I recently had to take my cats to the vet. Anyone familiar with cats knows that they hate going to the vet, and mine are certainly no exception. When I scheduled the visit, I must have had a mental lapse because I scheduled it at a time when I was home alone. Being a long-time cat owner I should know better. With just one cat you have the element of surprise and it's fairly easy to get them into the pet carrier, but once you capture one, the other one wises up real quick and is off and running.

Pearl was easy. She is a bit of a glutton so all I had to do was set out a little food. Creed was a little more suspicious and as soon as he saw me pick up Pearl, he was gone. He took me on a run of the house from the basement upstairs through the living room and up more stairs to the bedrooms. I dove for him as he went for my daughter's bed and was rewarded with a huge bruise from her bed as he fled. (I swear I heard him laugh as he jumped over me on his way back to the basement!) I got quite a workout before finally catching him. Who needs a stair stepping exercise machine? Just come to my house on vet day.

When the family is home it's a little easier. Yesterday when we had to give them flea meds, we spread out, staking out the usual escape paths and managed to catch both cats without sustaining any injuries.

It's a wonderful thing when the family works together and it can work in our family history research as well. No, I don't mean shanghaiing the family into helping file that pile of papers that is slowly taking over my desk again, or searching the Manhattan census page by page for my elusive Kelly ancestors. Like Creed, they'd catch on quickly and be off hiding under the bed too. Since today begins Women's History Month, today's column will focus on locating female ancestors--with a little help from family, of course...

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