Never thought I'd miss Petsmart

Pet stores simply don't exist in Lima. The "pet store" is simply a couple of shelves of pet supplies in the lobby of a veterinarian's office. Their entire stock could fit in my living room and there's little to no predictability about the products that will be available.

My cat is a picky woman. She likes cold water, preferably as it is falling from the bottle. She only eats crunchy treats. For food flavor, she sticks to seafood unless it's the fancy canned stuff, then she'll branch out to chicken. And for a scratching post, she will only use cardboard. Oh that's right, or my couch.

Months ago I found the perfect cardboard scratching contraption for her but she has clawed it to pieces. I've been searching for a decent replacement for weeks and unfortunately, the abysmal selection in Peruvian "pet stores" just isn't cutting it. Don't Peruvian cats need to scratch too? Where are all the scratching posts?

We've been to nearly a dozen pet stores, even one that my boyfriend's aunts called "grandasa" (really, really big). To me really, really big is Petsmart. To his aunts evidently really, really big is a store that could fit in the cat adoption room at Petsmart. Not quite the same thing.

So I have taken it upon myself to spoil my cat some more (and save my couch) by making a cardboard cat scratching post for Ms. Emmaline. Thanks to the world wide web, I have find some easy instructions. The doorman at my building saved some cardboard for me. I finally found a box cutter and now I'm good to go. Let's just hope this picky cat isn't too picky for DIY projects.