To Pee or Not to Pee

Where is the question.

It takes a sense of humor to live with a cat that pees in the bathtub. I have an idea what to do about it, but if I tell anyone—especially a non-cat person—I get the look. You know, the one with the really forced smile, like I’m nuts and they’ve had too many Botox injections.

All I can say is this: if I’m crazy, I’m in good company. The Angry Man of Jazz—Charles Mingus—toilet trained his cat, Nightlife. Fortunately for (most) everyone I know, I’ll not bore them with all the messy details of the kitty-toilet-training kind. Hence, a blog is born.

Mingus was a pioneer in an age before prefab, plastic toilet seats just for cats and flushable litter were readily available online. True to form, he improvised. In this case, with a cardboard box, shredded newspaper and some string.

Fast forward to 2009: I found two training seats options for Gizmo on the Internet.

The first is from a company called CitiKitty that promises to save me a load (no pun intended) on kitty litter for a mere $29.99 investment, plus shipping and handling.

The second, is the Feline Evolution CatSeat sold at Petco.com for $99. Note: It’s not available in stores.

Normally, my research begins and ends with the price tag. But as this is for Gizmo—and I am asking her to do something pretty amazing—I read on.

The Feline Evolution CatSeat has retractable sand-textured shelves (sounds fun to clean) and an oversized seat to help older and heavier cats balance. It also has folding legs, so it can be used as a free-standing litter box before it is mounted to the toilet.

The extra-wide seat interests me. I can only assume if Gizmo slips and falls in the toilet during the training process, all bets are off. No more dreaming of the day when I can just flush the toilet to clean up after her.

I live in a high rise, and let me tell you, kitty litter is more than a little inconvenient. For instance, everyone experiences awkward elevator moments at one time or another, but try carrying down a mysteriously odiferous plastic bag with three people on board. Of course, I always feel obliged to explain the smell. 

I point to the bag, “Cat poo.”

Then things really get quiet.

Still, I’m going with the $29.99 seat. It’s a bargain. Plus, Gizmo may eventually learn to use the ordinary human-shaped seat, sans retractable, plastic, sand-textures shelves.

Now only one questions remains: Can I turn the tables on 3.5-year-old cat who has invested so much time into training me, and actually train her to do something for a change?

Be sure and check back to see how she’s doing.

Tags: toilet train cat