Mother’s on the roof and I can’t get her off…

This is a story about this asshole right here.

First, I need to tell you a joke that my entire family knows, and then I can tell you the story.

So the joke goes like this:

A man has to go on a business trip, and he leaves his cat in the care of his feckless brother. He misses the cat terribly, and he calls his brother every day to make sure the cat is okay. On the seventh day, his brother says, “I’m sorry but your cat died last night.”

The man is devastated. He’s like, “That’s terrible! And the way you broke it to me! You couldn’t have been gentler?”

The brother is like, “I don’t see how!”

“Well, first you tell me, ‘The cat is on the roof and we can’t get him off!’ and then the next day you tell me, ‘We got the cat down, but he’s sort of sickly–we took him to the vets!’, and the next day you tell me, ‘The vet isn’t hopeful–you may have to prepare yourself,’ and then you tell me my beloved cat  is dead!”

The brother sighed. “I”m sorry. You’re right–that wasn’t very considerate of me!”

“Well, now you know better. So while we’re on the phone, how’s our mother?”

And the brother says, “Uh, Mother’s on the roof and we can’t get her off.”

*pauses for shocked laughter*

So that’s the family joke.

Well, the new family story is THIS:

This morning as I was brushing my teeth and going potty, I heard Mate and ZoomBoy talking.

“What’s he doing there?”

“I don’t know–I’m sure he’ll get down though.”

“But is he going to be okay?”

“Well, he got himself into this mess, he’ll be fine.”

“What if he’s not?”

“I’ll get him tonight.”

“Okay…”

And then they left.  In the quiet left in the house, I heard the unmistakable sound of Dewey the cat, whining.

“Mew mew mew mew mew…”

So I called to Squish. “Squish! Could you go get ZoomBoy’s cat? I think he wants in!”

“He’s not outside!” she called.

“But I can hear him!”

In a moment, she replied, “He’s on the roof!”

“Uh…”

And at that moment ZoomBoy texted me. “Dewey’s on the roof.”

And I was at a loss. I don’t do ladders. Not at all. My sense of balance sucked before I got to be the size of a tractor-trailer. So we left Dewey there as I took her to school, and the whole time I’m thinking, “Hmmm… if I put a ladder up against the house, would the idiot cat figure out how to get down on his own?”

By the time I got home, Chicken was parked in the living room, ready to distract me from my day like the good daughter she is.

“What’s up?” she asked. (I brought her coffee, btw, because I am a good mother.)

“Dewey’s on the roof,” I said.

“Dewey’s on the roof and you can’t get him off?” she asked, alarmed.

“No! The cat’s fine! The idiot floof just got himself stuck on the fucking roof!”

And now we judge him for being an idiot.

So Chicken grabbed the ladder and I held the garage door, and together we went out back and tried to figure out how to get buttheaded idiot floof off the goddamned roof.

She set the ladder up and I held it while she climbed up and tried to coax him down, but ten minutes of “Kitty kitty kitty… come here you dumbassed fat fuck or you’ll never eat again!” go us his everlasting disdain.

I ran and got a cup of cat kibble, and she shook that in front of him for a while before throwing pieces at him to get his attention. When he did look at her, he’d like realize, “Hello, you too are up at roof level, and I am fucking terrified!” and he’d back up.

When he did this, she’d bend over the top of the ladder and beg him, “C’mon, asshole, use my back as a springboard but get the fuck down!”

He did not.

Finally, by the kibble throwing gambit, she got him close enough to scoop into her arms so she could climb down the ladder and haul him off to his food bowl.

Where he promptly ate his anxieties into the ground.

Anyway, we laughed about it the whole day.

Because it was the only time in our lives that we were able to say without irony or tragedy, “The cat is on the roof and we can’t get him off.”