To Dream the Impossible Dream

With there being well over 6.7 billion people on this planet, that represents a heck of a lot of people's wishes and dreams. Individuals that listen to National Public Radio would probably like to see Peace on Earth, die-hard Cub fans would like the team to finally win the World Series, and perhaps those pesky North Koreans really just want unfettered access to Starbucks and Webkins - who knows for sure?

As for me, my aspirations are far, far lower - but no less personally meaningful.

All I am looking for is the perfect low-cost, low-mess way to dispose of our cats' litter.

Sure, it is nice having four cats - being the persnickety types they are, at least this enhances the odds that one of them will actually like me at any given time (often those odds are better than with my wife...). Plus, they make great bed heaters in the winter, and we can use the fur they shed as cost-effective and plentiful kindling for our Weber grill.

However, just like the old Dunkin' Donuts commercials, I have to scoop up the litter, no matter the time of day or night. It really is amazing how much they (ahem) output on a daily basis - and that is in four separate litter boxes that we have to maintain. I fully expect to see a note from our garbage man one of these Fridays, explaining we were over our limit - hence the un-emptied can.

Yes, I have seen the many different models of high-tech litter boxes - but these eventually all still need to be emptied and refilled with litter. And we just do not have the space in our basement for a veritable farm of these contraptions, whirring all day and night and jacking up our electric bill, too.

The low-tech version (as seen above) is not an option, either. One of my friends tried unsuccessfully to trick their cat to go in the toilet - so we are going get all of our cats thusly trained? And even if we did, we'd be flushing the toilet even more frequently than scooping the litter...

So, I am magnanimously passing up the opportunity to make this fortune exclusively by myself to toss this idea out to you (the three or so of you that accidentally happen by this blog) for help. I am convinced if we can come up with the right idea, we won't need universal health care at all - we'll make so much friggin' money, we can each have one of those CVS Minute Clinics installed in our homes.

And, I have the perfect name all picked out:

"The Lit-Ter-Minator".

Just say it in a Schwarzenegger-like accent - guaranteed to make you laugh.