A different breed of cat starred in a barroom saga in Cottonwood, Ariz., that’s “sure to become legend,” reports the Arizona Republic. The tale begins with a woman stopping her car at 10:30 p.m., after thinking she’d hit something. She had — a bobcat — which proceeded to pounce on her and rake her face with its claws. The animal then scared a worker in a Pizza Hut parking lot, before moving on to the front of a neighborhood bar called the Chaparral. There, it chased three people who were trying to leave the bar back inside: Pandemonium ensued, as patrons jumped up onto pool tables or ran around them trying to escape. The bartender made the mistake of reaching down to the bobcat to pick it up, whereupon the bobcat jumped on his face, scratching him under an eye and behind his ear. Then the animal found a new target, wrapping itself around the leg of a patron, who retaliated by punching it in the face. The bobcat lay still for a moment before racing outside through the front door, where it was shot dead by a police officer. “We’ve had calls to that bar before,” said a Cottonwood cop, “but never for a bobcat.” The bad news for everyone clawed was finding out that the bobcat was rabid; victims are now undergoing a series of five rabies shots. The good news is that the shots go in the arm nowadays. Said the bartender, “They don’t do it in the abdomen anymore. Thank God.”
Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.
