Ways to protect your house from your pets

[Catherine]

Cats hate doing anything we want them to do. So, the way to keep them off the counters is to keep putting them on the counters. Being typical cats they will tem refuse to go on the counters just to spite us. 

It could possibly work.

You could build counters that fold up when not in use. Or you could have a fake counter over your real counter that swings out of the way when you want to use the counter underneath. It wouldn't be convenient, but it might work.

How about having a trained dog to keep the cats off the counters. Dogs are talented and they could learn a simple thing like this. 
Of course the cat could fetch dog treats and bribe the dog. That would be a problem.