As told by Pete Schopen, owner of McHenry, Ill.-based Schopen Pest Solutions
When I was 19 and working with my dad at Mid Central Pest Control, a short-tempered woman called with an Indianmeal moth problem. I tracked the issue back to her living room vent, which contained spilled cereal.
Her husband watched me clean the vent while she ran errands. As I scooped out Cheerios, the family cat ran into the floor vent! Just a flash of fur and a skinny tail, and bam — it was gone.
“My wife loves that cat more than anything, even me!” the husband shrieked. “What are you going to do? She’ll be home any minute.”
I frantically stuck my hand deep inside the ductwork, trying to rescue the cat. Determined to stay put, the short-haired tabby mauled my wrist, forearm and hand. Fifteen minutes later, the wife returned. When she found out her cat was in the ductwork, she dropped enough F-bombs to make Gordon Ramsay blush. The dispatcher who answered the wife’s heated 9-1-1 call referred her to the local fire station, which said it couldn’t help, either.
“What am I supposed to do?” she yelled into the phone. The fire chief advised her to hire a pest management professional. Like Mt. Vesuvius exploding on Pompeii, she screamed, “I already did. He’s the one that got us in this mess!”
Schopen is owner and founder of Schopen Pest Solutions, McHenry, Ill. You can email him at pete@schopenpest.com or reach him via Twitter: @schopenpest; Instagram: @peteschopen; or Facebook: Schopen Pest Solutions, Inc.
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