Nicole,

I beat you to it! Last night after she came up the second time I wrote (what I thought to be) a very nice apologetic note. The gist of it was something like this:

"I am very sorry for the inconvenience I have caused you. We are now keeping the cat in the bathroom at night and are going to purchase more rugs first thing tomorrow. We hope that this will alleviate the problem.

I have had the experience of having an inconsiderate upstairs neighbor, and the last thing I wish to do is become like them. My hope is that we can resolve this issue without bitterness or the assistance of the management.

Please feel free to come upstairs if you have any questions or comments."

Turns out that the lady was so mad after the second time she came up that she immediately phoned management and left a nasty message saying that I said "there's nothing I can do." I did not say that, what I said was "I don't know what else I can do just right now" and as I turned around she was already down the stairs.

I understand being enraged, I just hope that when she woke up this morning she understood that I was not trying to make her life hell.

Management called me this afternoon. Again it was suggested that I "put the cat in a cage." When I told her that this was not possible because the cat would need access to its litter she told me I "didn't know cats" and that "it must be a mean cat" should it be forced to defecate/urinate in the kennel.

But I stayed polite and sweet and told her all I was doing and that I was aware of the issue and doing my best. I also slipped in that the way this building is, every tenant has to allow for some noise, though I will do my best not to inconvenience anyone.

We'll see how it goes. The worst part is I hadn't gotten around to registering Bettie with management, so technically I only have one cat. You are allowed two pets, so I didn't think it was an issue and I was going to do it eventually. But now I'm afraid they'll reject me if I try to register since there has been a complaint.

So I guess Bettie is contraband for a while.