(242) BOB CATO, ONE YEAR LATER

My friend, Bob Cato, died on July 12, 2008.

There are so many Bob Cato stories that I could fill a book. In fact, I have dedicated part of a book to our adventures together. Unfortunately some of the ventures cannot be mentioned because the statute of limitations has not run. However, this is one for the books, and it is benign. I may be repeating it; if I have, forgive me. I haven’t gone back and read every blog to make certain that this is not repetitious.

Bob was sitting on the front porch of a friend's house with Warren Scovell when a sheriff arrived with a summons/warrant for the friend who occupied the house. What was the problem? The problem: the friend allowed his cow to run free, and the cow had found its way into the neighbor’s garden, which was about a hundred yards from where Bob and the others were sitting, and the cow was munching down the neighbor’s crops. The cow had been doing this on a regular basis, and finally the neighbor took a warrant because the cow was out of control, running free and eating his crop. According to Warren Scovell,Bob asked the sheriff what this was about, and he said, "I have a summons for the owner of the house." Bob said, "Would you read it to me?" The sheriff complied and read the Summons and the Complaint to Bob. Bob said, "You’re reading that to the wrong person. You should read that to the cow that’s over there in the garden eating the man’s crops." Somehow this made sense to the sheriff, who dutifully traversed the distance and read the summons to the cow. Cato, Scovell and the friend who owned the house had a hard time repressing their laughter until the sheriff left.

What was the outcome? It must have worked because no one can remember the cow eating in the neighbor’s garden again. So while Bob and the others enjoyed a good laugh, in the end the sheriff reading the summons to the cow worked.

Respectfully submitted,
Donald M. Heavrin,
Your Servant of Truth
in the Garden of Life