"How My Dad Almost Killed a Cat"

I heard this story from one of my daughter's friends the other day, and I had to share it.

When this young woman's Dad was little, he lived next door to his best friend.

They rigged a pulley system up between their bedrooms, and would send messages and other things back and forth to each other through a bucket attached to the rope.

One day, they decided it might be a good idea to try to pass the cat over to the friends' house.

But, then they thought they should test their idea first to make certain that their pulley system could support the weight of the cat.

So, they figured out how much the cat weighed.

Then, they put the same weight of rocks into the bucket and began to send it across the pulley.

The bucket got halfway across when the line snapped, and the bucket, rocks and all, came swinging down from the second story, crashed through the dining room window, and smacked the mother on the side of the head.

The end of the story?

Mom had a huge bruise on her face for days.

The cat was fine, and was never, ever placed in the bucket to go visit the neighbor.

The pulley system was permanently dismantled.