911 kitty

She's quirky and cute. She was the last born of a litter of a rescued mother cat and kitten mission, born slate gray and rather ugly with her broken tail. We knew she wouldn't get adopted. We decided that she would be the one we'd keep. We named her "Mégot"* which in French means cigarette butt. Her tail resembles a stubbed out butt and she keeps it high and proud without much other choice. It's permanently stuck in this position.

It'd been two days and no sign of my little butt. We'd shaken the food box all up and down the streets to no avail. We did a roadside search (cringe) and by yesterday evening I was really worried. After baby S fell asleep last night I did a late evening tour of the neighborhood "here girl...c'mon tsk-tsk-tsk" and then I heard it. The response. A distant but urgent "mrrrooooooowwwww." I searched under cellar doorways, inside drainpipes and finally desperately pressed my ear to the closed doorway of the vacant house two doors down. Maybe? I wasn't really sure where the sound was coming from though. It sounded somehow to be coming from the rooftops. It was too dark to go that route. I decided I'd continue the search the next morning.

This morning armed with a ladder and a pair of sneakers I climbed up to our vacant attic, through the old skylight and up to our rooftop. Seb and I sometimes go up there to enjoy the view and drink a glass of wine. Someday we hope to build our bedroom there and enjoy a small rooftop balcony. I'm getting off track here though. This time I was up there for a rescue mission. The cries became louder and more desperate as I approached the pitch of the roof. My worst fears confirmed I peered down the chimney where it seem to be eminating louder and saw a pair of glistening, yellow eyes. My poor little "butt" had fallen 5 meters down into one of the many old chimney flues on our roof. It was a narrow rectangle about 7 x 15 inches. I had no idea how I'd get her out. There was no longer any exit. It was just a vast hole. "mrrrooooow" and then encore "mrrroooooooow" and then another gutteral "mrrroooooooow" for good measure in case I'd missed the first 3 thousand. She sounded very hoarse.

I called the pompiers.** This is the first time in all my time in France that I have composed "le 18."*** Well, maybe I did it accidently once or twice when stupidly trying to compose a U.S. 1-800 number, forgetting that they don't work in France. But this was my first real emergency. The classic "cat up a tree."



The pompier were very polite, arriving with as much promptness and cerimony as if it were a human trapped inside a burning building. They spent over two hours trying to extract Mégot from her little cinder prison. First they tried the cat in the bag technique, attempting to entice her to slip into it for some smelly treats. They then tried a variety of baskets eagerly provided by curious neighbors, "here try this one," "no this one," "how about this one!" Everyone it seems had a solution. Finally when the young fire crew had tried everything in their and everyone else's repetoire they decided to call the fire chief. I stepped away to drink a jus d'orange with my neighbor. Mégot was in good hands. There were now five pompier on the scene.

She was finally rescued using one of those special metal animal lassos and lifted to safety, wherein she promptly bolted in gratitude. I think everyone was relieved not to have to break the 2 foot thick walls in order to get her out. They told me they would have done it, but only as a last resort. I thought this might have been a good idea actually since we could have made a nice closet out of the hole in the future. That's me you know, always thinking of renovation. I know Seb would have thought the same thing.

The pompiers all had a jus d'orange with us at my neighbors house (we'd used her attic to get on the rooftop since it was easier). The chief drank his jus then shook his head dramatically sighing, "ai yai yai les chats!"****

* pronounced may-go
**the fire department
***the national number for the fire department (sort of like the US version of 911)
****good grief, cats!