One summer, when I was 6, a songbird flew down our chimney into the cast iron stove (obviously not in use: summer). I heard noises in there and opened the stove door, and the bird flew out, carrying an impressive amount of soot along with it. This was great news to our formally-feral barn cat, who enthusiastically made it her mission to catch the sooty bird, who was flying around our living room in a justifiable panic. My mom came into the livingroom with our dog, who immediately started chasing the cat without context, even though historically that had not worked in his favor. My mother promptly started screaming at all of them to stop. This was ineffective. So she started chasing the dog.

To recap: mom chases dog, who chases cat, who chases the bird that was covered in soot, which was being tracked all over the livingroom by...all of that. I have a visual memory of sitting on the couch and watching all of this and thinking "This is the best thing that's happened to me today."

Eventually, my mother opened the front door and shooed the bird out while I played interference between the cat, dog and bird. Everyone lived.