the trip down, and shredded his his back...