Escape Artist

So the other day I woke up late with the boyfriend, Giuseppe. We both had a day off of work. We got up, opened the windows, made breakfast, and basically did nothing for the following two hours. Daphne was wandering in and out of the house, as she usually does.

I never let Daphne out when I am not home. there are too many tourists and stupid kids in a country that does not treat animals very well. When I am home I let her out a bit and try to keep an eye on her-- she tends not to stray too far from our "calle". In the year and two months that I have had her, she has "escaped" a couple of times-- once into the garden of my neighbor and other times into nearby buildings. I have always found her after an hour or so.

So after Giuseppe and I decided that we wanted to spend our afternoon in Padova, we got dressed and he went out to get Daphne so that we could close the house. He looked in her usual places--mostly being my neighbors' windows, but she was not to be found. Okay, not totally unusual. We started going up and down the nearby streets, looking in corners and on window sills. Still no cat. We went to all the surrounding squares. We asked the shop owners and little old women who all know Daphne. Nothing. One old crazy lady said she saw Daphne an hour before, but who knew....

So Gius and I are both fire signs (I'll get into the whole astrological thing later) but we tend to exaggerate, worry, and generally be dramatic. We came home, knowing that Daph tends to return on her own. We prepared a pasta al pomodoro half-heartedly, thinking about all the tourists and stupid teenage boys and the possible "guai". After three hours, still no Daphne. Out we went again, doing the same rounds, this time knocking on all of the "portoni", the big entrance doors to the buildings, hoping that she had gone in one and not been able to come back out. We listened for her meow. Nothing.

We came home and started making "Lost Cat" signs on the computer, choosing which photos to use. After about 15 minutes, Gius, not able to sit still, went out again to look. Soon after he called me from his cell.
"Come to the restaurant storeroom! I can hear her meowing!"

Sure enough, she had been locked into a nearby restaurant's dark, dank storeroom. They had closed it after lunchtime, and it was now almost 6 o' clock. Luckily, 15 minutes later the owner came back to open up for dinner... and Daphne came home.