Self-Cleaning Cat Boxes

The Cat Link

There are many things I could post about today from the advanced state of the sewing room, to the settling into a bit of a routine, to the great progress on in-progress craft projects, but the thing that is most pressing on my brain is how the hell to get the cats to use the litter boxes. Three floors in this house. Three litter boxers--one per floor--for their highnesses' convenience. Yet cleaning up messes is a daily struggle.

I even upped my cat maintenance game this year and got two fancy schmancy self-cleaning ones--one is a Cat Link and the other a Popur. (Jessie still has a plain vanilla you-gotta-scoop-it one in her bathroom on the ground floor. )When we got the first one--the Cat Link--Kaiju and Pavlova seemed to take to it right away. Pippen, however, seemed too big to get into it comfortably, and I didn't think he was using it. He is over 21 lbs of round orange tabby, and the opening is kind of small and spaceship-capsule-like. 

The Popur

So for the next one I got a Popur which is supposed to be for big cats, and is more open on the top. Pippen used it fine, but it scared the crap out of Kaiju and now he won't use it. The Cat Link both looks like a space capsule, and when it cleans it also revolves like one. The Popur, on the other hand, does this alien-from-space movement and rears up making a big hood when it self-cleans. I think the motion--combined with the not insignificant noise--is what scared Kaiju off. He is at least somewhat considerate, and mostly pees in my shower instead of on the carpet or in one of our chairs, but this is not the outcome I was hoping for.

Yesterday I threw in the towel and put a big corner litter box in our bathroom, and that seems to have pleased both Pippen and Kaiju. I am less pleased as I have to get down on my hands and knees to get to it to clean it. 

Meanwhile I don't know what Pavlova thinks about the new cat boxes, but I know she is all in favor of spraying on any cardboard box left on the floor. And if she does it, the boys have to follow--including Rémy who isn't even a cat. The solution for that one doesn't seem to be catbox-adjacent, and requires me to finish unpacking and get all the cardboard boxes recycled.

The moral of the story? No more cats. I am too old for this sh*t.