On April 6, an SOU employee sent out an email to all students. “We live in and work in a beautiful valley,” the email explained. “And if you haven’t already heard, please be aware cougars have been seen recently in and around Ashland.”
The email included a link for more information about cougars to “keep yourself, your family and pets safe.” It went on to encourage anyone who sees a cougar to call 911.
Buzzfeed reports when 23-year-old SOU senior Caleb Diaz saw the email, his first thought was the “cougar” reference referred to an older woman, not an animal.
As a joke, Caleb hit “reply all” and wrote, “That’s just my mom.”
Apparently, Caleb assumed the school would have some sort of countermeasure preventing his email from actually going to the entire school. It usually does, but for some reason, his email made it through anyway.
Caleb didn’t realize that fact until the next day. He said it nearly sent him into a panic attack. “I ran out, grabbed my laptop, and googled ‘How to delete email from Gmail that you’ve sent,’” Buzzfeed reported.
Caleb’s hoped the email would simply be missed, but it escaped into the Twitterverse.
Twitter user Laurine Devine wrote, “My school sent out a warning about cougar sighting & some kid replied to the entire school.” She included a screenshot of the original email and Caleb’s reply.
My school sent out a warning about cougar sightings & some kid replied this to the entire school 💀💀 pic.twitter.com/JjwhKRk4BM
— Lauren Devine (@laureenmarie_) April 8, 2018
It doesn’t appear Caleb will get in any trouble for the email. In fact, SOU officials–and Caleb’s mom–seemed to get a good laugh out of it.
“I just burst out laughing in my office,” one Twitter user wrote. “So did we!” replied SOU’s official account.
So did we!
— Southern Oregon Univ (@SOUAshland) April 9, 2018
Caleb told Buzzfeed his mom’s feeling were definitely not hurt. Again, that’s according to Caleb.
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