There is a couch in our basement that is ground zero for a war between our two cats.
This turf war is half if not more of the reason for our philosophy on acquiring furniture for the house – we basically try not to pay for any.
We used to buy furniture, nice furniture even, and that was before we had kids and just one cat. One of the couches we purchased was this nice big thing that held a queen sized pull-out-bed. Heavy? You bet it was, but it was a great couch.
Then we picked up a 2nd cat and had a kid. Then another kid. And another kid. Eventually those two cats died and we got two others. And we had more kids.
Purchasing new beds is expensive, even if they are “just kids’ beds”.
But it was the dining room table that got us. We had a decent enough table, but it was small. We needed something that would accommodate us, especially at Thanksgiving. That led us to look at CraigsList, and we found a nice big table with 8 chairs for $150.
Ever since then whenever we’ve needed something that was the place we went to. Over the years we have picked up couches and beds for decent prices, even pianos for free.
Occasionally we will pick up something on the sidewalk, usually we wind up passing those along to other families, giving them to people we know who don’t have much but are going to be starting to set up a new place.
That’s where the current couch in question comes in.
As soon as we brought the couch home and put it in the basement the cats started their passive-aggressive war.
We had to get a plastic cover and keep it permanently on the couch. At least once a week we will find a puddle of pee on the couch. Fortunately the plastic cover helps with easy clean-up but it does make it amusing when one of the kids don’t look before sitting down.
I shouldn’t laugh, but I usually do.