scratch lounge!

i love my cat, oscar wilde (also known as “oscy,” also known, embarrassingly, as “foofy schnoofer”), dearly. he is one of the best things in my life. he gives eskimo kisses (seriously); he meows at the door when he hears my keys turning in the lock; he rolls over on his back when he wants to be petted; and he’s a saint for taking all of the medicine i give him on a daily basis and not hating my guts. he’s perfect. and he’s been through a lot: he was a stray (abandoned, i think), had two surgeries and has been on the aforementioned meds for the past 10 months. what a survivor.

he does, however, like to scratch the crap out of my furniture. and it’s not like i have a lot of great stuff to speak of, but i love the victorian-style loveseat that i inherited from my parents, and my blue-and-green urban outfitters chair is one of the first pieces of furniture that i bought on my own. so when i was in pennsylvania and saw my aunt’s three cats fawning over a cardboard-box-looking thing, i had to ask her what it was.

“it’s called a scratch lounge,” she replied. “they love it. they used to line up for a turn to sit in it, so i bought two more. they don’t scratch the furniture at all anymore.”

and it’s not just her cats that love it: my uncle’s fluffy monster, piqué, goes nuts over her scratch lounge, and another one of my aunt’s friends has had success with it, too. so i went to the web site, read the testimonials and ordered one. (ok, truthfully, my mom ordered one for me – but she also got one for her and my dad’s cats.) this thing looks awesome – it comes with a bag of catnip, contains no scary chemicals, is made of 100 percent recyclable materials and the company donates 10 percent of the profit from each scratch lounge to the amanda mobile foundation, a dog and cat rescue organization.

granted, the scratch lounge isn’t the most attractive thing i’ve ever seen, and i’m still on the hunt for a nice kitty bed for oscar. but you know what? if this gives him even a sixteenth of the amount of joy he’s given me over the past year and a half, then it will be more than worth it.