Tales of a Cat Door

I like sleeping with my door shut. (It's a necessity with roommates, since everybody goes to bed and gets up at different times.) When I got Ebony, I quickly realized that I needed a new sleeping solution. The first few days after I got her, she would wake me up in the middle of the night wanting to go out into the living room at 3 am.

I decided that I needed to install a cat door in my bedroom door so that she could come and go as she pleased without bothering me. Since I lived in an apartment, I couldn't cut a hole in the door. I looked on craigslist and found someone who was selling old doors. (She was remodeling her house and getting new doors.) One of the doors was the right size for me, so I bought it. I hauled it home in my little Toyota. I have no idea how I made it fit. The door never closed properly, so I had to use gate latches to keep it shut, but it allowed Ebony to move in and out freely. When I moved from one apartment to the next, I took the door with me.

It still didn't fit properly in the next place, but I used it anyway. (The dreaded apartment about which I've blogged previously.) When I moved back in March, I tossed the door out because I no longer needed it and it was in pretty bad shape anyway. I moved to my own roommate-free apartment, so I decided I would just leave my door open and let Ebony have free reign of the place. Then Jen moved in, so I needed a door again.

I measured the door and bought one that was supposedly the same size at Home Depot. My dad came over to help me install the cat door and then put the door up. Well, the door was about 3/8" too wide. My dad and I are both really good at computers, but we're pretty hopeless with home improvement tasks. (One time it took us four hours to put together a bunk bed because we put it together in every incorrect manner possible and had to redo it three times.)

I put up a message on Facebook asking for help, and one of my friends volunteered her father. My dad got in touch with her dad, and it turns out that the problem was bigger than we thought. He ended up having to get a new door from a lumber company, and they cut the cat door hole and everything. The door was installed last night.

Ebony loves her new cat door, and I love that she can walk in and out as she pleases. I'm totally getting some duct tape to darken the clear cat flap, though. Light from the living room was shining in last night.