At about 3 in the afternoon I was emailing my husband to say I wanted to get out of the house a little bit. While doing so, I hear a noise in the chimney that sounds like an animal is in there. Because our fireplace is in the basement, the chimney is right in the middle of the living room. My husband emails back and says there are probably some birds up around the top of the flue. I forget about it. He comes home and we go to the mall. So, we get home pretty late, and I notice the lamps are knocked over. Oh well, we have bad cats, it happens. I sit down to turn on the computer. Dave goes to put Jack's pajamas on. We have a dual reclining sofa, and I kick up the footrest and turn on the laptop. Suddenly I hear this wierd noise. My first thought "Oh my god, the cat is somehow stuck in the sofa and is dying or something."

I kick the footrest back down. Noise again. By now I am getting nervous and upset. I start calling the cat. He comes around the side of the sofa, he is filthy and still there is that wierd noise. I start calling my husband to "come right now because I am scared!" At this point I am thinking the noise is the cat's hunting call and that he is making it around whatever the prey *was,* as I am imagining it is alive and is stuck in his throat.

My husband fiddles around some more before coming to my aid, and by this point I am on top of another piece of furniture and not going anywhere near the sofa. I scoop up Jack, because surely whatever is going on is going to have to come out sooner or later. At this point my husband decides there is a SQUIRREL IN OUR SOFA. In our sofa. Inside of it.

Apparently, while we were at the mall, the cats pawed at the glass door on the fireplace until the squirrel was loose in here (seeing visions of Christmas Vacation yet?) Somehow the 3 cats and one frightened squirrel made it up out of the basement and into the living room, where said squirrel is now cowering INSIDE my sofa. At this point, I literally peed in my pants. Then I did what any good daughter would do and I called my father. He says to call an exteriminator. I start looking in the phone book. The ads for exterminators say "FINANCING AVAILABLE". I say, "we are going to need financing to get this thing out of my house?" My dad says, "Honey, it isn't a predator, it's FOOD." Gee, thanks Dad. LOL

We decide that Jack and I and the cats should be locked in our bedroom. My husband closes all the bedroom doors, opens the outside doors, and attempts to scare the thing out of the sofa. Jack and I are lying in our bed and Jack keeps saying "mama, you need to wash your pants." (LOL, that kid cracks me up.) Then he says, "Is Dada cleaning up the cats? Is Dada gonna sleep on the sofa because his blanket is in the wash?" (Where does he come up with this stuff?)

Meanwhile, I am yelling out, "is it gone yet?" In the end, my husband scooted the couch until it was in front of the front door, and then pushed this pet trainer thing we have (it emits some horrible only heard to animals loud noise) until the damn squirrel ran out the front door.

And the moral of this very long story is "when your wife says at 3 pm that there is an animal in the chimney, someone better do something about it, and that doesn't mean go to the mall."