Review of a product that was recently gifted to me: #1: The Cat Genie Here is a product that solves two of the most essential problems of human life. Number one: you have to do stuff. And number two (ha ha): cats poop. If I were to go on with the list, cats would take up positions 3 through 6, 10, 15, and 18 through 33. Basically what happens is that a cat eats a bunch of food, as much food as you give it, and then most of it comes out into this box with this “fresh” smelling course sand and the cat shuffles the sand around for ten to fifteen minutes and “buries” it “forever,” so that nobody will ever find it. Except that it’s exactly your job to find it. So you bend over and scoop it all up every so often and dispose of it somewhere and it’s all very unpleasant and undignified. Of course, sometimes your cat simply shits on the basement floor, but more on this later. Why am I telling you this? Why not just tell you the story about the apple falling on the scientist? It’s just as much an infallible law of nature, correct? You see, there is this thing called the Cat Genie, and I will tell you about it, but first of all, it’s very complex and sophisticated, and secondly, you won’t believe it. It’s like if some guy came up to you in a back alley and said that he wanted to give you a million dollars, no strings, just take it. You’d probably pull a gun and shoot him, if you carried a gun around with you, which, hey, I don’t think you should, but that’s another question, and I’ll readily admit that the answer to that isn’t as clear as the answer that I’m about to give you, which is basically like God coming down from on high and giving you the answers to your seventh grade Social Studies test. What this thing does is first of all, it senses when your cat does its things. It is always alert. To be fair, cats are not very subtle when they do their thing, so basically any device that could detect a mild earthquake will do the job. So we’re not very impressed yet, right? And then it waits ten minutes to begin its work, and we wonder, is that out of consideration for the cat, or simply because it’s procrastinating on that most unpleasant task. But then… It springs into action! It… wait… what is it doing? It’s lazily dropping some flimsy-looking plastic scoop into the bowl? Is it hoping to conjure the turds to itself, like some Jedi knight of, um, cat turds? But look! The bowl itself is now rotating, using some kind of law of physics (I forget which one, centrifugal force?) to draw the turds ever nigh! And it’s working! The turds are gathering. Okay, so you got all those turds in your hand, what you gonna do now, genius? “Slow down! Let me shake off the excess granules!” This part is difficult to describe, but it’s where you start to finally understand that there is a real plan here. The arm lifts, and it retracts. But as it does so, it rubs against all of these notches which give it a slight jerk, just the right amount of force to shake loose the extra litter that it has picked up, but not the heavier turds. This is one way in which it ensures that you never have to change the litter (or do hardly anything).( A caveat: if you have a kitten that likes to flop around in the litter, and treat it like a splashable pool, then yes, you’ll have to add more litter at some point.) So then you see the turds disappear down a chute. They’re getting liquefied, you are assured. But that’s just hearsey. It sounds unreal. Understand that you have spent half a day hooking the thing up to the feed line of your spare toilet (or washing machine) and feeding the “exhaust” to the respective waste line, all the while wondering what the hell you are doing, and if life isn’t just some meaningless joke. And you still feel that way, at this point. The scoop-arm drops again. This happens three times total. You think: ah, it’s got the one trick down, and it figures you won’t notice if it never does anything else. Or maybe it’s just malfunctioning, stuck on this one task. You’re losing the hint of faith that you had. But, you can’t deny: the turds are gone. Then something else happens. A rush of liquid pours into the bowl, more beautiful than any mountain spring. The bowl begins rotating again, and suddenly you get a glimmer of understanding. But not totally. The thing is just filling up with fluid and spinning around. It goes on and on. The arm comes down again to… to join the party? Oh, it’s leveling everything off, and spreading it around evenly. Finally, the liquid starts to drain out the bottom, which flows neatly into the toilet, leaving everything pure and clean. “Okay,” you say. “Nice trick. One time. Much luck with these turd monsters.” You walk away, confident that the thing will prove a disaster. You check back a few days later, and that’s when it hits you, looking down at the odorless and spotless bowl of undisturbed cat litter: this is possibly the greatest feat of engineering ever know to mankind. Then you start to worry: is there even any place for a human being any more? Can we so easily be replaced by robots? But then by chance you go into the basement and discover that one of your three cats has been steadily pooping there all along, litter box or no. All seems right once again. Thanks, Janet Sullivan. Hankie boy will come around.
Posted on: Thu, 05 Sep 2013 04:35:21 +0000
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