Conversations from the Mazda

There are times when clichés need to be rewritten.
For instance, the adage you can lead a horse to water but can’t make it drink should, for this trip, be updated to: you can lead a cat to a litter tray but you can’t make it poop.
It's impossible.
At least you can drown the horse but what can you do with the cat? Shower it in chunks of deodorized and bacterial growth inhibited clay particles?
Sir Richard's stoic refusal for a morning constitutional BEFORE we leave the motel has become a point of tension on the pilgrimage.
He's perfectly fine when you get to the motel for the night but he's just not a morning pooper.
He'll sleep for the first half an hour but when he rises he does so with the most mournful and harrowing meows possible.

SR: Daaad?
ME: No.
SR: Daaaaaaaaaad?
ME: NO.
SR: DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAD?
ME: WHAT?!
SR: I need to poop.
ME: Hold it.
SR: But I caaaaaan't.
ME: Sure you can.
SR: CAAAAAAAAAAN'T.
ME: For the love of ...
SR: No need to blaspheme.
ME: But I never....
SR: You were about to.
ME: Since when have you cared?
SR: I've converted.
ME: From what?
SR: What?
ME: You said you converted.
SR: And?
ME: It means you must have been something else. You can’t convert from nothing.
SR: What?
ME: Look…
SR: POOOOP.
ME: Hold it.
SR: I can’t.
ME: You’ll have to.
SR: Just pull over.
ME: I can’t, we are on the Trans Canada. You can’t just “pull over”.
SR: They did.
ME: “They” crashed into a snow bank
SR: Let’s do that.
ME: NO.
SR: Please?
ME: Why can’t you just go before we leave?
SR: I have to be in the mood.
ME: Really?
SR: Oh yeah, it’s very emotional. You wouldn’t understand, squelchy.
ME: What does that mean?
SR: I can hear you, you know
ME: That’s different.
SR: Look, I need to be Zen. I need to be centred.
ME: So you’ve converted from Buddhism?
SR: What?
ME: Zen is a Buddhist construct. So if you’ve converted to Christianity then you must have been a Buddhist.
SR: I am NOT a Christian.
ME: Why stop me from saying God?
SR: Did I?
ME: You know you did.
SR: Why do we always have to argue?
ME: (Silence)
SR: Pooooooooooop.
ME: No.
SR: Fine.
ME: What’s that smell?
SR: What smell?