Had a good laugh at the comments by rgraham and doug floor plan.
Agree there's probably an exciting plan to set fire to that pile of stuff, and the idea of sending a hapless pussy cat down the laundry chute is at once hilarious, typical of what boys would do, and fully empathetic towards the terrified kitty.

I bet it involves matches.

At least that's what Erma Bombeck said. She said with boys at least you know exactly where you stand -- in the path of a hurricane. She gave the example of, when you hear a noise upstairs and you call up to a bunch of boys, "What are you boys doing up there?", they'll yell down, "We dropped the cat down the laundry chute. It was cool!" But when you hear a noise upstairs and call up to a bunch of girls, "What are you girls doing up there?", they'll yell down, "Nothing." And you have no idea what they're up to.

It's interesting that, when I tell that story to women, they almost always beat me to the punchline.

They found Timmy!

This photo, and the lads within, immediately reminded me of a scene in the 1986 coming of age film Stand By Me. "Vern" Tessio, played by Jerry O'Connell, is desperately digging under his front porch for a quart jar of pennies he buried there at the beginning of the school year!

Vern was listed as the 13,698th most popular boy baby's name in 2021.

The decline has been steady for over a century, but it appeared to hit its nadir about the time of the one-season 1988 CBS program "Hey Vern, It's Ernest!"

Rick and Marty Lagina starting their search on Oak Island. It's a Bobby Dazzler ...