Tawt I Taw A Putty Tat

We are the proud caretakers and slaves to three cats, all who came to us through the Humane Society.  Kittles is the oldest and the only girl.  She is a slender 10 year old tortoiseshell who adores Doug and tolerates me when she is desperate and demands some petting.  She is not a lap cat by any means but I can, on occasion, get her to settle down.  That is until Doug enters the room.  Then she is up and ready for her close up.

Toby and Tyler came to us together as kittens four years ago.  These two boys are about a week apart in age and nothing like Kittles.  Tyler is the Big Guy.  He is 20 pounds of yellow cat.  I call him my baby puma.  His feet are huge, his head is flat.  He walks around like a lion.  He also has the tiniest mew mew voice (unless he is in the car!).  A true Baby Huey.

Toby is our Upstairs Scardycat.  He loves and appreciates the upstairs and spends most his day there.  When he comes down, he is a bit startled, walking quickly and avoiding eye contact.  We call him "Little Guy" because at 17 pounds and short little legs, he is the smaller of the two boys.  He is a beautiful American Shorthair.

Tyler developed a nervous problem after we had the bathroom remodeled.  He would get excited or upset and pee.  Give him catnip, he would be all over it and then pee about a foot away.   At first we thought it was just a behavioral problem and tried to work with it.  We then found it was an emotional problem.  Those workers really bothered him, especially after he had to go to the Kitty Hotel while they installed and stained the hardwood floors in the living room, hallway and stairs.  He is on medication now and rarely pees in inappropriate places.

But the upstairs reeked of cat.  We had the carpets shampooed.  We bought a shampoo machine.  We bought stock in cat urine remover–we call it kitty pee juice.  We finally tore out the carpet in our bedroom and installed hardwood floors.  We figured that would be easier to clean up if something happened.  We then had the guest room and computer room carpets shampooed.  But the odor continued from the guest room.

Yesterday we tore up the old carpet in the guest room.  We can’t afford to install hardwood floors at this time, but decided to just paint the floorboards with KILZ and worry about covering it later.  What we found under the carpet was old linoleum.  Ugly old linoleum, probably from the ’20s.  I figured it would grow on us…  Unfortunately, it is probably asbestos backed, so we need to have it removed.  Just as well…vintage or not, it is ugly.

But until then, the house is finally cat pee free.  Life is good.
peace~~~