Cat Tales

We have two cats adopted from the shelter – Calliope and Pattipaws (Cally and Patty respectively). My DH, who has long insisted that he does not like cats, really likes these two. However, he hates the litter box. In the 16+ years we have lived in this house, we have tried to find an appropriate place for this much needed accoutrement. It’s not so much of a problem when the weather is nice and they go out, but we live in Vermont where the weather is often NOT nice for long periods of time. The cats beg to go out, but when the door is opened, they look outside, turn around and walk away, leaving the door opener (and everyone else in the vicinity) freezing. The box has been in the downstairs bathroom, the upstairs hall, my sewing room, and in a spare room we used as a home gym. None of these places were acceptable to DH who complained of litter being tracked on the floors and the odor of a freshly used box.

After much discussion, he finally suggested the basement as an appropriate resting place for the box. He would put a pet door in the basement door so that we could leave the door closed. I argued that that it would be too much of a change for them to have to go through a pet door, so we decided on a graduated plan for the change. First, move the box downstairs to the basement and leave the basement door ajar. Next, cut a hole in the basement door, close the door and hope that they would go through the hole. And, finally, install the pet door and hope for the best. Sounded good to me, except for one major flaw - we live in an old farmhouse and the basement is often quite wet when the snow melts or we have a lot of rain (both common occurrences in VT).

To keep my little kitties’ feet dry, my husband made a trip to Home Depot and built a large platform at the bottom of the stairs which would ensure that both kitty and human feet would not have to wade through water. With the platform finished, the big day arrived. We carried the litter box to its new home in the basement. We brought Patty and Cally downstairs to visit their new loo and made sure the door was always ajar. It seemed perfectly simple.

There was another problem, however. Although the majority of the basement has a concrete floor, the area that houses the oil burner and oil tank is gravel. Oops – it looked like one big litter box to one of the girls. Another trip to Home Depot and we had builder’s plastic and marble chips to cover the gravel area. Now it looked like an even nicer big litter box. Back to the drawing board and Home Depot. This time DH returned with two by fours and chicken wire. He proceeded to build a wall to block off the gravel section of the basement with a chicken wire wall. However, since the oil burner lives in there, he needed to make a door with a latch so the oil burner tech could get in there for repairs and cleaning. By this time, the cost was high enough that I could have bought one of those fancy electric automatic cat boxes, but we were in too deep and he was determined!

Now with the oil burner safely caged lest it should go on a rampage, we should have been good to go – NOT. The next morning, DH went down to clean the box only to find that it was not being used by one of the girls. Instead he found a deposit next to the box right on his foot protecting platform. He cleaned up and moved the box over the offending spot. The next morning the deposit was in front of the box. This continued for several days. Now what??? DH wanted to go the pet store for advice – I wanted to go to the pet store to buy a second litter box. I won. The second litter box was placed next to the first and (knock wood) the problem seems to be solved. And, as an added bonus, we have a great cage in the basement should we ever decide to breed little oil burners or lock up intruders.

Stay tuned for what happens when he cuts the hole in the door and puts in the pet door. I shudder to think…