Pease Crows Nest

Oct 31- Nov 1: Tommie Found!

Starring - Tommie “Houdini” Pease as herself, co starring- Kathy and Dan Pease as Tommie’s people, Denny and Laura Herrmann as Cat super-sleuths, and Holly Childs as The Cat Whisperer. Supporting rolls played by the entire Haven Harbour yard crew including Ship-Wreck Larry. Introducing Jezebel and Chloe as the Nuisance Kitten and the Tommie Stand-In Kitten. Transportation provided by Janie Meneeley and Erica Stewart.

Tommie earlier this summer.

As you already know, on October 18th 2015 we made Haven Harbour Marina in Rock Hall MD our port of call. It had been a rough day, made worse by a pesky engine alarm that just wouldn’t quit. Shortly after docking at the far reaches of the marina, and being met by cousins Denny and Laura, we set off for a visit at their house. Tommy, left to her own devises, made her break. We will never know how or why she did it, but somehow she got to shore. When we returned that evening, the boat was empty, no cat to be found.

The next three days were spent combing the area, but a cat who doesn’t want to be found, or isn’t around, is very hard to find. Talk about a needle in a haystack, we didn’t even know which haystack, or if there even was one.

Wednesday afternoon, we gave up looking and decided to move on, sad in leaving without our Tommie. But Laura, Denny, Holly and the boatyard and town’s people were very supportive and helped us get lost cat signs out, and promised to keep an eye out for us. Several times over the next week we received calls about a found cat, but none were the right one, each time our hopes were raised, but to no avail.

We visited Annapolis, Oxford, Solomons Island, and several days up the Potomac River to Mt Vernon when we got a call from Denny, “we think we have seen Tommie!” Ship-Wreck Larry was looking out the window of his motor-sailor and a cat was looking in. The cat matched Tommie’s description, and MO. Had she really been drawn to another motor-sailor? So many disappointments we tried hard not to get our hopes up.

We didn’t share the potential news with anyone for fear of jinxing our luck. We toured Washington DC with hope and good thoughts. Then the roller-coaster started in high gear.

The day after we had left DC we were eating breakfast at anchor in Potomac Creek off Virginia when I received a text message picture, and before I could look at it, cousin Denny had called Kathy’s phone, “We have Tommie!” I checked my phone and sure enough it was a picture of Tommie, wild eyed, in a cage!

Denny and Laura said they would bring Tommie to us, all we had to do was figure a good place to meet. We decided on a marina in Port Tobacco, so we hastily got underway for the three hour trip.

Sunrise with sea mist - Potomac Creek

Then 30 minutes later another call. Denny, “Tommie got away”. While transferring from one carrier to the next Tommie made her move from her unfamiliar captors and was once again on the loose. What to do next?

No question, we must go to Rock Hall and help apprehend that cat.

We kept making for Port Tobacco and put plan B into action. Janie Meneeley, our friend in Annapolis, had let it slip that she had 2 cars, so a phone call later she was on her way to meet us at Port Tobacco. We all arrived within minutes of each other and hopped into Janie’s little pick-up, (remember the ones without a back seat?), and were off to her house in Takoma Park. There we had a bite to eat and transferred our gear to Janie’s little car and off we go for the Beltway and the Chesapeake Bay Bridge.

On our way, Kathy called Holly, the Rock Hall cat rescuer, and filled her in on the situation. Holly mobilized and helped Denny set three more traps, all baited with fresh tuna.

After a beautiful drive thru the fall colors all the way along we arrived in Rock Hall. Denny and Laura met us and showed us where Tommie was last seen, around three un-occupied summer homes across the dead-end street from their house.

Each of the houses were built on legs and all had lattice-work around the perimeter. One was all open underneath and filled with kayaks, boat gear, yard equipment, you name it. The perfect place for a cat to hide. The other houses had an alleyway around the house foundation 3 or 4 feet back from the perimeter lattice-work. All had plenty of places to chase a cat, but there were lots of escape routes.

Of course we had no idea where to start, was she staying put, or making her way back to the boatyard where she was first caught? Hard to get into the head of a cat. We spent the day looking and calling, back and forth around the houses, to the boatyard and back, on and on.

At suppertime, somewhat discouraged, we took a break and took Denny and Laura to supper at a local seafood place. We had a good break and enjoyed the small-town atmosphere.

Back to the neighborhood, we started looking for Tommie again now that it was dark. Wait, a cat in a trap! Not Tommie, a black and white kitten. one of the neighbors had two cats, this black and white as well as a smaller version the same colors as Tommie. That had the makings of a confusing and frustrating chase, as that kitten was having lots of fun with these 4 humans and their 2 flashlites.

We finally decided to give the traps a chance to do their work and went inside for a while, still having no confirmed sighting of the real Tommie.

At about 11 o’clock we all went back outside for one last look.

Laura was scoping out the southern most house crawlspace and hollered to us, “I see three sets of eyes!” So I carefully picked my way into the space and spotted two tabbies, one going out to the South and one to the North.

Kathy confirmed that the South bounder was not Tommie; good, that meant Tommie was headed for the trap area. We followed her blind trail and got her to answer our calls, a step in the right direction.

She eventually led us to the third house and ran in underneath, into the only lattice alley without and escape route. A slam-dunk, I had her cornered. She went into a little space of the end of the corridor where I could just get my hand to her, where she backed right in hissing and growling. Kathy was able to see her and took my flashlite while I tried to stroke Tommie’s chin to calm her down. I was able to grab her by the back of the neck and pull her out at which she just went limp in my arms. Success!

Then as I am crawling out with her in my arm, she comes alive and is Gone! She had evaded me, which I should have known she would do. Off she went into the darkness. I felt like I had just muffed the last second winning touchdown pass in the Super-Bowl. Right there, I had her. Then I didn’t. How could it have happened, and how would we ever have a better chance than that?

We decided that enuf was enuf for that night and headed back to Denny and Lauras’ house. Neither Kathy nor I slept much, both reliving the moment of success and failure over and over, and trying to get into a Tommie’s head. What will she do next?

I was making all sorts of plans for the next day’s foray. More flashlites for sure, seal up some points of egress under those houses, and get rid of those other two kittens! My nights’ planning was never needed, as at 0600 I decided enough laying awake was enough, and went to check the traps. I walked right by the first one as I saw the black and white in the second, screaming for all she was worth. Then I went back to the first, and there was Tommie, sitting quiet as a mouse, can of tuna clean as a whistle in her little trap, safe at last.

We decided that since Tommie was confined to her carrier that we had better make our exit and make our way back to the Willie Dawes. We set out at once to return Janie’s car. When we contacted Janie we found she was busy all day long, what to do?

Another quick call to Washington DC to our friend and ex-Lewis R French Crew Erica Stewart. She said she was free and would meet us at Janie’s, we could leave Janie’s car then Erica would deliver us to Port Tobacco. Everything coming into place.

We got back to Port Tobacco and the marina, said our goodbyes to Erica and the crew at the marina, and dropped our lines.

Tommie was not to be out of the carrier until we were out of pier-head-leap range!

We anchored, gave Tommie a flea bath, just in case, and had a very quiet night 100 yards off the marina, Tommie purring up a storm, and very happy to be back aboard the Willie Dawes. Maybe almost as happy as we were to have her back.