Columnist Susan Snyder: Feline is a swirl of issues

Friday, May 3, 2002 | 2:38 a.m.

The line of seniority must be drawn somewhere, and at my house it crosses the lavatory door.

I will not share the bathroom with the cat.

There are people who have trained their feline companions to use the regular commode. I am sure they are very happy sharing their bathrooms with their cats. It certainly would beat some of the humans with whom I've shared bathrooms.

For $24.95 cat owners can purchase a kitty toilet-training kit from catgift.com. The kit comes with a plastic training toilet seat and a book, "How to Toilet Train Your Cat: 21 Days to a Litter-Free Home."

This is what happens to people who don't have children.

In a Columbia News Service story released last week, a woman described how she trained her two cats to use the guest-bathroom toilet.

She turned off the commode's water and stretched thick plastic wrap over the bowl. She put the kitty toidy seat over the wrap and filled the space with litter. She rewarded the cats with tuna for using it.

Once they got the hang of it, she cut a hole in the center of the plastic. She kept cutting it bigger until eventually there was no plastic, and the kitties perched atop the toilet seat. One expert even said cats can be taught to flush by attaching a catnip toy on a string to the handle.

At my house, we'd be flushing the toilet all day. First of all, the Feline King is an addict. He rolls and slobbers on catnip toys for an hour or so, then sprawls in the middle of the living room floor like a sot on a three-day bender.

And he is fascinated with the toilet. Sometimes he'll stand next to it waiting for someone to walk past and flush, so he can watch the water swirl around.

Other times, he'll stand on his hind legs with a front paw on either side of the bowl and his little furry head tucked nearly out of sight as he stares at the water below.

He looks like my college roommate used to on Sunday mornings -- without the sound effects. At the first sign that I wanted him to use the toilet, however, I am certain all interest would fade.

And I cannot fathom what you'd tell guests. You'd have to say something to avoid the ugliness of them sitting down in the middle of the night on a commode covered with plastic and kitty litter. (Could be fun with the in-laws.)

"Um, you'll have to use the master bathroom or hit the 7-Eleven up the street because we're toilet-training the cat."

Again, people without children ...

We recently moved into a new home and added a second human to our domicile. Cat commandeered the new person's shelf of clean T-shirts as his private sleeping and shedding spot and isn't picky about whose face receives the 4:15 a.m. paw. Announcing that we are now to share a bathroom with him would not be prudent.

Besides, through some miracle we have trained the new human to clean the litter box without even asking (at least, until today ... unless I hide the newspaper). It didn't cost a cent, and it didn't take several months.

The box is clean, and the bathrooms still belong to the humans.

Could a whole chicken breast to myself be in the future?