Month: May 2024

A visit and an unexpected $138 stock up shop

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Today, the plan was to meet my brother to help set up my mother’s air conditioner for the summer. Since I was going to be out anyhow, I planned to go to the grocery store after, and pick up some eggs.

Since I was out anyhow, my daughter asked if she could bribe me into picking up some stuff for her, at which point it was worth the gas to go to the town we usually shop at.

Of course, nothing quite goes to plan, does it? I like it when that turns out to be good, which is how it worked out, today.

My brother and I pre-arranged to meet at a gas station before going to my mother’s together, so I left early to tank up, first. Once we connected, we both headed over to our mother’s place. My SIL was a sweetheart and sent a lunch for us all, with enough extra to feed my mother for at least another day. She is such a saint. She no longer visits my mother, because my mother has been so incredibly cruel to her, but she still loves her and does stuff like this. Which makes her a much better person than me. My mother has literally thrown away food my SIL made for her – frozen in individual meal portions – so she wouldn’t have to cook while recovering from surgery, because she decided it wasn’t “fresh”. She actually gave it to me to give to the cats. It wasn’t until later that I found out where it was from. I’ve tried to bring my own cooking to my mother as well, but got nothing but complaints, so I’ve given up completely. Now, she complains because I spend money on food, which makes me bad with money in her eyes. We can’t win, no matter what we do, but my brother and his wife just keep being so sweet to her! Which is a big part of why I was happy to join him today. Not only do I get to see him, but my mother behaves differently when both of us there, compared to how she treats him when he’s there on his own.

Setting up the AC didn’t take long at all. It’s one of the portable AC’s, not a permanent window one. Basically, it just involved removing the Styrofoam insulation that’s set in the window for the winter, and hooking up the duct from the machine. He’d taken the original window out and replaced it with a board the exact same size, and the window part of the AC set up installed in the middle, then cut 4″ wide Styrofoam insulation to fit on the inside, taped in place, for the winter.

Of course, once it was set up and plugged in, we had to test it. The outlet it’s plugged into has its own switch on the wall, which he taped in the On position, and even wrote “AC” on it, so no one would flick the power off from that outlet.

And… someone did. The tape was still there, but the switch was off. He turned it on while I was next to the plug, which has a reset button on it that I heard beep… but the AC would not turn on. If the switch was pushed in further, it would beep again, but that was it. So there’s clearly a connection problem in there, but not something we could deal with. That’s something my mother should call for a maintenance request for, though she won’t do that, of course. My brother could fix it, another day – and knowing him, he probably will – but technically, he shouldn’t. At least not without getting special clearance from Public Housing.

What we found, however, is that once the tape was put back over the switch, it was enough to hold it in place and keep the power on, and the AC was working fine.

That done, we had lunch, which was way more difficult than it should have been. My mother had delayed her breakfast and made “extra” for us, so she kept trying to make us eat her toast and cheese chunks, while trying to not eat the food my brother brought, because she made breakfast… As we were setting up lunch, my brother went into the fridge and found it almost empty. Oh, yes, my mother says. I’m running out of things… but I’m good for a few more days.

*sigh*

It took both of us to convince her to take advantage of the fact that we were there and could do it right away, instead of having me come back later in the week. So once we finished lunch, I started making a list with her. That’s when she said she wanted bleach, for her bathroom sink.

???

The sink was draining very slowly, so she wanted to use bleach to clear it.

So we explained that bleach won’t fix something like that. She would need a drain cleaner – maybe. My brother went over to take a look, filling the sink to see how bad it was. It turned out to be pretty bad!

Then we took a closer look, and there was all sorts of gunk visible. So my brother got a wire coat hanger, turned it into a small hook, and started pulling stuff out.

While he did that, I did my mother’s grocery shopping.

By the time I got back, the sink was draining like a dream, and my brother was “fixing” her TV. She was complaining about how the picture was too small – she was seeing black borders around the images. The problem turned out to not be the TV or its settings at all. Her cable provider recently upgraded, but not all the channels she gets are HD, so some channels automatically fill her screen, while others don’t. There was nothing wrong with her TV.

Meanwhile, as I put away the groceries, my mother was checking out the receipt and suddenly said, I told you I didn’t want lettuce.

???

I took a look and sure enough, there was iceberg lettuce on there – and it was voided, then her cabbage was listed. The cashier had put in the wrong code, then fixed it. My mother, however, was convinced that she was charged for a head of lettuce because she once got charged for a watermelon she didn’t buy, some 10 years ago (which I’m not sure actually happened; I think she mistook a promotion on the receipt as a sale item, which she once did with shipping I helped her with). So once everything was put away, I got out my phone with its calculator and added it all up. The total I got, minus the lettuce, matched the subtotal on the receipt. When to told her this, she gave me a look we all know too well. She didn’t believe me. She then tried a different tactic and implied the change she got was wrong. Well, I’d given her her change with the receipt, and it was still on the table, so I added that up and it matched the receipt, too.

You’d think that would have made her happy.

It didn’t.

Instead, she now thinks that not only is the store cheating her, but I’m lying to her about it.

*sigh*

Still, we dropped that.

As always, my mother tried to bring up all sorts of things in the most negative way, even trying to twist things to make it so that her behaviour is not a problem, but that everyone else is – including a nasty dig at my brother’s wife in the process.

*sigh*

My brother was way more gracious than I would have been, by that point!

My brother had told her yesterday that he couldn’t stay long, as he had an event to get ready for later today, but as we were getting ready to go, my mother kept trying to make us have tea, or eat something, or… I had already told her I needed to run errands, too, and she started giving me a hard time about how I’m always running errands. I told her, if I’m going to be going out anyway, I want to do as many things as I can, so I’m not going out several times a week. Of course, we’d already been there for a couple of hours, so it’s not like we were rushing off. Then she tried to make me take a little jar of “keys” home. Why? Well, she doesn’t have room for them. I looked in the jar and didn’t see any keys. Instead, I saw a mix of all kinds of objects; the sort of stuff you’d find in a junk drawer. Any keys that might have been in there were completely buried. I asked her, why are you giving me your junk? Oh, there’s lots of room at the farm.

*sigh*

That’s the problem, I told her. There’s too much stuff at the farm, including stuff people gave to her and Dad 50 or 60 years ago!

So she tried to tell me that I could sell the metal to a scrap dealer.

…

At that point, my brother stepped in to end the conversation, because it just wasn’t worth trying to explain it to her.

I didn’t take her jar of junk.

Then we both had to leave.

Which just made my mother angry, saying we were leaving because we didn’t like what she was saying (at that point, she was into a completely different rant about a topic unrelated to any of us), and we were like, no, it’s time to go, that’s all!

Sadly, while that was true, we were both glad to be gone. I’ve tried to explain to her that her behavior towards people drives them away, and she just excuses it with “I just say what’s on my mind.”

*sigh*

While my brother had to rush off to get home, I was able to make a quick stop at the hardware store, where I finally picked up a bale of peat moss for the garden, first. Then it was off to town and for what was supposed to be just a few items.

Ha!

I didn’t get a picture of what my $137.99 looked like, though. Just the receipt.

My daughter had requested the energy drinks and coffee creamer. The cases of energy drinks were quite a bit cheaper than most of their sales, so I got two. Usually, it’s just maybe 50¢ off per case, but this time they were $1.30 off per case.

My husband requested the Coke, which was also on sale, so I got two 12 packs of those. Not much of a sale, but better than nothing. He requested the Sweet Chili chips and corn chips, which were not on sale… good grief, they are expensive these days! That came out of his budget, not the main budget, though. 😄

The flats of eggs were not on sale, but they are about 3 dollars per flat cheaper than at my mother’s grocery store – if they have any flats at all.

Pierogi were on sale as well, so I got a couple of bags.

One of the big savings was the butter. I haven’t seen butter for less than $5 each in four years! The other was the chicken, which was a buy one, get one free, deal. It was a mix and match option, but I chose two whole chickens instead of parts and pieces.

So while I ended up buying more than expected, we’ve got more butter and extra chickens in the freezer, and that’s always a good thing!

Once I got home and everything was put away, I really needed to just sit down and decompress for a while! Visits with my mother – even good ones like today (yes, this was a good visit!) – really take a lot out of me.

While I was out and about, we got hit with passing rain several times, so things are wetter out there now, then when I left this morning. The next two days should be cleared and warmer, so I’m hoping to finally get some work down outside – including working some of that peat into various prepped beds, and finally planting my potatoes! I’m hoping to get another bed of peas, spinach and carrots planted, too.

The rain has delayed getting other beds ready, but most things won’t be planted until after June 2, so we’ve got the rest of May to get those done, and build new ones.

If the weather holds out!

The Re-Farmer

Another damp morning

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It rained steadily through most of yesterday, and continues today. No downpours, but constant enough that we’re getting quite a bit of standing water in the usual places.

Also, the rain is light enough that the cats don’t mind being out and about in it!

I think I counted 30 or 31 this morning, but they were milling around too quickly. Then something startled them and they exploded in all directions, at which point, I gave up trying! 😄 Sad Face was in the sunroom when I first came out, and I was even able to pet him briefly while he was outside.

I haven’t seen Judgement in a while. Hopefully, he’s just out exploring his territory and will be back soon. I also didn’t see Broccoli. She would be somewhere with her babies. Hopefully, there will still be kibble left when she does finally come to eat!

While doing my rounds, I was joined by Syndol. While petting him, I spotted what looked like blood in a patch of white fur. He let me check, and it looks like he got into a fight and a tuft of fur was pulled out at his neck.

While checking that out, I also found a wood tick, right next to the bald patch!

Syndol was patient about letting me get a grip on it and pulling it out. Not easy, in that long fur!

While going through the maple grove I paused at an old willow that is half dead. Something about it looked… different. I’m not entirely sure what the change was, but it was enough to make me grab hold of it and give it a shake.

At which point, I brought the camera out…

I was easily able to pull that dead trunk down with one hand. I honestly don’t know how it stayed up for so long!

This was basically two willow trunks against each other, and the other trunk also has some rot on it. I’m not sure if it’ll keep going for a few more years, of if it will come down, too. It leans quite a bit already. With willow, though, you just never know. The big willow nearby has been slowly dying for years, and it’s center, where it splits off into several trunks, is fully rotted out. Yet, year after year, it keeps going!

I could see more snow crocus flower buds this morning, and the tulips are growing nicely. I’m seeing more garlic coming up, too, which is a bit of a relief. I was starting to think most of them hadn’t survived the winter.

Once again, it’s too wet and muddy to do the outside work I need to do. This afternoon, I’ll be making a trip to the post office. Yes, more packages for my husband to pick up, but also one to return. He had picked up a video card for his desktop computer, in hopes of getting it working again.

He had the tower open to work on it, when a cat came in and knocked it to the floor, and onto his foot. No injury, thankfully, but … well … he now has a big, expensive paperweight.

He is not a happy camper.

The video card is not much use now. I’m not sure he even finished getting it out of the packaging.

*sigh*

As much as we need this rain, it’s really doing a number on the gravel roads. The road running past our driveway isn’t too bad. It gets a bit more maintenance, since it gets a lot more heavy traffic than some of the other side roads. A lot of dump trucks, tractors and heavy equipment use this road to get to the fields to the south of us, including our own that is rented out. I was talking to the guy who delivers our prescriptions, and he was telling me some of the gravel roads he has to take are in really bad shape. Some of them even have grass growing on them! Nothing can really be done about it right now, though. If the roads are too wet and muddy, the graders can’t go down them without causing more damage.

The main gravel road that runs past us, which we take to go to town, is constructed for heavy traffic, and is considerably wider than any of the side roads, but there are still patches of it that break up, every year. It’s actually in worse shape than the section of road that goes past our driveway!

All in all, we’re doing pretty good, while getting some much needed moisture. Which will continue for a couple more days! When I looked previously, we were supposed to get a break over the weekend, then a couple more days rain. Now, that rain is expected to hit us over the weekend, instead. We’ve got some decidedly cool days in the upcoming week, too. [update: the forecast has already changed! Now we’re not supposed to get rain over the weekend again. LOL]

Meanwhile, my brother is coming out tomorrow, to set up my mother’s air conditioner. I’ll get joining him to help out – and enjoy his company. She won’t be needing to use in for a while! Still, it’s good to get that done now.

There is no hurry at all in getting the AC they gave us set up. We’ve got the living room set up for transplants right now, so the outlet is blocked. Once we no longer have seedlings in the living room, we can move the shelves away again, and hook it up. It should be interesting to see how much of a difference it will make in the household, come summertime. When he set it up for us last year, the summer was almost over, so it didn’t get much use before being set aside for the winter. I suspect the living room is going to become a favourite place to hang out this summer! Especially for my husband. I would not be at all surprised if he ends up linking his laptop to the TV to use. His south facing bedroom gets pretty warm in the summer, and he does not tolerate heat well, at all.

We’ll find out in about a month or so!

I’m still wrapping my brain around the idea that we’re in May already. This year is just flying by.

The Re-Farmer

Our 2024 Garden: 100% melons!

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I left the Summer of Melon blend of seeds until evening before planting them. By then, the last few seeds were sending out their radicles!

I had to be careful with some of the bigger ones, and their roots has made their in between the layers of paper towel.

All 21 of them got planted into the larger cell trays we’re testing out this year. Even the last one that just started to germinate. While I made sure to plant the seeds so they were not completely buries in the seed starting mix, the vermiculite added to the top does hide most of them. Which should be fine. They’ll still get light, and it’s so light, it won’t hinder their growth at all.

To make room in the aquarium greenhouse, the last tray of Wild Bunch winter squash got moved into the mini greenhouse frame at the window, and the remaining containers of seeds set to pre-germinate were moved over to that side of the aquarium.

Getting the tray with the planted seeds in it is always a pain, though. These trays are a bit longer, and the aquarium has a support running across the middle. The tray needs to be carefully tilted to get it in. It means waiting until after it’s set up before adding water to the bottom tray. The freshly planted seeds did get misted with a spray bottle, after the vermiculite was added, and the seed starting mix was pre-moistened, too, but once it’s on the heat mat, things will dry out quickly. The smaller celled trays we used before – the ones designed for the small Jiffy pellets – had openings in two corners, where water would be poured through. These larger celled trays fit the same base trays, but are quite a bit taller. Normally, that gives space to add water to the base tray from the side, making use of the gaps between cells. That can’t be done with it set up in the aquarium, so I had to move the tray of cells off to the side, add water to the base, then put it back.

I need to find a better way to do that. We have a funnel that is long and flexible that we use to put drain cleaner/maintenance stuff into the washing machine drain pipe. I think that would be long enough to work. The next time I’m at Canadian Tire, I’ll see if I can find another one.

I might be planting more in the next couple of days, though! The watermelon seeds look like 4 out or 5 have germinated, and the Sarah’s Choice melon seeds just sort of exploded. None were germinating when I checked this morning, and now all 5 are sending out little radicles! Even the Zucca melon seeds look like they will soon germinate. Nothing on the Pixie melons yet, though. When it comes time to plant those, they can all go into another of the large celled trays that I have. If the 100% germination rate keeps up, that will be another 10 melons, 5 watermelons, plus the 4 Zucca. That will leave a couple of cells to spare, which will make it easier to keep track of them.

Oh!! While doing a quick search to get the link for the Zucca melon, I found an article about some people in the Canadian prairies, like us, that successfully grew them! That’s encouraging, considering we’ve had I think 2 … or is it 3? … failed years with them. Last year was the most successful, but the developing fruit all suddenly started to rot on the vine, and I don’t know why.

Well, we’ll see how they do this year. Hopefully, we’ll have 30-100 pound/14-45kg melons this year!

The Re-Farmer

Broccoli is first, and growing things

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I was a bit later than usual when I came out to feed the yard babies, so there was quite a crowd.

I immediately noticed Broccoli’s back end was looking bedraggled.  As she milled about, eating ravenous, I could confirm.

She has had her litter.  Possibly just hours before. 

She has her “nest” somewhere in the outer yard, so we likely won’t see them until they are old enough to bring them to the kibble houses. 

*sigh*

This would be the first litter of the year.  Out of the 33, at most, that we see, I have been able to spot possibly 5 in total that look pregnant, including Broccoli, with one tuxedo I think might be female and is probably pregnant, plus the tiny fluff ball that hangs put in the sun room that I think is female, but is from the youngest litter from last year.  I’m working on socializing her, but have had little success.

Why are the ladies all the most feral ones?

We are also getting a regular stinky kitty visiting.  A very small skunk, too, and only by itself.  The cats are completely indifferent to its presence!

On a different note, while doing my rounds this morning, I’m see8ng more snow crocuses blooming… but not very many plants. Hopefully, more will cone up.

Speaking of which, my daughter’s tulip patch has lots coming up, including a surprise.  I found some working their way through the mulch I moved aside from the saffron crocuses.  I planted them there because the tulips planted nearby didn’t make it.  At all.  Now, after at least 2 years, there are tulip leaves visible!  These should be the Bull’s Eye tulips, with their unique blossoms.  Hopefully, they will actually bloom, and we can confirm that. 

We had lights rain, off and on, yesterday, and should be getting more, today and tomorrow.  The weekend should be clear-ish then a couple more days of rain.  Which would be great, if it were more than just a fine mist that just makes surfaces damp.  We could really use some good downpours.  We are still being affected by the strong El Nino, though, so our area is unlikely to get much. 

Today, my main goal is to plant the summer mix melon seeds.  I gave them a extra day in their containers.  In checking the others last night, I saw my first watermelon seed germinating. 

If the seedlings remain as successful as the pre-germination, after transplanting, we will have a massive amount of winter squash and melons this year!

The Re-Farmer

All the things…

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… and it’s barely past noon!

First the fun stuff.

I counted 31 yard cats this morning! Likely because it’s a rather chilly and damp morning – and I was a bit later than usual for bringing food out!

With the chill and that damp, I don’t expect to get much done outside, but I might get some seeds planted into cells this evening. I might wait another day, but when I checked the mixed melon seeds when shutting down the lights last night, I saw a whole bunch of radicles peaking out! None of the other seeds are showing them yet, but almost all the mixed seeds were sprouting. I checked again this morning, and it looks like we’re at not quite 100% germination with the mixed melons, already! This was the packet that had 21 seeds in it. The large celled trays I am trying out this year have 21 cells, so that works out, if they all make it. I don’t want to put them in soil too quickly, though. A bit more time in the warmth and dampness above the heat mat will be good for them.

Speaking of dampness…

While checking the status of the basement, I was able to shift the new blower fans to focus more on the stairs. The space under the stairs is looking pretty dry, as well as most of the concrete floor, but it’s going to take longer on the steps.

We should probably remove that carpet that’s nailed to the stairs. Most likely, it’s scrap carpet salvaged from somewhere that my parents acquired and added during the years we lived out of province. Likely to make them less of a potential slip hazard? Or just because they felt like it. I don’t know. I think, in the near future, we should pick up a gallon of durable paint, get rid of the carpet, and paint the stairs as soon as possible, so there aren’t any exposed holes in the wood. The girls have plans for fixing the basement up a bit, including painting the ceiling – the exposed floor beams and joists – white, to brighten up a really dark area. I’d like to get more of those shop lights that we are using as grow lights. I prefer them to the lights that are already down there and, to be honest, I’m not too keen on replacing the existing wired in fixtures just yet.

But those are plans to slowly work on over time.

I checked the root cellar floor as well, and it’s mostly try, so the box fan remains. The hydrometer I’ve got in there was at 60% humidity still!

We might later need to move the new blower fans to the counter shelves. The pedestal fans are still aimed at them, and there is significant improvement, but there’s a lot of stuff blocking air flow. We’ll probably need to move some things out – and it’s a good excuse to finally drag out the old door from our old van that my brother was able to replace for us, shortly after we moved out here. Yeah, it’s been sitting there all these years, just in case parts were needed. Now that we no longer have the van, there is no reason to leave it there.

Other than the weight and how awkward it would be to get it up the stairs and out the door!

Anyhow.

After I did my rounds this morning, I called my mother. She sounded better, but she told me she was preparing to head out to the clinic. I asked how she was feeling, and yes, the Pepto seemed to really make a difference. We talked a bit about that, and then she went back to talking about going to the clinic today.

Why, if she’s feeling better?

She kept jumping back to my brother telling her that she needed a doctor to say she could move to the nursing home, and I eventually figured out that she believed she could just show up at the clinic, have a doctor say she needed to move to a nursing home, and basically start getting ready to move.

She has gotten really eager to move out of where she is and into the nursing home! Specifically, the one in town, where her sister and my father spent their final time, as well as many old friends and neighbours of hers.

Once I figured out why she still wanted to go to the clinic, I told her it doesn’t work that way! I told my mother she would need to make an appointment, then told her I would call the clinic about it right away, and get back to her.

Which I did, and had a great conversation with what turned out to be an unusually knowledgeable receptionist on the topic. It turns out she also does home care and is quite familiar with the process.

One of the things she told me is that we need to give the doctor a “top 3” of nursing home choices, not just the one my mother wants to live in, and they all have to be in the same region.

My mother’s doctor, however, is on holiday for most of May, so the earlier appointment I could get for my mother was at the end of May. She booked my mother for a longer appointment, since it is for a long term care assessment, and made sure the appropriate forms were attached to the appointment file.

I really like the people in this clinic!

Then I called my mother back with her appointment, and explained things to her, including how this just puts her on a waiting list, so the whole thing can take months, and she might not end up where she wants to be. We talked about other towns with nursing homes, and even the smaller, nearer city, which is in the same region (the bigger city is its own region, by itself). When we’d talked about assisted living previously, she was adamant she never wanted to live there, but now that we’re talking nursing homes, she actually seemed quite okay with the idea of living there. Particularly since it puts her closer to both my brother and sister. It’s roughly half way between us and my brother’s, so our trips to see her would be about the same length of time. My sister would be only maybe 15 minutes away, at most.

But, who knows? We have to get her assessed first, and we now have an appointment to get that ball rolling.

My mother updated, I then updated my siblings. While we can all help out, ultimately, it’s on my brother, as Power of Attorney for my mother, to finalize things on her behalf.

After all that, I was finally able to take a breather, have breakfast and start this post – at lunch time! 😄

I’m glad to have gotten that done, but I’m also glad to NOT be making a trip to the clinic with my mother, nor anywhere else. I don’t even have to go to the pharmacy; my husband’s refills are going to be delivered today.

Between all the phone calls and writing, and the cool, damp weather, what I’d really like to do now is go for a nap. Weather like this always makes me so sleepy!

The Re-Farmer