Cat's Night Out

While in this case curiosity did not kill the cat, it certainly made for a long, uncomfortable night for him.
We just got back from a great 3-day trip to Stockholm, only to find hot, muggy conditions in Belgium. To let in some fresh air, we opened all the windows in our house, screened or not (we've put screens in about half; they are almost unknown in most of Europe). The unscreened window in the bathroom opens to a small, extremely steep part of the roof, which empties into a horizontal metal rain trough.
It was dark outside by the time I closed the non-screened windows (queue the scary music...). Little did I know that big, gray Max had somehow decided to take a road trip out of the window, somewhere onto the trough below (or so we assume). The only way we learned of this was 6 hours later, as were waking up. We heard his tiny, muffled meowing and only slowly grasped what had happened: the guy had spent the entire night outside the window, somehow perched 15 feet above the deck on a trough measuring no more than a couple of inches. To say that he was happy to be back indoors is an understatement. He may never venture near a window again. Then again, Max is not the sharpest knife in the drawer, so I guess we'd better check carefully each and every night...