Thanks! Stuffradio, the Pac Choi is actually Fordhook Giant Chard. :) I love the galvanized tubs as well loribee! IMO they cant be beat for the price. They should last a long, long, time. Hopefully my lettuce doesn't bolt in the heat we are expecting this week! I have misters set up to try to keep them cool!

Hey Carla! I'm gonna give you my 2 cents as well. I live with 16 cats( and 11 rescue dogs) in the house. All are spayed or neutered. All are rescued strays. Some are related, most are not. All came to me a different ages. Some were born with me ( took in a pregnant mother), some were young, some were old. There are 6 females and 10 males here. I have 4 that will pee in the house. 1 old male does spray. 1 is just so feral that she freaks out, hides and then pees in my stove burners! 2 are siblings, a male and female, that suffer urinary tract trouble. The female is actually being x-rayed for stones tomorrow. They stopped using the box when it started to hurt. They associated the box with pain and thus avoided it. Needless to say, they both have seen the Vet numberous times for this trouble. I believe the problem is just hereditary with them. Looking into their mother's possible mates, I feel strongly that she bred back to her own father. The entire liter has had problems. I was able to do this because she was a stay that my mother was feeding and she was able to give me this information. The other female that freaks out so bad is also from this mother so we are not surprised that she a little mental, as some of the others from that litter are. I truly believe that all 3 of these cats have litter box issues because of their inbreeding. The 1 male that does spray came to me as an adult male tom cat. He has the big cheek patches from fighting and is FIV ( feline AIDS) possitive. He is now neutered, but does spray. I agree with quasifish that this is a behavior issue due to stress. I think he objects to there being so many cats in the house. There's only one problem with that, all my cats are people's "throw away" cats. Cats that people have dumped or abandoned. Most have problems, physical, behavioral or mental. There is no other home for them. No one wants them but me. So we have to think outside of the box to solve the problems. How I solved this one is I gave them their own room, a spare bedroom. It has a window and we removed the door and put up a screen door so they could see out and get air flow. This works great! They love their room where they only have to deal with each other and it enables me to keep an eye on the 2 with urinary trouble. If they stop using the box, I don't have to wonder who did it. The floor is vinyl for easy cleaning and the walls are painted in a semi-gloss. Everything wipes up with ease. But honesty, since Caleb (the sprayer) was put in the cat room, he hasn't sprayed. I have floor length drapes and have never found a mark on them. Now understand it is a cat room. It has beds everywhere, toys and things to climb and claw on. Everyone seems happy. All eat well and maintain a good weight. Also know that I clean houses for a living. I am a bit fussy about how clean things are kept. So to end this book, I would have to say that in my experience I don't think you have anything to worry about with this kitten. The chances of him being a sprayer are very very remote, or pretty much nonexistant. Just neuter him before 6 months old and there won't be any troubles. As for asking your Vet questions..... I used to work for a Vet and you need to remember he/she is a paid employee! You are paying them to help you and answer your questions. If this Vet or his/her staff is making you feel uncomfortable about asking for information then you need to fire their butts! That is what they are there for. That is what they are being paid for! I don't work at my Vet clinic anymore, but I call them all the time and ask questions! I even call the emergency clinic and ask them questions! If they get offended then they are a lousy clinic! As for sexing. When they are young or a male has been neutered young it is a little tougher to tell, but I will do my best to describe the difference. Pick the kitty up and face him to you, butt first. First find his rectum. It is right below the tail. Just below the rectum is his genital area (where he pees from too). In males there will be a little bit longer distance between the rectum and genital area. This is to allow for the testicals. In females, you will see that the genital are is a little bit closer to the rectum and there will be a very faint line between the rectum and gential area. If you need to, look at you other girl cats to see what I am talking about. I found a good picture, but I don't know how to post it here. So, if you email me directly, I will send it to you. Axelsrose2001@aol.com Hope all of this helps. Susan

Thanks for the encouragement. I've now gone from dreaming about counter tops to losing sleep. Last night I tossed and turned. I'm just about ready to cry from all of this. Who knew it could be so stressful to pick one island and a countertop. I must just want a kitchen I don't have. The KD of this fancy place said that my surrounding cabinets wouldn't do a honed dark granite justice. That I couldn't pull it off. I know what she means - I really don't like my cabinets at all. But they are decent 42" birch interior, maple stained cabinets made well by a local Amish man. And given the how expensive it would be to do all new everything, we really can't replace everything. So I thought/hoped that by rearranging the kitchen (the cooktop used to be on the island) and by making a really beautiful piece of cabinetry for the island, we could pull off a nicer look and more closely approximate the kitchens I love. The KD's thought was to paint the island white - Linen White by BM and then use a chocolate truffle Caesarstone on everything. I don't mind the white island, because I would love a white kitchen. But the surface of the quartz is what I don't really like. It is a great color, just too speckled looking for my taste. I asked her about using marble and honed granite, etc. and she was pretty positive it wouldn't look good. Mind you, what I have been thinking about for days and days and for hours, took her about 10 seconds to decide. If I trust her - and her kitchen store is the nicest I have ever seen - then I should seriously consider the white island and finding one color counter top. Staceyneil - I absolutely think you hit the nail on the head with the door fronts being the wrong style for the honed look. My husband actually built our last kitchen cabinets, so he is more than capable of building new fronts. I guess it is a matter of the time. We are putting in all new floors ourselves and just moved in a few months ago. But if and when we had the energy, that would make all the difference in the world and certainly would be more cost effective. The cabinet you described is exactly the look we had in our last house. It was natural cherry cabinets with a very simple shaker type door and flat drawer fronts, all full overlay. I miss our house back in NY so much (and my whole family for that matter) but we had to move to PA for a job... And so here we are, and here I am thinking/agonizing about counter tops and spending way too much time on GW! :)

If you are ok with the tv in the corner there, it is fine. If you don’t want the tv showing all the time, you could use a tv lift cabinet. They can be pricey; but since you are open to custom modifications, you could get an inexpensive cabinet/stand and have it customized with a lift mechanism. This way, when you are entertaining and don’t want the tv, you could just put a floral arrangement or even a lamp on that cabinet adjacent to love seat. And then if tv becomes a part of the equation, you can just lift it up. This mechanism is motorized: https://www.wayfair.com/furniture/pdp/progressive-automations-hidden-pop-up-tv-lift-388-inch-black-motorized-articulatingextending-arm-desktop-mount-33-62-screens-holds-up-to-135-lbs-bogr1005.html