Pee Problem

As I mentioned in the blog about our Christmas tree, Louis isn't a fan of the tree. The first night we got it home, he "marked" the skirt. I washed the skirt that night (last Monday), put it back with gifts on it, and we figured he'd leave it alone. Not so much. Wednesday afternoon he found the one spot without a gift on it, and "marked" again. Furious, I rewashed the skirt, this time putting it back in the Christmas decoration box once it was clean. Fine, I guess we just have to have beach towels around our tree this year. No biggie - you can't see them anyway with all those presents. Problem solved, right? No..afraid not.

Friday evening I was on the phone with my mom when I pulled in the garage. I was just telling her how I think we solved the "pee problem". I got off the phone, got out of the car, and went inside. A wall of pee stink hit me in the face. Louis had struck again. Cortney was just in the throes of washing the blanket on the back of the couch (yes, the one I blogged about that Louis made his permanent bed). He must have saved up because that was the most liquid we had ever seen come out of that cat. Yes, I was livid. The cat was yet again banished to the basement.

We kept checking his litter box - he was using it. On a normal, frequent basis. We even removed the hood so he would be more encouraged to use it. It wasn't that he WASN'T using the box - it was that something (my guess is the Christmas tree) was making him mad upstairs. Again, we thought we solved the problem. He was good Saturday, Sunday, and Monday. We thought he was done fighting. Wrong again.

Tuesday, in the 10 minute overlap when Cort left for bowling and I came home from Christmas shopping with my dad, Louis decided to use the last remaining blanket that he frequents as a nap spot as a toilet. This time it soaked through the blue fleece blanket onto the white, decorative afgan, and onto the leather chair. I thought I was going to murder him. So I spent two hour using leather cleaner and conditioner and a product called No Mark and I finally got the smell out of the chair. I did NOT, however, let the cat back upstairs that night.

I don't know WHAT his problem is, but he lives downstairs now at night while we sleep and during the day when no one is home. He is fine down there in the family room. His food is down there and his litter box is in the unfinished bathroom downstairs. He of course meows like crazy when he realizes someone is up and moving around upstairs. We let him up when he can be supervised, but not otherwise. We figure we will have to keep this up at least through next week until after Christmas when the tree comes down and we clean the carpet. There must be SOME smell on that tree that is threatening to him making him think he needs to leave his scent. Or he is just pissed at us for getting a tree. Who knows what goes on in the mind of a cat!