Ha, cats are gonna cat no matter what you buy. A tower does keep dice on the table better than a tray, but a determined cat can still take the whole thing down in one swipe. Worth it for the elbows at least.

Wish I could blame the wood but my last few cooks have been so bad the neighbors probably think I forgot how fire works. Wood sure helps when it's dry and split right, but a dead wind day and meat that cooperates is half the battle. Some days the pit just likes you and some days it doesn't.

Have you noticed how this same thing happens with grocery lists and to do lists too? People start out writing every little thing down and then realize they never look at half of it again. The Alistair method works because it forces you to keep everything in one place instead of scattering it across a bunch of pages. I ran into the same mess with my old daily spreads, flipping back through weeks of notes trying to find one phone number I wrote down. That whole thing taught me a lesson that shows up everywhere, which is that more space does not mean better notes, it just means more junk to dig through. Keeping it tight and in one spot beats spreading it out every time.