A few years ago my neighborhood had a bad cat overpopulation problem. I’d find kittens dead in the street and slinking ferals behind every nook and cranny in my overgrown yard. I took to setting a borrowed trap every night and ended up catching about one every other morning. At lunchtime, I’d come home and spay or neuter it—on my glass and steel kitchen table.

Sounds a little rustic, I know, especially without technical assistance. But someone had to do it, right? The cats uniformly did well, running off the next morning with a full meal in their bellies and a serious aversion to my yard.

So it was that when I read about a brave vet in Pittsburgh I was impressed—very impressed. This guy stopped mid-spay to run upstairs and secure his family’s safety (it was one of those hospital/home arrangements), rescued the clinic’s animals, then grabbed the spay and finished his work out of doors. Now that’s rustic.

I like to think of vets as able to think on their feet and capable of working under challenging conditions, but this one beats ‘em all. Someone give this guy a medal—or at least donate to his fund for a new hospital.