However, some days “the beast” was worse than others, and after a long enough period had passed that he should only have been a pile of dry bones, we began to suspect something else. My friend Sarah was over and we commented on the smell. She got down on her hands and knees in our livig room and declared “the cat is peeing on your rug.” Not good. Cats can get very psychological about their urination habits. Once this sort of behavior begins, it’s really hard to make them stop.
We rented a steam cleaner from the grocery store and set to work on the carpet. Instead of cleaning it, the machine seemed to suck up all the urine that was located deep down and our house began to smell like a littler box. A really disgusting litterbox. So we rolled the carpet up and brought it directly to the curb. An interesting thing about our community. Anything put out to the curb becomes fair game for night trawlers in dark, wood-sided pick up trucks. Evidently, someone saw our rug, on the curb and thought they scored big. It really was a beautiful rug. I wonder how long it took for them to realize that it was permanently infused with “the beast.”
Since the smell began when we inherited the cat, we promptly relegated him to life on the front porch. We fed him out there, and visited with him, but he was no longer welcome in our house. And he lived out there for a couple of months.
And then “the beast” returned.
Our sweet dog Jack, the best dog in the world, the dog that puts all other dogs to shame was....the....beast. We couldn’t put him on the front porch. He barks. Plus I’m pretty sure he’d wander away. A trip to the vet did not prove any physiological reason for Jack’s behavior, nor any viable solution. This is the point when Amazon once again proved that theyindeed sell absolutely everything. I purchased three cloth dog diapers. One black, for formal occasions, and then some sporty blue ones for every day urination.
Jack doesn’t complain when we strap these things around him. He really bears it quite well. Much better, in fact, than a cat ever would. I worry that he’ll get wiener rot or something, so we change him frequently. Yet still, he has urine stains on his white parts, and we have to bathe him much more frequently. My husband tries to detect if the unworn diaper he’s looking at is clean and dirt by putting his nose right up in there and giving a deep sniff. And then he gags. I don’t know why he continues to check them that way, but it makes me laugh every time. I may sound like someone in a twelve step program, but Hi! My name is Julie and my dog wears diapers.