Month: September 2023

You, too, Little One! Plus, some vehicle progress?

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I already posted a photo of the new kitten on the block. This is a photo I took, just before I caught it.

The kitten in the back is the one I caught. The puff ball in the front is also on the list for kittens that are so tiny, they need to come indoors.

It is not at all cooperative.

There are two more black kittens with white spots on their chests from this litter (plus a much bigger one from another litter that is more catten then kitten, now). One of them should be fine and is bigger, but the other is staying teeny tiny. I don’t know why there is such a difference in sizes in the same litter, but the littles are at far greater risk, so if we can snag them for indoors, we will.

In other things…

My husband and I headed out fairly early today to get our blood work done. The results should be ready in time for his appointment with a doctor, tomorrow. Hopefully, this is a doctor that will take him on as a new patient. Once of the requirements for his disability income is to be under the care of a doctor, and he doesn’t have one right now.

These were fasting blood tests, so after it was done, we had to go for breakfast. With all the medications my husband is on, he doesn’t feel hunger anymore, but I was at the “getting dizzy and nauseous” stage of hunger. There was one restaurant we’ve been to before that I thought would be open, but it turns out to open just before lunch, not for breakfast, so we stopped at a hotel café not far away. This is one of those places that has been around forever, and where locals go to regularly for breakfast. I haven’t been there in years!

It’s not accessible, though, so my husband had to cane it up the stairs. Once we were there and settled, looking at the menu, I happened to glance across the room and saw a familiar face I hadn’t seen in years! It was an old friend of ours from high school! The last time I saw her was before she’d moved up North to one of the territories! It was really great to run into her like that!

After breakfast, we made a stop at the pharmacy to pick up prescription refills that would normally have been delivered today, then headed home.

My husband told me to go ahead and park in the garage, rather than drive up to the house, once we got home.

Then he fell, trying to get out of my mother’s car.

Well. More like a half fall. He ended up with one knee on the ground, one leg still in the car, and stuck in a most awkward position. After some struggling, he managed to get himself up. There was little I could do to help him.

He thought he was fine at first, but after a few hours, that knee that hit the ground (we have a dirt floor in our garage) was starting to really hurt.

Thankfully, he has plenty of really powerful pain killers, including one that’s “take as needed”.

I had intended to wait until closer to the end of the month but, after this, I sent a message to our mechanic, who also used vehicles available for sale. It’ll be 6 months at the end of September, that I’ve been using a low limit credit card to rebuild my credit score. Which means I should be able to apply for financing on a vehicle and have payments we can actually afford. The last time I applied for financing, the terms and interest rates were insane, they wanted a high down payment, plus the payments would have been $700 a month!

We messaged back and forth for a bit. He actually has a truck available right now. I had walked over to see what he had available, the last time I was at the grocery store across the street, and it’s a really nice truck. We could certainly use one but, for our primary needs, we need another minivan, though we could possibly get away with a SUV. He told me he would look for something for us. He knows our needs by now.

Not long after, I got a call from him. He told me he was with a new financing company now. One that specializes in helping people rebuilding their credit. He’d talked to her about our situation, and that we were living on a disability income. She told him that they could do pre-approved financing. That would go a long way in helping him know exactly what he could find for us, and not be stuck with a vehicle to sell to someone else, if we can’t afford the financing.

So I gave him permission to pass on my contact information and I got a call from the company already. The initial process has been started. The next step at our end will be to send in our ID and probably proof of income, etc., like we had to before. We should know in the next couple of days, what we can get for financing. From there, our mechanic will be able to look for something that meets our needs, and falls into the financing parameters.

I pray this all works out. As much as I appreciate having my mother’s car to use, it meets my mother’s needs, not ours. Plus, that thing needs to be replaced, too! My mother has already told my brother and that we should just sell it, but it’s too difficult for her to get into a larger vehicle, so a small car is needed for her. She won’t buy another car, though. She doesn’t drive or even have a license anymore. She’s got no problem with the idea of us buying another car for her, though… Not that we could afford to have two car payments!

We shall see how it works out!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2023 garden: frosty harvest

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I’m just going to post this photo for now; I took some video and will upload that later.

Until then, this is what I was able to harvest today.

We did get another frost last night. I was out doing my rounds early enough to see some frost still on the ground. Once again, there was no frost warning and, according to the official past 24 hours record, we never dipped below 6C/43F, while I know I saw 4C/39F on my app when I checked before heading out this morning.

I should get one of those high/low thermometers that have needles to mark the highest and lowest temperatures on the dial.

So for now, all the stuff affected by the frost has been harvested that could be harvested. I left the melons, because they look like enough of the vines survived for ripening to continue. We’re supposed to warm up over the next while, so that will give more time for things like the melons, peppers, Spoon tomatoes and the one eggplant to ripen. The other things, like the carrots and onions, can handle frost so they’ll be fine for quite a while longer.

Our gardening season is not done yet!

The Re-Farmer

Caught… and settled in

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My computer was misbehaving, and I think I discovered the cause. There was an operating system update waiting for me to power down the computer.

So while that’s doing it’s thing, I’ll just use my phone to share this bit of adorableness.

Can you spot the new face?

There are now 8 kittens in there. I managed to snag the tiniest outside kitten. This is one of the 8 that were born in the barrel, almost 2 months ago. Some of them are really tiny, still. We now have 3 of them indoors.

I was able to catch Pom Pom only because of a dislocated arm that, thankfully, reset itself.

I had been able to catch and hold Soot Sprite before, so he was a bit more used to human contact. He adjusted to indoors faster than Pom Pom.

The new baby (in the top middle) was a providential catch. I managed it shortly after I headed outside to get some work done, so it was just a quick drop off in my room.

It almost immediately found the food bowls.

When I came in again later, all 8 kittens were curled up in a pile on my bed. It took a while before I could get a picture.

Not only was the new kitten immediately absorbed into the creche, when I walk past, it allows me to pet it, along with the other kittens, as I go by!

They are all solidly asleep right now. Which likely means another sleepless night of mayhem and destruction by the older kittens, while the Littles watch in stunned disbelief!

There are at least 2 more really tiny kittens that need to come in. In time, I will take photos of all of them to pass on to the Cat Lady to share among her contacts for adoption.

The Re-Farmer

Trellis bed progress

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I headed out to check the garden as the day warmed up, to get a better idea of how much frost damage there was. As things warm up, the damaged/dead parts turns a lot darker, which showed me that the tomato plants in the main garden area did get killed off. Not the ones in the old kitchen garden, though! The melon plants might make it. Lots of dead leaves, but not the entire plants.

Tonight, we’re looking at a low of 5 – 6C/41 – 43F which, if things go the way they have been, lately, may actually end up being 3 – 4C/37 – 39F.

The high for today ended up being 18C/64F. I took advantage of it and got some work done on the trellis bed. It was actually feeling too hot while I worked! This is where I stopped for the evening.

The first thing I needed to do was finish off the wall on the left. I rolled the top log off, then used a chain saw to try and smooth and flatten things a bit, mostly to get rid of odd lumps and bumps, then putting the top log back. I still ended up with some gaps, but those will be filled with pieces of wood from the inside

The next thing was to use an auger to match the size of the pieces of rebar I have. Thanks to my husband, I have a nice set of long auger bits for my drill. They’re a touch shorter than the rebar, so after drilling holes through both logs, I removed the top log again, then drilled further through the bottom log. Once that was done, the rebar got hammered through the holes in the top log until it came out the other end, which I could then use to position the top log back again before hammering the rebar flush with the top.

The base log for the other wall was already debarked, but needed some clean up to remove bits of branches and other lumps and bumps. Then I got out the garden fork and loosened the soil between the markers where the log would be positioned. I found a large rock in the process that would not move. Since it’s under a wall, I left it. Once the soil was loosened, and the worst of the weed roots removed, I spun the log around so that the wide end was facing the other way. The ground is a bit lower on that side. I should have laid the base log in the other wall that way, but didn’t think of it until I’d already positioned it.

This base log itself has a long bend in it. I made sure it was positioned to bow outwards. That will be taken advantage of later in the build. Once in place, I used the chain saw again to remove any parts that looked too uneven and lumpy, and trimmed a few branch stubs a bit more.

The top log then needed to be debarked and prepped. This wood actually took the knife a lot better, so I went ahead and shaved a flat strip, so it would lay flatter on the base long.

That didn’t quite work out!

While the top log is a lot straighter than the bottom one, when I put it in position, the narrow end of the top log, which is set above the wider end of the base log, was floating at least 8 inches above! After rotating the log until it finally set the most evenly, the shaved part was now on the top!

There were still some lumps and bumps in the way, though, mostly on the base log. The wood on that tree did not take to the draw knife well, so I used the chain saw to level it off some more, then made another matching flat area on the top log.

With the bend in the base log, though, the top log is lined up on each end, but almost completely off the bottom log at the bend! It wasn’t going anywhere, though, so I repeated the process for inserting the rebar, more or less matching where the ones in the other wall are set.

With the rebar holding the logs together, I used a board to line up and mark the ends for cutting, then removed the jagged ends of the logs. I had to be careful with the bottom logs, so as not to be cutting into the ground!

The two logs you can see set aside in the photo will at least partly be used to close up the ends of the beds. These beds are meant to be 18′ long and 4′ wide on the outside. With the ends trimmed, they are no longer 18′ long, but the end pieces will be used to make up the gap. It doesn’t have to be exact, but I’d rather they be a bit longer than shorter. With how the logs taper, I might have to find thicker pieces of logs to finish the ends and get that 18′.

Once the end pieces are in place and secure, I’ll start working on attaching the 4 vertical supports for the trellis, which will then get horizontal supports across their tops. They’ll be added after the verticals are in place. The ground is uneven, but I want the horizontals to be level. Since I’m not going to be digging post holes as originally intended, and just attaching them to the outside of a wall, I’m no longer going to be losing about a foot of height on these 7′ posts, so I will likely mount the horizontals at 6 1/2′ rather than 6′, then trimming off the excess height. When the second bed is built at the other markers, it will have matching trellis supports and, eventually, they will be joined at the top to create a tunnel.

If all goes well, we’ll make at least one more trellis tunnel set up in line with this one. My priority, however, is going to be making more high raised beds, once this is done. Mobility, reach and pain reduction while tending the beds are becoming more of an issue for me.

Not before this bed is finished, though, and that will include filling it and preparing it to plant in, next year. That means layers of carboard on the bottom, maybe some small branches, wood chips, fresh green material such as the frost bitten bush beans I pulled earlier today, grass clippings and topping it with some of that purchased garden soil we still have left. Last of all with be a grass clipping mulch to protect the soil over the winter.

The bed the Roma tomatoes were in needs to be prepared for the winter, and if I could at least make that into a high raised bed, that would make life easier for next year!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2023 garden: No warning

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When I woke this morning and checked my weather app, just before it refreshed itself, I saw something I did not want to see!

2C/36F

Considering the time of that reading, it was entirely possible we had frost last night.

We had no frost warnings at all before I went to bed.

Not that we could have done much about it. All those support poles and trellises are great, but make it impossible to cover the plants. At least not with the material we have. The squash patch is just too big.

When I first started my rounds after feeding the outside cats (I tried for a head count and saw 26 or 27. I may have double counted one) and headed towards the gate cam, I was somewhat encouraged. Usually, even if we have a light frost, I would still see signs of it in the shaded areas along the driveway long after it melted elsewhere. I saw only dew.

Then I started checking the south garden beds. Everything looked fine as I made my way through. Even the Little Finger eggplant in the concrete blocks, and the Caveman’s Club gourd, seemed unchanged.

Then I saw the squash growing in the compost pile.

All the leaves were drooping.

Still, this area is a lot more shaded than others, especially in the mornings. The nearby beds of onions, carrots and the popcorn cobs drying on their stalks are frost hardy, so they were fine.

Going to the sign cam, I pass the Crespo squash patch. That spot doesn’t get shade until the sun is at its lowest in the winter, so even this time of year it gets the full morning sun.

The leaves were all drooping, and I think I might even have seen the remains of frost glittering on some stems. It’s done.

When I got to the main garden area, I was a bit more encouraged. The plants supported on trellises seemed to fair better. The melons did show some cold damage in areas, while others looked just fine. Even the tomato plants seemed mostly all right. Much to my surprise, all the pepper plants in their grow bags looked absolutely fine!

The squash patch, unfortunately, was completely done in. Half the patch gets more shade than the other. In the heat of the summer, the plants that got more shade were doing better than the ones that got more sun but, right now, it’s the rows that get more sun that are looking less damaged than the others.

I’ll leave them alone for now, and see what happens over the next couple of days.

The old kitchen garden, much to my surprise, was fine. Even the luffa! The peppers here also showed no signs of cold damage, the Classic eggplant and all the transplanted tomatoes in their plastic shields seem completely unaffected. Even the Spoon tomatoes looked undamaged, and I was able to pick a bunch of them.

What’s frustrating is that there were NO frost warnings. I found a site that gives temperatures for the past 24 hours, and I did find it dipped to -2C/28F at around 6am – in the city! When I did a search for our area, plus the areas north and east of us, where I know there are weather stations, the lowest recorded temperature was 5C/41F Yet, my own app showed we were at 4C/40F at a time when the past weather chart was showing 7C/45F.

Today, we’re looking at a high of 17C/63F, with an overnight low of 6C/43F Those overnight lows have been consistently wrong on the high side. Which means that we’re not getting any of the frost warnings that would normally be set off, once the temperatures are expected to drop low enough, even as the real temperatures drop below that warning threshold.

Again, there’s not much we could have done, but we would have at least picked all the remaining tomatoes and brought them inside. Including the mostly green tomatoes still out on screens under the market tent.

As things warm up today, I’ll head back out and reassess the damage.

I’m not sure what to do about the winter squash. All those big, beautiful Pink Banana and candy roasters! They are not fully ripe, but if we leave them out and the vines die back, will they continue to ripen? We certainly won’t be able to store them for the winter, but I don’t even know how edible they are at this stage.

Well, I just found the answer to my own question.

So, in theory, we can bring them inside and lay them out to continue to ripen. Since they won’t store for the winter at this stage, we could cook them and freeze them, instead.

I don’t think that will work with the melons as well, but those plants might survive.

Unless we get another frost with no warning again.

We really need a polytunnel.

The Re-Farmer

Nemesis

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It’s a monster!

I found this beast on one of my bean plants. For this type of slug, it’s huge!

No surprise, considering they have been gorging themselves,not only on the leaves, but the pods, as well.

Slugs must die! 😆

The Re-Farmer

Exhausted

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I am so totally drained.

Today, I was taking my mother to a medical appointment – and appointment that had been moved up 2 hours. I’d say that was why I was up and doing my morning rounds early, but in reality, I was just up and couldn’t get back to sleep. I can’t even blame the kittens on that one, because I woke them up trying to roll over. I had a least 3 of them on and against me, keeping warm. I have the window open just a bit for air circulation, but when we’re hitting 7C/45F (at least when I checked), it does get a bit chilly! I was also checking on my computer during the night, having left it on to upload the garden tour video I posted this morning.

I made sure to have a solid breakfast, though, which turned out to be a good thing, even though it was a couple of hours earlier than I usually have breakfast.

I got to my mother with adequate time for a short visit, then we headed out about an hour before her appointment. With the time it took to get her and her walker set up in the car, then the drive in, we got there about 10 minutes early for her appointment.

We ended up waiting about an hour before she was finally called in – and there were others who were already there waiting for the same doctor before us! They, too, had been called to have their appointments rescheduled, and were told to come in the same time my mother had been told, which was not the time I was told when I phoned to confirm!

So… yeah… Not a good start.

This doctor is new to us, with our previous doctor having moved to another clinic. My husband and I are seeing her on an interim basis for prescription refills, but my husband already got a letter from her stating she would not be accepting him as a patient. Which was a surprise, since we even talked about it during our appointments, saying we knew she was not accepting new patients. So it was a surprise for me when I brought my mom in, and she told my mother almost right away that she was accepting my mother as a patient!

So this was a follow up appointment to talk about some test results. My mother is still refusing to take the T3s because they are a “narcotic”, and when I mentioned that word being used was one reason my mother wouldn’t take it, and my mother mentioned reading about all the bad things that would happen if she took them (meaning the possible side effects listed), and so on. The doctor seemed quite amused that my mother wouldn’t take them because they are a “narcotic”, but didn’t try to reassure her or explain anything.

Which was basically how the entire appointment went.

Now, my mother is already not happy with this doctor. She’s female, she’s black and she has a strong accent. Unfortunately, she also speaks quickly, and tends to bowl over us when we tried to explain things. Even I was having a hard time understanding her. She seems nice enough; I’m sure I’d enjoy her company in a social setting, but as a doctor? Nope. I’m not happy with her, either.

In the end, my mother was given a new, short term prescription to try for a complaint she brought up, with instructions that included to go ahead and stop taking them if they made her feel too drowsy, or if they didn’t do the job, then given a requisition for a urine sample to get a culture done, which had not been part of her previous lab work.

Then the doctor abruptly left.

Okay, they were far behind, but usually there’s at least some sort of comment to let you know the appointment was over, even if it’s just a goodbye or some sort. It felt almost as if she were leaving in mid conversation.

No matter.

The lab is across the waiting room, so we went straight there. The lab’s waiting room was crowded, but there was a chair available for my mother while I handed over the requisition and got her medical card for them to confirm. The couple sitting next to her were sweet and got up so I could sit beside my mother.

My mother commented on how many people there were. She was clearly not happy and started talking about just going home. I totally understood the feeling but I told her, you only need to give a urine sample. All these other people are probably waiting to get blood work or X-rays or something. Yours is just in and out. It shouldn’t take long.

I then started talking to her about the new prescription and explaining what the doctor had said.

“You mean I have to buy more pills?”

Uhm… yes.

“I’m not buying them!”

I explained again what it was for, and she declared that it wasn’t much of a problem and she could live with it. She said she didn’t understand what the doctor was saying (my explaining it obviously meant nothing), so she wasn’t going to fill it. Knowing my mother, however, I know she would not have been saying the same thing if the doctor had been male. That’s more of a thing for her even over skin colour. Likewise, if my brother were the one explaining it to her instead of me, she would have been more willing to listen.

By then, we were both getting really tired, too.

Then she got called in and it was just as quick as I told her it would be. As we went to the car, though, I could really see how she was slowing down.

Normally, after her appointments, we would do things like go to a grocery store, or go to a restaurant for lunch. After a bit of indecision, my mother asked what restaurants were close to one of the two grocery stores in this town. I only know of one, that we’ve been to before, for sure. It’s a franchise she normally likes, and we went there the last time she had an appointment in this town.

No, she won’t go there anymore. Why? “You saw what people were there.”

*sigh*

I reminded her that the service was excellent and the food was great. Her response?

“I’m just to tired of brown people.”

*sigh*

I pointed out that this was not a very Christian thing, and the subject was dropped.

We were going to drive past one of the grocery stores, and she wanted if there was a restaurant near there. I could not remember seeing one, but drove into the parking lot anyhow. That’s when I could see the Subway, though getting to it involved going back onto the road and taking a different driveway, because of barricades between parking lots. The spaces closest to the doors were also barricaded, so we had to part fairly far away – no disabled parking at this place, even though the doors and building were accessible!

We went in and my mother went straight to a table, expecting to be served. I explained how it works to order at a Subway. Reading a menu on the wall was more than she could handle, though, and she started asking if they had soup. I couldn’t see that on the menu, nor could I see any over the counter, but my mother started shouting from her seat to the one guy behind the counter, asking if they had soup. They didn’t, so she suggested we leave.

Which was probably for the best. Ordering at a Subway would have been beyond her, anyhow. I would have had to make decisions and order for her, even at the best of times.

From there, she just wanted to go home.

When we parked at her place and I started getting her walker out, she started asking if there was something she was supposed to give me. I knew nothing of that, so she basically threw me $20 for gas and told me I could go home! She didn’t even want me to help her with the doors!

It’s not the first time she’s been this tired after an outing, and I really couldn’t hold it against her!

I, however, was getting pretty famished and seriously considered going to a restaurant before heading home, but in the end, I was just too tired. I pulled over long enough to message the family and update them a bit, then headed home myself.

Thankfully, there was food at home that just needed heating up, so I got to eat right away. Then I updated my husband with more of how things went before finally going into my office/bedroom and indulging in some kitten therapy.

Ghosty really, really loves licking noses.

When I’m out of the room, though, I’m going to have to find a way to protect my keyboard. When I got to my computer, I found the task manager and calculator open. Neither of which have short cuts on my keyboard!

It’s past 5pm right now, and I’d love to just go for a nap right now, but that would really mess my up for the night!

A day out with my mother is tiring enough on my own, but this doctor’s visit was even more exhausting than usual.

I just need to decompress for a while. I’d love to get outside and get some work done in these awesome, cooler temperatures, but the days are getting a lot shorter now, and the jobs I need to work on require more light than I’ll have for very long. Which gets very frustrating, considering how many things have been distracting me away from them.

Ah, well. The world isn’t going to end if they get delayed a bit longer, again.

The Re-Farmer

(too tired to hunt for typos. My apologies for the ones I’m sure are all over this post!)

Our 2023 Garden: September garden tour (video)

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Last night was our average first frost night, and there was no frost. The garden survives another night!

Check it out. 😊

May the frost hold off at least as long as predicted. Cooler night means things are slowing down, so if we’re going to get to harvest things, we need as much time as possible for it to fully mature.

The Re-Farmer

It’s a trap!

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Well. Sort of.

This is set up across from our driveway now.

It took forever to go through the trail cam video files this morning! There was a constant stream of activity triggering the motion sensor – and that’s just the stuff that it catches. There was clearly more activity, beyond the range of the motion sensor, that I could see happening in the background when something closer triggered the camera.

I was chatting with the Cat Lady this morning, and mentioned how all this activity would be driving away our missing cats. It probably isn’t helping bring that dog home, either. I was able to identify two pick up trucks, two minivans and a car, all involved in the search. She told me that it’s being shared all over Facebook right now. I haven’t seen anything, but I’m not in the groups it was being shared in. She sent me a screen cap. The group was a missing pet group for the city! That’s an hour’s drive away. Her thought was that the dog was probably stolen and taken up north. Apparently, that’s a common thing. I was able to let her know that the dog has been sighted here, so not stolen, at least.

I also shared with her my experiences with the owner, who was nice to my face, but not so nice behind my back. It probably never occurred to him that anyone would hear what he said about me, but all sounds from that direction really carry to the house, and the windows facing that way! My daughters hear way more than they would like.

I ended up sending an email to my brother that lives across from us through his wife (he doesn’t do tech very well. LOL), just in case they didn’t know what was going on. Their main driveway is a quarter mile up the road. The driveway across from us is just to the field, and they wouldn’t necessarily see or hear. I also mentioned our own lost cats, in the off chance they show up at their place. They are the closest home that’s occupied, and have plenty of their own yard cats. Butterscotch would remember their place. Maybe even Nosencrantz. It’s Marlee that would be completely out of her element, and we haven’t see any sign of her at all.

While talking about cats…

TTT has been at the small window in my room, squeaking away (what a strange, quiet meow she has!), wanting out. I’ve been trying to let her out of the room, but the kittens try for the door, instead. She’s so high strung, she backs off rather than goes through.

This morning, she was on my bed and accepting pets. Sort of. She spins and moves around so much, it’s really hard to pet her! However, I was able to pick her up and, while the kittens were distracted, take her out of the room. She’s been out before, but not for very long. It went rather well, so I just put her down and watched for a bit.

She’s still out.

We’ll see if she wants to stay out for good! I may be down to just the kittens in my room.

While doing my rounds this morning, I took some footage for a garden tour video, so that will be my project for today.

What I really want to do, though, is go for a nap. The kittens are actually sleeping right now. I might be able to get some sleep for a change!

Nah. Too much work to do!

The Re-Farmer

Apparently, I’m a “stupid fat f***g b****”.

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But only behind my back.

We’ve been hearing a lot of commotion on the roads lately. Some of it is expected. It’s harvest time and the renter’s corn is being done, so they’re big equipment and trucks are going by. Other farmers are bringing in their hay bales, or just plant going back and forth between home and fields.

On the trail cams, however, I’m also seeing a lot of regular vehicle traffic doing strange things. We’ve also been hearing lots of voices and shouting. The gate cam is set to record stills and video, so I’m seeing vehicles drive slowly, then reversing, then going forward again, etc. During some night time shots, a vehicle driving by triggered the camera and, in the background, I could see people walking around my brother’s field (the younger of my brothers) with flashlights. If I hadn’t also seen my brother’s wife in some of the images, I would have been more concerned.

It does mean I’ve got a lot of files to go through when I switch out the memory cards!

Late this morning, I was having an early lunch before heading outside to get some work done when I got a phone call from my mother. She was struggling, physically, today and wanted to know if I could come over and help her with some house work that was getting too much for her.

So of course, my plans changed.

As I was getting ready to head out, I walked over to open the gate before opening the garage, so I would only have to get out of the car once, to close the gate behind me.

Which is when I saw a guy set up in my brother’s driveway into his field, across from ours. That driveway is rarely used, so it’s quite overgrown. The guy was in one of those folding chairs with a canopy, half hidden in the tall grass, with stuff that looked like blankets on the ground beside him, and a gorgeous Great Pyrenees at his side.

As soon as the dog saw me reach the gate, it got up, all excited to see another human, and started barking.

This did not go over well with the guy, who started trying to shush the dog.

I started to call out and ask if everything was all right, but he started trying to shush both me and the dog at the same time, and asked me to back away. Then he saw something down the road and started talking into this phone (I’m amazed he had enough signal to use it!), saying things like “I see him! He’s right there!” and telling someone they should be able to “see him” right at that moment. The someone turned out to be his dad, and I was not impressed when he started swearing at his dad for not seeing what I figured out was another dog, and telling his dad he needed to come get the dog because someone (me) had come out, the dog started barking, and the other dog got scared away.

While that was going on, I opened the gate as quietly as I could. I even tried to open the garage door as quietly as possible, and that thing gives off metallic screams, squeals and squeaks like nobody’s business!

Then, of course, I had to drive out and close the gate, which I tried to do quickly, so as not to scare off this other dog, if at all possible. Thankfully, I needed to go the opposite direction from where he’d seen his dog.

When I stopped at the intersection, I saw a new sign not far from our own, so I took a picture.

I removed the phone number, of course.

The next time I stopped, before getting on the highway, I sent the photo to the family and let them know what was going on, then continued on to my mother’s.

When I got there, I checked my messages.

My family was not sympathetic to the guy with the lost dog.

It seems there was a lot of shouting after I left, loud enough for my daughter to hear me being referred to as a “stupid fat f*****g b****”. Apparently for using my own driveway and scaring off an already scared dog.

I wonder what he thought about the big harvest trucks, trailers and combines that had to go down that road to the fields the dog was hiding in!

The shouting they heard was enough for my daughter to warn me to be careful when I got home, and for my husband – my broken husband! – told me to let him know I was on the way, so he could meet me at the gate.

Things apparently calmed down by the time I was done at my mother’s. The guy was no longer set up across from our gate, and they weren’t hearing shouting anymore.

As I turned the corner to get home, though, I did see a truck parked on the side of the road, not far from our driveway. As I drove past it, I could see an older gentleman in the driver’s seat, but there were too many reflections on the glass to see if someone was with him. About a quarter mile down the road, though, I could see the canopy on the folding chair set up.

After I opened the gate and started back to the car, though, guess who came out of the truck?

Yup. It was the same guy, coming over to talk to me.

He was quite polite to my face!

Turns out his 8 month old Great Pyreneese that he recently acquired broke out of their house, along with the other one I’d seen earlier. That one, they caught quick enough, but the other was apparently quite happy to be running around outside, and not wanting anyone to come close. They’ve seen him eat the food they left out for him, but still wouldn’t let them come close, disappearing into the corn field, instead.

He mentioned my cameras and asked about them. I let him know that the motion sensors are set on the gate and the sign, so while I can see things on the road, it’s limited. He asked if he could set up cameras, indicating the easement between our fence and the road, and I told him to go right ahead; that areas is public land, anyhow. I did say he could use a fence post or something, if he wanted to.

He also mentioned where he lived, should we happen to see the dog. Turns out he’s right in the middle of our little hamlet, a littler more than 3 miles away. Which makes me wonder about his dog being out here!

Since they were all over the place, looking for the dog, I mentioned we had 3 lost cats and described them. So far, though, he’s only seen a black and white one – likely Adam – crossing the road. Unfortunately, their being all over the place looking for the dog, they are likely scaring the missing cats away completely.

Turns out he’s a cat person, as well as a dog person. He asked me if I knew someone, who turned out to be the guy that found Potato Beetle, last winter! It turns out they are great friends, so I asked him to extend my greetings, and let him know that Potato Beetle is now an indoor cat. 😁

So it was quite a friendly exchange we had.

Not bad, considering I’m such a stupid, fat f*****g b****.

No, I’m not angry or anything like that. More amused than anything else!

The Re-Farmer