javachick, after the attempts to use one like Cash recommended and finding it not tall enough to really stop the problem, I'm afraid the one you linked to is not tall enough either. Not to mention the corner where one of the boxes has to be sometimes freezes in winter, causing the plastic of the cat to get brittle and crack, so it would make me feel like I had doubly wasted the money $25 on a broken litter box that didn't do me any better than a $12 one. Everyone is trying to help, but Harvey manages to trump all that.

beth, if you built a sort of ramp, or steps, up to the opening, I'll bet your arthritic cat could use that box. We've had to cobble ladders and things for our three-leggity guy to get up and down from windows. I'm sure you and your clever spouse could figure something out.

That's a fabu litterbox, Cash, but it still has a seam where the top and bottom meet, and from Andi's description, I think Harvey's aim is higher than that.

I know there was more. I forget.

Andi, is it someplace where you could tape up sheets of plastic to protect the walls and floors? Sorry you have to deal with it. I know how frustrating it probably is.

Kristin--the tub guy you recommended is coming to do our tub tomorrow. Thanks for telling me about him!

It's still Matilda's birthday where Matilda is, right?

It is!

One year ago I left my wife and child at the hospital to go sleep in my own bed.

I woke up to find out they'd spent the night in the NICU. I spent the next day rocking Matilda in the NICU and singing a new lullaby just for her.

And then she was okay.

Cash, that's not a bad idea. What we have right now, is a layer of cheap 12" linoleum floor tiles, the kind with the peel-off backing over the adhesive, under the litter box. It's a pretty easy clean-up, but in a not-easy-to-reach space (sandwiched between the deep-freeze and the wall, and with a stack of stuff blocking easy access for humans but not for cats in front of it.

I think it is too early in my cycle for the excessive reaction to be PMS. Is there such a thing as pre-PMS?

Oh! It's Matilda day. Happy Matilda Day, everyone! That's a much happier thought. Mmmm. Mental images of pics of Matilda and Emmett together definitely make everything better.

is it my imagination, or is there a lot of cool folks from other shows in Bionic Woman?

Two from BSG and, I think that was Badger from Firefly in prison.

Two from BSG and, I think that was Badger from Firefly in prison.

Also from BSG. Heh.

So I'm working away on my manuscript. A colonel is flattering his commanding officer a bit, talking about the utter success of their most recent action.

He called it "a glorious battle."

In my mind's eye, my characters instantly morphed from humans in the elegant officers' uniforms of 200 years ago, developing ridged foreheads and growing long, long hair. Their discreet glasses of claret disappeared, replaced with great goblets of blood wine. My colonel's concern that the general would give him a stern tongue-lashing upon learning he allowed an important enemy leader to slip through his fingers became shame and terror that his fearsome commander would declare him without honor and kill him where he stood.

So. Humans cannot fight glorious battles. The very phrase transforms them into Klingons.