Janus am I; oldest of potentates;
Forward I look, and backward, and below
I count, as god of avenues and gates,
The years that through my portals come and go.
Welp, ahhh… yep—it’s January 2025. Crack your knuckles, grab a bowl of popcorn, and let’s do dis. January gets its name from the Roman god Janus, and as the excerpt from the Henry Wadsworth Longfellow poem above (“January”) so beautifully conveys, Janus is the protector of gates and doorways and symbolizes endings and new beginnings. Lotta shenanigans are gonna be side kicking their way through this year’s door, begetting an entertaining (and likely terrifying) 2025. Fun! January is a time to make resolutions for the new year. This practice of annually being resolute with our behavior began in 2000 BCE. During the 12-day festival of Akitu, the Babylonians celebrated the beginning of the farming season by returning borrowed farm equipment to their knights. This whole-ass festival of returning gardening tools was a symbol of the resolution to pay debts in the coming year. Today our resolutions tend to be of the more spiritual, organizational, or corporeal variety: going to church more, cleaning your house, or drinking less and being more active. And let’s not forget how much of a hoot New Year’s Eve can be! Whether you’re sloshing your way into 2025 by downing champagne, singing “Auld Lang Syne” and making out, or tooting your way into the new year by housing a bowl of black-eyed peas (don’t choke on the penny!), I hope you enter through the year’s door with a smile on your face, positive thoughts in your head, and with your house in order. Now return your neighbor’s hoe, and let’s talk cleaning!
Are self-cleaning litter boxes worth it?
Ah yes, the age-old question of whether to scoop feline poo manually or let a robot do it. Two of my best friends and favorite people on the planet, Quintron and Miss Pussycat, just adopted two delightful kittens, a trickster tortie named Grendel and a sassy Siamese named Peanut, and they are asking themselves this very question. Our love affair with pussycats began around 12,000 years ago when the people of the Fertile Crescent stopped roaming the land and started to cultivate it. The growth of crops and storage of grains attracted rodents, and the rodentia attracted the African wildcat, a.k.a. Felis silvestris lybica (Possibly the origin of cartoon heroes Felix The Cat and Sylvester The Cat?). As cats do, they stayed for the food, allowed the locals to hang with them, and eventually evolved into the domesticated Felis catus. And boy, us humans sure do love kitties! Egyptians worshipped, mummified, and sometimes dressed them in gold jewelry (I can relate—my cat Mignon wears a gold dookie chain. The adoration is real). They are so good at murdering rats that the Royal Post and U.S. Postal Service made them bonafide employees! People began pss pss pssing cats indoors about 70 years ago. In order to house all of these Jellicle Cats, humans had to provide them with a potty, and so along came the “kitty toilet.” This newspaper-lined metal pan was filled with dirt or sand, under which the animals buried their kitty cat turds. In 1947, clay litter was invented, which allowed felines to more thoroughly cover their poo and created easily scoopable pee clumps! Eventually, the act of scooping cat waste out of the litter box by hand became too taxing for people, and in 1991, according to tidylitter.com, the first automatic litter box appeared on the scene. Throughout the years, self-cleaning litter boxes have had many iterations: from raking systems to rotating globe contraptions that spin and use gravity to separate the poo/pee clumps, then send them to a waste drawer at the bottom of the machine. New shit box innovators have now created NASA-level turd removal technology with a self-flushing litter box, connected to a drainage outlet that can be operated by A.I. This is frivolous and stupid. While these systems eliminate the really easy and not-that-big-of-a-deal chore of removing doo-doo with a hand-held scooper, they are expensive and loud, the units have to be taken apart periodically to remove all the attached dingleberries from the the waste compartment and internal mechanisms, and they have the tendency to break if not cleaned by hand regularly. But the biggest and most terrifying drawback of these fancy-schmancy machines is that they can be dangerous for the very animals they are made for! Cats can and have been trapped in and killed by these turd burglars. Anywho, in my opinion, the tried-and-true hand-held scooper OG litter box is the way to go. If you buy a trad box, you’ll need to scoop it daily (I personally scoop the box every time my cats poop because, just as I don’t like to use a dirty toilet, I assume that they don’t want to either). I suggest the Zarler Odor Control Stainless Steel Litter Box. It’s really easy to clean and the stainless steel doesn’t absorb urine smell like plastic does. You should still completely dump (tee hee) the litter periodically and thoroughly wash the box. Pour the dirty litter into a garbage bag. Spray all of the remaining yuck away with a hose. Squirt some pet-safe dish soap into the box and use a sponge to wipe it. Rinse it, making sure to remove all of the suds. Leave in the sun to dry. Add fresh litter and get ready for the BMs!
I purchased a rad macrame lamp shade from a flea market, and it smells musty. How do I get rid of the smell?
Oh! I love a ‘70s macrame look! This project is pretty easy. First, you’ll want to spot test the lamp shade to make sure that washing it doesn’t cause discoloration. Squirt some mild detergent into a sink or bucket filled with cold water. Dip an inconspicuous area of the shade into the water and gently massage the fibers. Let it dry. If washing doesn’t change the color, you can move forward with your macrame cleaning adventure. Place the lamp shade in the sudsy cold water, swish it around, and gently massage the fibers. Bring it outside and either lay the shade onto a dry towel or hang it in the sun to dry. This should eradicate the ‘70s must!
Got cleaning questions? Email isabel@antigravitymagazine.com
illustrations by Ben Claassen III | @dirtfarm
