I always have to stifle a giggle when somebody tells me, "Oh, I don't allow my cats on the counters." (Or the furniture. Or the table.) I've had cats a LONG time, and I guarantee that this so-called "not allowing" only lasts as long as it takes for the door to close behind you when you leave the house.
When I was a teenager I went to Memphis to stay with my sister and her husband for a couple of weeks. They had this elaborate antique red velvet sofa in the front room, and I was told very firmly that although I could sit on it, the cats were absolutely not allowed on it, even in a lap. The second or third day I was there they had both gone to work and I slept late. When I came down the stairs in the empty house I surprised one of the cats -- sleeping squarely in the middle of the sacred couch.