The Slice: Maybe your cat is just shy

What are the three biggest reasons why your cat is not an Internet sensation?

Let’s move on.

More tales of phone courtesy: “I arrived at Fairchild AFB with my new bride in 1971,” wrote Frank Kondler. “We were lucky to get base housing almost immediately. It didn’t take long to realize our home phone number was very close to the NCO Club paging number. This was before Caller I.D., so I had to pick up if I wanted to know who was calling. Most of the time when I informed the caller that he/she had the wrong number, the response was polite and apologetic. On one occasion however, things did not go well.

“It was on New Year’s Eve. I don’t recall the year. The woman who called had obviously been partying already. When I told her she had the wrong number she called me a liar and said I had better page her husband right now. I just hung up.

“In a matter of seconds she called back and once again insisted I had better page her husband or else. I told her to hold and covered the mouthpiece of the phone. After an appropriate amount of time, I came back on the phone and told her that her husband did not answer the page, but a buddy of his told me that he had left with some woman. I then hung up.

“I did not hear of any homicides on Fairchild the next few days and don’t know how things turned out for the husband. Some time after that the NCO Club number must have been changed because the wrong-number calls stopped.”

That reminds me of a time long ago when I was spending time with a football coach named Pepper Rogers for a story. He received a wrong-number call from a brusque man demanding to speak to some woman.

Rodgers got the idea that the woman was someone the guy was seeing socially. And he didn’t really care for the caller’s tone. So Rodgers said, “She’s gone. She went out with a doctor.”

Feedback: After The Slice alluded to the overpopulation of cats, a North Idaho reader sent a note: “Centuries back France burnt cats and became overrun with mice and rats.”

So there you go.

Today’s Slice question: Do any sack-lunch packers still include little notes?