Today turned out to be a decently warm day, with a slightly higher than forecast high of 4C/39F. Thankfully, most of where I needed to work was sheltered from the wind.
I decided it was a good day to start collecting material for the walls on the chain link fence garden bed, to replace the temporary walls we have right now, as well as cutting things away and clearing up at the same time. This is progress so far.
The first stack is maple suckers that are strong and straight enough to be used as vertical supports for the garden bed walls. For what I have in mind, and the space I’m working in, I’ll need a total of 48 stakes, with a quarter of them double the length of the others. The longer ones will be used to support a cover for the bed, to keep it from being choked out by Chinese elm seeds, or used as a litter box by the cats. They’ll be cut to length, sharpened at one end, and peeled of bark. For now, I am mostly aiming to do the wall against the chain link fence, so I need only 24 stakes to be able to get started.
The next picture in the slide show is a collection of poplar, maple and willow branches and suckers. I will need a LOT more of these, but it’s a start.
Some of the material came from maple and willow I needed to cut back to get branches away from the power lines. I wasn’t able to clear it completely, as I needed a ladder to reach. It was a bit too windy to safely use a ladder there and, by then, that wind was causing what promised to be a massive ear ache, if I didn’t get inside soon!
Meanwhile, we have been keeping an eye on the isolation shelter. Pinky is doing very well and seems quite content in there with the three littles.
One of my daughters was able to get a look at her incision and it’s all looking excellent. They are all quite enjoying their special isolation shelter treat of wet cat food. Hopefully, this means the little will start gaining weight and getting bigger!
The angry looking little fluffball tabby is so chill for a mostly feral kitten! Totally enjoying the shelter. None of the littles have shown any interest in leaving it!
I think we have a name for the angry looking kitty.
Furriosa.
😄🤣
That little tuxedo has the smallest, roundest eyes. They look huge because the kitten always has this stunned expression on its face. I’m able to pet him (her?) and the white and grey pretty regularly, but Furriosa allows touches only while s/he’s eating.
Speaking of pets, I was able to pet Frank today! She’s still very nervous and was very cautious about coming to my outstretched and, but I was able to give full back pets, and even got some purrs out of her. Which means our chances of getting her to the vet one of the two slots we have on the 28th just improved dramatically.
Now, if I could just get one of the other adult ladies friendlier! They just will not let it happen. *sigh*
The kittens in the isolation shelter are too small for spays or neuters, but we might be able to get one of the bigger kittens in the sun room. A couple of tabbies are getting okay with being pet and handled, though I think the bigger one is male and the smaller is female. If I’m right, neither are ready for spay or neuter. The smaller one is under 2 pounds, which is the minimum weight the vet will do a spay, and if the other is male, his balls haven’t dropped yet, so he can’t be done for a while yet. We do have older, bigger kittens that would be easy to grab, all male, and priority is much higher to get females done.
Well, we’ll see how it goes. We’ve got about a week to work on it.
As much as I am appreciating the mild November we are having, just to get stuff done outside, I also appreciate it for making life a lot easier on the furballs! Especially the tiniest ones.
Today turned out to be a very dreary day outside, so it was a quiet one for the family. I did, of course, keep an eye on Pinky, and she seemed to be doing very well.
Also, no damage to the isolation shelter from the raccoons trying to break in, that I could see. I did end up ordering a solar powered security camera that was on sale. It likely won’t arrive until after the cats are out of isolation, but it will still be good to have it set up to keep an eye on things in there.
When doing the evening cat feeding, I did grab a tiny tuxedo and put him (her?) in the isolation shelter. As with the mostly white one, it’s so small, it was being pushed away from the food trays and I would often find it off to the side, looking forlorn.
When I tucked it in s/he immediately started eating.
I’m glad Pinky is okay with the company of littles. She never really got along with the other cats and was a loner. When her own kittens were still around, she was such a good mama – but would bat at any other kittens that came close! Now, the mostly white one likes to snuggle up against her, and she’s fine with it.
That tuxedo settled in real fast. Once the belly was full, it curled up in the cat bed and promptly went to sleep!
I did make a point of stopping by and petting Pinky as often as I could while doing my evening rounds. The mostly white one was also enjoying pets. I was able to pet the fluffy grey tabby while it was eating, but that’s it. While not at the food bowl, I can’t touch it.
I did get a look at Pinky’s belly, and could barely tell there was an incision at all. No sign of infection or any sort of irritation. All is looking very well!
While doing my rounds and switching out the trail cam memory cards, I had a whole crowd following me. I ended up getting lots of pictures.
Above, the first picture is of a very gorgeous, Rabi (I’ve concluded that yes, he is Kohl’s brother), AKA: Fancypants. Then there’s an adorable black and white kitten that I think might be female. Next is Hypotenose, aggressively demanding pets. I came back later and paused to try and get a picture of the fluffy orange kitten, Colby, though the cat house window, which attracted a whole crowd on the roof! The seven biggest ones all wanted attention. The fluffy kitten in the back won’t let me close.
And that’s about the most exciting thing of my day today.
Well, having Frank and Pinky in the isolation shelter overnight (with a fluffy feral kitten) almost worked.
We were able to get Pinky into a carrier, but Frank escaped while we tried to get her into the second one. My younger daughter had been helping me while my older daughter distracted the other cats by feeding them. When the three of us failed to catch Frank, we couldn’t grab a substitute, since they had all eaten, and they need to be on an overnight fast.
*sigh*
So, my younger daughter and I headed out with just one cat instead of two for spay.
I made sure to open the gate before we headed out, so that we wouldn’t have an extra stop once Pinky was in the vehicle. The sky was just starting to get light in the East, when I spotted something interesting. Forgive the poor quality of the image. The best picture I could get was quite zoomed in.
I absolutely hate driving at sunrise, and sunset. That half light makes it so hard to see. Especially with oncoming headlights. My daughter was on deer watching duty (she did see some, thankfully out in a field, not about to run across the road!). The visibility was so poor while we were traveling east, I never did make it to the posted speed limit. Once we were driving south, it was better, but when I ended up behind a slower moving truck, driving with its hazards blinking, I really didn’t mind slowing down. Not that passing would have been safe for quite some time. I was not the only one okay with driving slower, either!
It was full light by the time we got to the clinic parking lot, just before the clinic opened. Which is when my daughter saw that I had dried blood all over the side of my hand! Frank got me good, when I tried to pick her up!
Thankfully, we keep wet wipes in the truck.
Pinky was very quiet for the entire drive in, which was almost scary after a while. She had been scrambling to get out of the carrier before we put her into the truck and then nothing for the entire ride!
After we checked her in, they took her carrier to where they could keep her in a larger kennel until her surgery. My daughter and I then headed out, first to get some gas, then grab breakfast. We went to the McDonalds in the Walmart, because there really wasn’t anything else for that time of the morning.
Then we did some shopping. I had to pick up more kibble for both inside and outside cats, plus I got extra wet cat food, as kitties recovering in the isolation shelter get treated extra special while they are stuck in there, and that includes their own wet cat food. By the time I got the cat supplies, plus some household supplies, my budget was pretty much done. One thing I needed to get, but didn’t have much budget for anymore, was new work boots suitable for the winter. Both my regular work boots and my steel toed shoes are falling apart and are just not wearable anymore. My daughter, however, went looking for different boots for me to try on. When I saw the price, though, they were out of budget. Not by a lot, but enough that I wasn’t going to get them – but my daughter insisted that she would buy them for me! That was really sweet of her. She’s getting a disability income now, but it’s a paltry sum.
Aside from that, I had a few smaller items for my husband, such as more distilled water for his CPAP humidifier, while my daughter had her own shopping list. We took our time about it, since we knew it would be a while before the vet clinic called.
After the shopping was done and in the truck, we sat in the truck for a while and talked. Which is when I realized I’d forgotten a few things. Things we could get at the nearby Dollarama. So we went there next. Along with my forgotten items, I found some things for my mother. The one thing I knew she wanted, we couldn’t find in either store; a sink plunger. Her kitchen sink drains very slowly. She’s called about it before and they sent someone to pour drain cleaner down the pipes, and that was it. The problem never went away. So she’s been asking for a sink plunger for some time, and this time I actually remembered while I was out and about.
We didn’t find one at the Dollarama, but I did find an affordable cat cave; one with wire supports on the outside, that would keep cats from crushing it!
That done, we headed across the street to the Canadian Tire. We actually found several tyles of sink plungers there! I picked one that I thought would be easier for my mother’s mobility.
Another thing I remembered I wanted to pick up were more furnace filters, as we are on our last 3 pack. Canadian Tire is the only place I’ve been able to find the 20″x20″x1″ size our furnace needs. I just about lost it when I found them – and saw the price! A 2 pack for $42.99! Singles were $31.99!
I remember getting 3 packs for under $10.
After looking around, I found some off brand filters that were exactly like what we’ve been using. A three pack for only $7.99 What a difference!
By the time we were done there, it wasn’t even noon yet. It could still be a couple of hours before they called us. So my daughter and I went for lunch.
At McDonalds. Because that was what I had a budget for.
Twice in one day is a bit much!
After lunch, we decided to just go back to the clinic and sit in the parking lot to wait. We both ended up leaning our seats back and napping! My phone kept going off, though, so I didn’t get much of a nap. When it was getting closer to 2pm and we hadn’t gotten a call yet, I figured I would go in and ask.
Pinky hadn’t gone in for surgery yet!
That just blew me away. They’d never been this late before! In fact, knowing that I’m hanging around town because we live so far away, they’ve always made a point of getting our cats done as quickly as they could. Usually, I would have been on my way home by 2, or even earlier. Poor Pinky would have been so very hungry by then! I was assured they would call me when she was done.
So we waited some more – and fretted. They must have gotten her in shortly after I asked about her, because I got a call just before 2:30, saying she was done and recovering, and that I could pick her up after 3.
We ended up going in early, as we needed to use their facilities before our drive home, and they were able to get Pinky out right away. All I had to do was give them the marked envelop for the donated, and they gave me an after care printout.
Poor Pinkly was pretty upset when my daughter tried to put the carrier into the back of the cab. In the end, she held the carrier on her lap for the drive home. Pinky was quiet, but she would try to claw and bite at the door to get out. Most alarming was that she frequently stopped to just pant.
I did manage a picture before we got her into the truck. Not a very good one!
In the first picture, you can actually see that she’s panting.
The next picture, my daughter had taken for me earlier, of the damage Frank did to my hand – after I’d cleaned the dried blood away! That one didn’t hurt at all. Oddly, it was a less deep scratch under my thumb that actually stung more.
In the last picture, Pinky is all tucked into the isolation shelter, with the fluffy feral. They quite enjoyed their wet cat food that my daughter gave them, while I distracted the other cats with their softened kibble feeding.
After they were fed and everything was put away, I set up the new cat cave. It was immediately explored!
Havarti is almost too big for it! The little ones could certainly fit in there. They currently like to crowd into the blue striped one. That one is taller, but has a smaller base than this one.
Of course, we’ve been checking on Pinky and her companion often through the evening. Usually, all looked well. However, as I was writing this post, I paused to go into the kitchen. I heard a commotion out the window and feared Pinky was trying to escape.
Nope.
I found three or four big raccoons, trying to break into the shelter! There wasn’t even any food left inside, but they still were trying to get int! Two or three were on the roof, and one was at the ramp door below, when they all scattered as I stepped outside.
This is not good. I really don’t think the shelter is raccoon proof! Those buggers have hands. They might be able to open, or pull out, the sliding windows, or tear apart the roof panels.
While I was finishing things up outside, before it got dark, I did see Frank.
It’s going to take a while to regain her trust. She won’t let me near her anymore! We really need to work on that. We have two cats booked on the 28th. We really want to get her spayed. She is so small, and I remember how bloody she was the day she had her kittens.
Meanwhile…
Before we got home, my husband sent a note saying that my mother had called and left a message. When I checked the answering machine, though, I found a message that had been left earlier.
Much earlier. While we were still on the road.
It was home care, saying they had a list minute cancellation for my mother’s morning med assist. The scheduler did at that they had someone that could eventually do her med assist, but it would be so late that it would be about the same time my mother was getting her lunch meal assist. The scheduler even left a number for me to call.
Neither my husband nor daughter had heard the call come in, and the scheduler never tried to call my cell phone.
I thought that maybe my mother still got her med assist later, but when I called her back after hearing her message, she told me that no one showed up for her morning med assist. I told her about the message I got; that they did try to call me, but I was not home, and they never called my cell phone.
What my mother had wanted to talk about was a call she got from the hospital about her upcoming MRI. They asked all sorts of questions to make sure that my mother had nothing metal on or in her body. She had forgotten to mention her dentures. The form they sent for her to fill out did include dentures, which we checked off, but my mother doesn’t remember that and is now all worried about it.
Aside from that, though, her main reason for calling me was because neither I nor my siblings have called her in a few days. I’d spent most of Friday with her, so it hasn’t actually been that long – and I did mention to her that I had an appointment today, but she forgot. When I updated my siblings about the missed home care visit, my brother mentioned he’d just done a 13 hour day, and still didn’t finish what he needed to do, but had to call it a day. I’ve told my mother as often as I can, that my brother works very long hours at his job – sometimes odd hours, due to time zones – but she still expects him to be able to drop everything to tend to her. Even today, when I told her about the call I got from home care, she was asking “why are they calling you?” I don’t know how many times we’ve explained to her that I’m at the top of their list of people to call. Next on the list would be my brother, and there’s no way he’d be able to leave his job and drive out from the city to do something like a med assist. My sister is technically retired and works only part time, but she has a late shift, so she tends not to get up until much later in the morning. Plus, to be honest, I don’t know that my sister’s health is all that good, either. She isn’t saying anything, but even my mother is seeing signs that something is off. My sister is approaching 70 though, like my mother, she doesn’t look anywhere near her age. Anyhow, there are many reasons why I’m the one they call. If not me, I’m not sure who else my mother thinks they would be calling!
After talking to my mother, I sent an email to the home care coordinator. I did a reminder about my mother’s MRI on Sunday, adding that I plan to be there earlier, then my brother will be driving us to her appointment in his car, so we’ll be able to take care of both my mother’s evening med assists. I also mentioned the message I got this morning, and that I never actually heard the message until evening, so my mother missed her meds. I asked if they call me on my land line and it goes to the answering machine, to please try my cell phone after leaving a message. They know we live in a cell phone dead zone, but if I’m not there to answer a call to the land line, chances are good I’m out and about and can get a signal. Even if I’m just outside in the yard, I’m more likely to have a call get through than if I’m in the house.
We’ll see how that works out.
For the next while, I actually get to stay home until it’s time for my mother’s MRI. I asked about doing another grocery shopping trip for her on Friday, but she said no. The daytime temperatures are expected to be fairly warm, which I plan to take full advantage off, as much as possible. It will also be good for Pinky and her fluffy companion in the isolation shelter. Though, after what happened with the raccoons, I’m thinking we should look into getting an outdoor security camera that will allow us to keep an eye on the isolation shelter more easily. Considering how much use it will get in the winter, it might be worth the investment. Something solar powered. I’ll have to do some research on that.
Anyhow, that’s how things worked out today. It’s unfortunate Frank managed to escape this morning, but at least Pinky is done and seems to be doing quite well, so far.
As long as we can keep the raccoons out of the isolation shelter!!
I headed out to town this afternoon to get the cash donated for tomorrow’s spays. The girls and I will be heading out later this evening to get the two ladies closed up in the isolation shelter for the night, along with a wet cat food treat, before they have to start fasting after 9pm.
On the way home from town, I stopped at the post office to pick up a parcel, and found the insulated cat house I’d ordered was in as well.
The first picture in the slide show above shows the parts and pieces. The liner for the bottom, the roof and the sides are all lined with self-heating insulated material. It also came with two pegs to secure it to the ground.
The second picture shows it all assembled, plus I cut a couple of pieces from a long and thin scrap of rigid insulation we had left. They are slightly longer than the shelter itself.
When doing the evening feeding, I moved the box nests in the catio to make room for the new shelter. In the third picture, you can see it set up on top of the insulation. Since it is inside the catio, I am not bothering to use the stakes, but if I did, there is a loop at each end for them.
In the last picture, you can see it didn’t take long for it to get jumped on! I straightened it out but, if it continues to be an issue, I’ll move it under the floating shelf.
Hopefully, this will attract the more feral cats into staying in the inner yard more, instead of disappearing somewhere in the outer yard they’ve found nests in.
It was still pretty nice out, so I got another quick project done, in the water bowl house. I started off by emptying it of everything but the pieces of rigid insulation, and getting some measurements. I then went through our pile of scrap wood that my brother gave me when they were bringing all their stuff out here after selling their property, to find something I could cut to the right length for the sides, and something I could use for a shelf board.
I’d found a 2×4 long enough to cut two support pieces out of, and the shelf board is an actual Melamine covered shelf; the longest of the ones my brother passed on to me. It was actually a smidge too long to fit between the true-to-size 2x4s forming the frame in the back of the shelter, so I shaved off the width and length of a blade on each end with my miter saw. That was just enough for what was now the back of the board to fit between the frame. I did not bother to secure the board to the supports, though, so we can take it out as needed.
Then I added a couple of screws to that loose board in the wall. This structure is mostly nailed together and, for some reason, that corner keeps getting knocked loose. That will no longer happen!
In the second picture, everything is put back in again. The cats really love that cardboard box, so I put it back, too.
Eventually, I want to get another shelf board that is long enough to reach from wall to wall and add it in front of the board that’s there now. We do have some scrap pieces of plywood that could be cut to fit, but it’s thinner and would bow under the weight of cats without some sort of support in the middle. For now, the cat beds in the back have a little more shelter, the cats can sit on the shelf above – and the box will no longer be crushed by cats getting on top of it! We might even be able to pop open that cat cave again, so they can shelter inside it again.
I wasn’t sure if it was going to get done. When I headed out this morning to feed the outside cats, it was decidedly unpleasant.
I also counted 38 cats. I haven’t seen that one tabby that I didn’t recognize, but none of the ones I did see were unfamiliar. Which means the crowd was congregating all at once!
I didn’t soak the kibble in the morning, because I knew it would freeze, so I saved that for the afternoon. I counted 32, that time. Including this little fluff ball.
Tomorrow evening, we are going to get Frank and Pinky closed up in the isolation shelter, so that they can have their fast (after a treat of wet cat food) and be easier to catch in the morning, for their spays. The other cats and kittens are not going to be happy with not being allowed in the isolation shelter for a month! We’ve got the first two that will be in there until it’s time to switch them out for about 10 days, and then we’ll have the next two set up in there for their recovery period. Assuming we can catch two more females. If we ended up with males, they won’t need that much time for observation and recovery.
After the second feeding, I did my evening rounds before it got too dark – these are being done earlier and earlier! Today, I made a point of checking the asters. I’d left the flower bed untouched, so that the Cosmos could shelter the memorial asters from the frost, and hopefully give them time to go to seed.
I collected some to bring inside for planting next year. I left others to self seed. I’m so happy they had enough time to develop seeds before the deep freeze hit!
It was nice enough out that I grabbed a rake and collected leaves to do some mulching, then did a bit of winterizing.
The first picture in the slide show above is where the tiny strawberries were transplanted. I have no idea if they will survive in their new location, but it is worth a try. In the next picture, you can see that the strawberries transplanted into the retaining wall also got mulched with leaves. Next was the saffron. I don’t know if I am being too early with this, or too late, since they are showing new growth. The one flower bud that is still there looks like it froze before it could open, so I left it. I had considered leaving those until later, as we are supposed to warm up a little bit over the next week, but then I saw cats digging around them to leave “presents”, so the mulch is to keep them away, too.
I didn’t mulch the little herb bed, as we are still able to harvest from them, but I did get a pile of leaves ready for when it’s time.
Now that our septic tank is empty, it’s time to get that area ready for winter, too. We’ll be setting the emergency bypass up, just in case, so I stretched out the flexible hose so that it can warm up in the sun and straighten out. I ended up sitting a short length of pipe into the far end to flatten it, because it kept sticking up into the air. The two lengths of PVC pipe we set over the pipe from the basement got shoved into the flexible hose at the other end to help straighten that out, too. In a couple of sections, I leaned boards and bricks and whatnot to get them to straighten out and flatten to the ground.
We did not get the straw bale I was hoping to get this weekend. It might still get delivered in the next while but, just in case, I set the insulated tarp over the septic tank and weighed it down.
The forecast now says we should reach highs of 5C/41F next weekend, and that should be pretty much it for the winter. Time enough for a few last things, like covering the herb bed and, if the straw comes in, using that in various places. I’ll take advantage of every warmish day we have right now!
Usually, her eyes are blood red. I think this is the first time I’ve seen them looking black.
Those are her back feet, of course. That box up by the ceiling is a favourite perch.
I can’t say I got a lot accomplished today. Certainly not outside. I at least got a dump run in. They have a different attendant now. A guy in a high viz vest and a clip board, even. I hope the older woman that needed a cane that used to be the attendant is okay.
After showing him the card that we have to prove we actually live in the municipality, and aren’t coming in from some other one where you have to pay to drop off your garbage and recycling, he asked what was being dropped off. When I told him it was just household garbage and recycling, he told me I might not be able to get the recycling in. The bins were really full, so it would have to go into the pit.
The bin for glass was overflowing, so our glass went into the pit, along with one of our bags of recyclables. I could only get two into a bin.
I’d hoped to get some stuff done outside, as we were supposed to hit 2C/36F today. Which we did, but the wind chill was significantly colder. As I write this, we’ve dropped to -1C/30F, and the wind chill is -12C/10F.
I did get some progress inside, at least. I got home so late from my mother’s yesterday that I didn’t start the beef broth I had meant to. I got that done started today. The meaty bones got roasted first, and then into the slow cooker they went, with onions, garlic, carrot, celery, ginger, apple cider vinegar, salt and pepper. And water, of course. That was left on high for an hour, and now it’s running on low for 8 hours, and there’s still another 4 or 5 hours to go.
While the bones were roasting, I took out the last of our peppers from the garden. The Sweetie Snack Mix peppers that I picked while still green took a while to ripen indoors. Some of them just withered, instead. We ended up with red, yellow, light orange and dark orange peppers. There was just enough to cover a parchment lined baking sheet with strips. After the bones were removed from the oven and into the crock pot, the pepper strips went into the partially cooled oven. They’re now dehydrating on the “warm” setting, at 150F/66C (our oven is the only thing we do at Fahrenheit instead of Celsius). Those will probably just end up as a snack for the girls, still warm from the oven, once they are fully dried.
That’s pretty much it for my accomplishments today. Tomorrow, at least, the winds are supposed to die down, so I might get to the things I hoped to get done today.
Good grief. It’s pitch black out and feels like it should be nearing midnight. Instead, it’s not even 6:30, yet!
I think I’m still in recovery mode from spending so much time with my mother, yesterday. I still feel totally drained!
Today was set aside for me to go to my mother’s to do her shopping and errands and household stuff. I’ll start off by saying, she was actually on really good behaviour today, comparatively speaking. Things did go well.
The morning started off with the feeding of yard cats and doing my morning rounds. I tried for a head count this morning, and got 30. Last time, it was 35, including a cat I didn’t recognize. I haven’t seen it, since.
I moved both heat lamps lower, but this one is a 150watt ceramic heat bulb. The other is 200watt. I thought it was 250w, forgetting that I wasn’t able to find the ceramic heat bulbs at 250w. The lamp is rated to 250w, and there’s an incandescent 250w heat bulb in a matching lamp in the isolation shelter.
Speaking of which, that’s going to be used for its original purpose soon!
This morning, I got a message from the rescue. We have two dates to spay two cats each. I was sent a screen cap of a texted confirmation with two dates, one of which was for 3 cats. I was told I had two slots and someone else had the third, so I thought that was my date. I didn’t think the earlier date was also for me until I got a call while I was at my mother’s from the vet clinic to confirm the earlier date! It is straightened out now, though I did tell the woman who called me that, while we have two females we know we can catch for the first one, with the second one, we might have to just catch what we can, and see what they turn out to be! This isn’t very uncommon when it comes to strays and colony cats. I’ve brought in cats without even knowing for sure what gender they were, and they were fine with it.
But that got worked out much later.
I was able to head out a bit early to my mother’s bringing along my stock pot and a good knife, along with the prepped vegetables and herds, for the chicken stock was would be making for her. When I got there, my mother was back in bed, after her morning med assist. I noticed she had a garbage bag ready for the bin by the door, so I quickly dropped the stuff off, grabbed the garbage and headed out. Which turned out to be excellent timing. I passed one of her neighbours in the hall; someone who’s window faces the street. We ended up chatting for a while, and he told me he seeds me out his window quite often. He was very sweet. He mentioned that my mother clearly needs more help, and that he’d told her, if she ever needs anything, to just knock on his door.
When I got back, I told my mother about this, but she had no memory of him saying this to her! When I told her which apartment he was in, she even struggled to remember who lived there. She would recognize him to see him, but not necessarily connect him to any particular apartment.
It’s good to know she has some good neighbours.
When I got back to my mother’s, she was up and at her table. She joked about her being wrapped in a robe and wearing a regular shirt, because it’s been so long since her laundry was done, she ran out of nightgowns!
She was rather amused when I started unpacking my supplies and pre-prepared ingredients to work on her chicken stock. I just had to prep the chicken legs and thighs. My mother insisted I wash the pieces really, really well, to wash off the “chemicals”, then started telling me how the stores all spray meat with chemicals to make meat last longer. I told her that’s not quite what they do, and she got instant angry with me – but I was still washing her chicken for her, so she turned off the angry. I’m not sure if she was thinking of the CO that’s used to keep beef red in packaging, or she she was thinking of the chlorine rinse they used to do, to kill off bacteria like salmonella, though that hasn’t been done in years. No doubt, it was something she saw on daytime TV or read in a paper, many, many years ago.
After the chicken was in the pot, I started adding the mirepoix ingredients, then showed her the rest. I don’t think she has ever used ginger before, except maybe in power form. I know she was aware of turmeric, as she had bought a whole bunch for herself because she’d read about how healthy it was, but didn’t know how to use it. She ended up giving it to us! Apple cider vinegar is something she was completely unaware of.
She was oddly surprised by how many garlic cloves I brought – an entire head, so about 6 or 7 cloves. That was probably the last thing I would have expected her to be surprised about. “Polish penicillin” was always a staple ingredient when I was growing up, and she often brings up about how we should plant lots and lots of garlic. I remember how my parents would sometimes eat it. They’d pour some salt onto the table, then dip their cloves of garlic into the salt as they ate it raw!
Once the chicken stock was at the point where I could turn it down to a simmer, I got the first two loads of my mother’s laundry going, then we went over her shopping list. She had added a few things to it since I started it for her a few couple of days ago – including wine! The pharmacy has a liquor section, but the wine she likes isn’t available anymore. In our province, the government controls liquor sales (which is one of the reasons our booze is so expensive; it’s mostly taxes). When Trump started talking tariffs, our premier ordered all US booze to be pulled from the shelves. This was already bought and paid for by the government, of course, and hardly anyone was demanding US booze get pulled. It was just an childish tantrum on the part of our premier. Canada has one Western province where alcohol sales are private. Some places did try to remove US booze from the shelves, but the customers complained so much, they put them back. People in our province have no such say in the matter. The irony of this childish display is that we’ve had tariffs on US products for decades.
Which means the wine my mother usually gets – a super sweet kosher wine my parents bought for as long as I can remember – is no longer available. She asked me to try and find something I thought would be close. 😄
The pharmacy was my first stop and I had to ask one of the staff for help. I don’t know wines. Nothing against them. There just aren’t a lot of alcoholic drinks that I enjoy. In the end, I had two staff members looking things up, trying to find something my mother might like to replace what she normally would have gotten. It came down to just one thing – without US products, their shelves were pretty empty – and there was only one bottle of it left. On sale, too, which was nice.
That done, I picked up a few other things on her list, then got her bubble packs. I got another nice surprise at the checkout. My mother has the loyalty card, which is on her file at the pharmacy. She had lost track of the card for a while, but because it’s on her file, any times she got her prescriptions, she was still collecting points. Only at the store counter does the card need to be shown to collect points.
My mother was able to get $40 off her stuff! Plus, she collected enough new points through her prescription refills that, next time, she’ll be able to get another $20 off. !!!
When I told her that later one, her response was, why didn’t they use that $20 right then?
*sigh*
That done, the next stop was the grocery store for a somewhat larger shop than usual for her. She even requested I picked up some of the deli chicken I would get for her for sandwiches. She didn’t want slices, though. She asked for a chunk about an inch thick. That certainly made it easier for the deli person!
By the time I was done the shopping and back at my mother’s, her Meals on Wheels had arrived and the empty tray was waiting on her walker, outside her door. Those get left in the common room for pick up, on the next delivery day. So I took care of that for her before heading in. I was quite surprised she was done so quickly, and commented on it. I did notice the container with vegetable soup was on the counter, though. Once a week, they do a “use whatcha got” soup using leftovers. My mother says it tastes like dishwater. !!! So that ended up getting tossed. Another moment where she suddenly got angry at me, this time because I couldn’t read her mind over just how she wanted it tossed. *sigh*
Once her things were put away, the rest of the time was spent tending the stock, her laundry and general clean up. I did stop for some tea and a bun as a lunch, before getting back at it. Once the stock was done, I took out the meat to set aside for a bit, then the large sticks of celery and carrots, because I knew my mother would want to include them in a soup or something. I found a little strainer that I used to get most of the big stuff out for the stock before salting it and letting it cook longer, while I deboned the chicken. That all fit into one of the freezer bags that I’d brought along with everything else. The vegetables went into a handy take out container my mother had.
The stock was a different issue. I should have brought jars! I could find only two suitable empty jars and started ladling the stock into them, through the strainer. My mother kept telling me to leave everything out to cool down, first. It took me a bit to understand that she didn’t like the containers being used, and especially when I put the lids loosely on the jars. She thought they would take longer to cool down than if they were just left out. The idea of covering them at least to keep dust out apparently never occurred to her!
I find myself wondering if she was expecting to leave my stock pot behind?
By this point, I was finishing off and starting to pack things up to leave, as soon as her last load of laundry was dry. I had mentioned to my mother earlier that I needed to swing by the garage before going home (she wouldn’t understand what getting a tire torqued means). When she started complaining that I was getting ready to leave, I told her, I still need to go to the garage on the way home.
Which is when she started getting mad at me again. Why was I leaving so soon? I told her, I’d been there for almost 5 hours. Didn’t she finish her Meals on Wheels first? Yes – before I came back with her groceries. She actually tried to claim I’d been there for barely 2 hours, instead of almost 5 hours!
One of the things she wanted me to do was cut her toenails, which I really didn’t want to do on top of everything else. It would have been good for her to soak her feet to soften them, first, too, which hadn’t happened. She basically started having a tantrum. It was as if I hadn’t done anything else for her at all, because her toenails hadn’t been done.
Then she started berating me, asking why I booked to go to the garage on a day I was going to be at her place. I told her, I didn’t; I brought the truck in yesterday. This is a safety thing to make sure my tire doesn’t go flying.
Some time ago, I’d brought over a good set of toenail clippers, because she only had fingernail clippers, and a micro-pedi grinder thing. She told me to take those home, and was angry about it for some reason. I told her, no. She has toenail fungus. If I take them home and use them, I would get her toenail fungus. Only she can use them, now. That made her mad, too.
In the end, I agreed to take a look at her feet. It turned out her nails were really broken up, and only a few had anything to be trimmed. I started using the clippers and she got angry again, demanding I use scissors, because the clippers didn’t work.
They worked find.
I think she may have tried to clip her own toenails and couldn’t manage it, because then she told me one toe had gotten so bad, she grabbed scissors and cut as much as she could, herself.
While I was doing her toes, I pointed out which one had the fungal infection. That lead her to complain about how she spent so much money on medication for it, yet never used it. So I asked her were it was and went looking. At first, the only box I found that was the size I remembered it came in turned out to be eye drops. My mother got angry again, saying she’s never bought eye drops before, so why was it there? She forgot that we did get eye drops for her, when she started getting treated for her macular degeneration.
I finally found the box, hidden way in the back of her cupboard, and applied the medication, but this is not something she can do herself, and it’s not on her care list with home care. I’m not sure if we can even add it to the list or not, partly because I don’t know that my mother would be willing to let them do it.
Ironically, for someone who complains about all the medications she’s taking, she once again brought up about how she thinks she should be using the inhaler – a prescription that was cancelled. I had to explain to her, getting this was a test to see if she had asthma. The alternative would have been to get on a waiting list to get tested, and it could take a year or more before she got to the top of the list. It was simply faster to have her try the prescription to see if it worked or not.
My mother doesn’t understand. She has trouble breathing at night, and she’s gone from complaining about “having” to take it, to now wanting to have it, even though it made no difference at all. Her mind has just latched onto it, now that the prescription has been cancelled. She’d been wanting to stop using it for a long time, too.
Anyhow.
I finally managed to head out, though my mother was still quite angry that I was leaving “so early”. I did manage to get to the garage in good time. I just had to wait until someone was available to do it. Then, since I was there, I popped into the grocery store across the street to pick up some bread, after my daughter told me she hadn’t had a chance to do any baking today.
By the time I left, it was starting to rain! We had reached our high of 10C/50F, too. Happily, I managed to get home before it was getting too dark. That half-light at the end of the day makes it so hard to spot deer getting ready to run across the road.
While things ended on a fairly negative note, I got a lot done at my mother’s. Her fridge is stocked up again, she has her meds, I got her chicken stock made and she has cooked chicken to last her a while.
It just took a really long time, and unfortunately, spending that much time with my mother, even on a good day, is pretty draining.
Today was supposed to be an at home day, except for a trip to the post office.
Ha!
After doing my rounds this morning, making sure to open the gate for the septic guy, I was just finishing breakfast when I got a call.
From home care.
Someone had called in sick, and they didn’t have anyone for my mother’s morning assist.
I had just enough time to throw some shoes on, grab a coat and head out. I did phone my mother first. Which is good, because she about to start making herself breakfast. Which the home care worker is supposed to do! I told her, if she’s willing to wait half an hour, I’ll do it for her, then told her about the cancellation.
Then she asked me if I was going to stay to do more stuff for her. I told her, no – I’ve got Friday set aside just for her! I told her I wanted her to take the chicken out of the freezer on Thursday, because I was planning on cooking it for her, and she was very happy to hear that.
Then, I headed out and got there just at her scheduled visit time, which worked out nicely. My mother was starting to do a few things for her breakfast, so I got her to sit down so I could finish it for her.
I did the usual stuff home care would do for her, like empty her commode, but also refilled her water bottles from the tap in the laundry room for drinking/cooking water. I made sure to check her milk supply and she was almost out. For just the one thing, I simply walked to the grocery store to get more for her, since I’ll be doing a full shopping trip on Friday. She’s been working on her list, and it’s going to be a very large one, compared to her usual.
Before I headed out, I got more details about that call she got about canceling her Meals on Wheels.
It wasn’t the Meals on Wheels office or kitchen that called her. It was the Senior’s Centre that oversees the program. She was able to give me the name of the guy that called, and she could hear the worker that delivered my mother’s meal earlier, talking in the background.
They told her that someone had called to cancel her Meals on Wheels and when she asked who, they suggested it was probably me – they actually used my name. So my mother said she would call me. The odd thing was that the woman that delivered my mother’s meal said that she did not deliver a meal that day. My mother told them, yes you did, I’m looking at the tray on my table right now!
With that information, I headed home, with a quick stop at the post office to pick up my parcels.
Before I opened them, I made sure to call the Meals on Wheels office – my husband has messaged me to let me know someone from there had called me while I was gone. There was no answer, so I left a message explaining that I was just at my mothers, what she told me, and that we were very confused by all this – but also very glad that it was confirmed her Meals on Wheels was NOT cancelled.
Today is a Meals on Wheels day.
That done, I finally opened up my parcels. There are two things that I got, that I can give reviews on already.
The first is a cat toy.
I picked it up because it was very inexpensive, and I was curious if it would live up to the promotion.
The first picture shows how it arrives. This is one of those toys that are supposed to change shape as the cats try to get at the captured jingle ball inside.
I had to use double sided tape to get it to hold together. I’m not sure how it was supposed to hold together without it. The two ends did actually stick together at first, but popped apart very easily.
As you can see by the second and third photos in the slide show above, Ghosty was very interested! The pictures are in two of the configurations it can roll into. The third encloses the ball completely inside.
Once it was together, I set it in the dining room for all the cats to check out. For a while, there were four or five of them around it, trying to get at the jingle ball.
The toy did NOT change shape while they played with it, which is supposed to be part of the attraction for cats.
They soon got bored with it, but for the rest of the day, there have been cats in and out of the bigger box. There a cat sleeping in it on my bed, right now. The cats are going to be most displeased when I move it! 😄
The other item I got was a tool to clean our eavestroughs from ground level.
I had considered getting the kind that you attach to a hose, but for this time of year, I’ve got all but one short hose put away for the winter, and that one will be put away very soon. If I’m going to get one of those, which I do still want to, it will be closer to spring.
In the first and second pictures, you can see it came with two brushes and a bungle of pole attachments. The instructions are pretty basic. Screw the pieces together to get the length you want. There is one piece that is for the end and has a cap that can be used to hang from.
It’s a good thing it came with two brushes.
Since the septic guy hadn’t arrived yet, I started off at the eaves above it. This area is particularly difficult and hasn’t been properly cleaned out in a long time. For starters, there is a right angle where the roof over the old kitchen meets the roof over the original log part of the house. That corner is always getting the most debris collected in the eavestrough. The ground below is not level, so using a ladder is dangerous. My younger daughter was (key word, was) the only person able bodied enough to go up there on a ladder, while her sister held it steady. She, however, has problems with heights and even with the ladder being held steady, it feels so precarious, she just couldn’t do it. Now, she physically can’t really do ladders at all, anymore.
Getting into the eavestrough was not easy. The brush had to be bent almost completely down, and it kept straightening while I was working on it. It could only really be used well in one direction, too. If I tried to push in the other direction, it would start unscrewing itself from the pole pieces. In fact, several different ones would start to loosen as well.
It got really hard on the hands, too. I’ve been losing my grip strength for quite some time, and all my finger joints have osteoarthritis, so for me, that’s to be expected. Plus, after a while, that left shoulder of mine – the one I injured when I had my fall in the summer – was starting to really feel the strain.
Still, I was able to get some of the debris out. Once I got as much as I felt I could (no, I could not clear them completely), I moved over to do the long eavestrough on the East facing addition.
Which is when the septic guy arrived, so I paused to keep kittens away from the tank until he was done and the gate was closed.
It was while I was working on this second section that the brush broke, which you can see in the fourth picture.
*sigh*
I got the second one on and continued trying to clear the eavestrough.
Trying.
I did get some out, at least, but definitely not all of it. I’m not even sure if I got most of it out.
Then I got called in to take a phone call.
It was Meals on Wheels.
After hearing the message I left this morning and had contacted the Senior’s Centre to try and figure out what happened.
They called the wrong person.
There is someone else with a very similar name to my mother’s. Similar enough that she sometimes goes by the same name as my mother.
Just first names, of course, but that’s what they went by when they called my mother.
The fact that my name actually came up as the possible person that canceled my mother’s Meals on Wheels means that they did know who they were talking to – and yet, the woman who delivered my mother’s meal just an hour or so earlier was saying she had NOT delivered to my mother.
Whatever confusion there was, the Meals on Wheels lady got it straightened out. It was never my mother that they were supposed to call.
As soon as I found that out, I called my mother to let her know. It turned out she already knew. Her Meals on Wheels had been delivered and the same person had delivered it, so she passed on what happened. So that all got straightened out, thank God!
While talking to the woman from Meals on Wheels, she told me that my mother had called the Senior’s Center earlier and was saying something about my coming over to do bulk cooking for her. She actually thought that my mother had cancelled her home care lunch visits! I told her those had not been canceled, and took the opportunity to mention that my mother was starting to have cognitive issues. If they were to ever get any sort of call about her service, I asked them to please call me to confirm. I explained that, with the limitations on home care meal assists, these Meals on Wheels meals are the only complete meals my mother is getting. She completely understood.
Oh, dear.
Now that I’m writing this, I suddenly find myself wondering.
Could my mother have called home care, too, and cancelled her lunch visits, after I left?
*sigh*
Checking on that will have to wait until tomorrow, and I’m not going to be home for most of tomorrow!
After calling my mother and updating my siblings, it was back to cleaning the eavestroughs. In the last photo of the slide show above, you can see how it reaches the eavestrough. At that angle, it can’t get much of anything, so I keep having to bend it back to a sharper angle.
After that section was done, I moved to the side of the entryway, where this is rather short eavestrough. That one is the hardest to get at. The ground below is sloped more than other areas, which would be good for drainage, except that it slopes towards the well, so we really don’t want water getting under there at all. There is also a couple of rows of the enameled bricks we have all over the place – I remember them from when I was a kid, even – that I really want to remove and replace with gravel, as they are dangerously slippery. Access to the basement window is there as well. Basically, there are a lot of things in that corner that makes getting to the eavestrough very unsafe.
It also has a different design of eavestrough, made of galvanized steel instead of aluminum. The brush could actually get into it a bit better, and I was able to get out some very composted leave mold out of there.
I still couldn’t clean it out completely, though.
Finally, the last section to do was over the sun room. That one was actually pretty clear and didn’t take long.
I did go back and work on the East facing section and got more stuff out, but there was no way I’d be able to get it completely clear with this tool.
Still, what I was able to do was better than nothing!
So… would I recommend this tool?
No. Unless all you’ve got is very light material to clean out, it’s not the right tool for the job. It will get some debris out, but not all. It might be more useful if it were followed up by the type attached to a hose, to blast away the debris the brushes loosened.
The tendency for the joins to loosen is a pain. I could work around it, but I shouldn’t have to.
Having one of the brushes break so quickly wasn’t good, either. It was likely because I kept having to bend it back into a useable angle. At least the second one lasted until the job was done.
[Edit: I went back to the order and looked at the images of the product. In it, they showed the bristle portion being bent at 90° to reach into the cutter, not bending it where it joins the pole. In the box, it was already bent at the pole. I did actually try to bend the bristle portion instead of bending at the pole, and it simply would not bend. At least not with just my hands. Partially because the bristles made grasping it unwieldy. In the end, it just wouldn’t bend for me in the bristle portion.]
Still, I was able to get enough debris out that I think it should be good for the winter. It’s better than nothing, so I am glad I have it. There’s just one eavestrough I couldn’t do, and that’s on the second floor. Someone has to climb onto the roof over the new part of the house to clean it. With how high it is, it doesn’t get as much debris into it, at least.
Meanwhile, my husband needed to go into town soon to do some blood work before a telephone appointment he has with his doctor. Since I’m going to be away for most of tomorrow and the day after, it had to be done today.
So, I was soon on the road again, this time with my husband. The clinic his doctor is in is in the same building as the hospital and lab and Xray, so he could go to the reception desk for his doctor to pick up the requisition, then check in at the registration desk we passed along the way, then then wait until he was called into the lab around the corner. Very convenient!
He was hoping he felt well enough to stop at a restaurant somewhere afterwards, just to have some fries. When I message my daughters to let them know we might be longer, my older daughter offered to send funds for a full burger meal take out for everyone.
Of course, we accepted the generous offer!
Once my husband was done at the lab, we headed over to the DQ. My husband didn’t even try go get out of the truck, and just waited while I ran in to place our order. He has lost so much muscle mass on his legs, he was having difficulty getting in and out of the truck!
Aside from lack of physical activity due to pain, he’s been on Ozempic for years. The side effect of “weight loss” with that stuff isn’t loss of body fat, but loss of muscle mass. For someone who had always been so very athletic when he was able bodied, getting to the point where he has difficulty getting in and out of the truck is really frustrating for him. He actually stopped taking it a while ago, because his private insurance will only cover what they consider a “reasonable” dose, and his current doctor doubled his already high dose. That made it expensive to pick up, until the deductible for our province’s pharmacare insurance is paid. Then it’s covered 100%. He’s been off it so long that he’ll have to work himself up from a low dose again. Frankly, I don’t think he should be on it at all. He’s on it to help control his blood sugars, along with his slow acting insulin, but he’s in so much pain all the time, his blood sugars tend to be high, no matter what. Lots of things cause high blood sugar readings, not just diabetes. Things like chronic pain, sleep apnea, poor quality sleep and stress, and I’m pretty sure the doctor that originally put him on it thought it might help with weight loss, and we all know that losing weight is the magical cure for everything that ails you, right? /sarcasm. He was even told by a diabetic nurse, before his condition deteriorated to the point of permanent disability that, until he got his pain under control, he was not going to get his blood sugars under control.
His pain is not under control. It’s more like “just barely functioning” levels – and that’s with the maximum safe doses of his current pain medication. They’ve tried him on so many powerful painkillers, and most of them just take the edge off. Meanwhile, his blood sugars haven’t really changed, even on such a high doze of Ozempic and, while he’s losing muscle mass, he has had zero change in weight. He’s had some of the other side effects of Ozempic, and they are decidedly unpleasant.
That’s no way to live, but when you’re on such powerful painkillers and they’re not really working, doctors start looking at you and thinking you’re making it up, or it’s all in your head, because it can’t possibly be because they’re failing at finding a way to help. My husband, meanwhile, has basically given up. It’s been so long, and he’s seen so many doctors and specialists, in two different provinces, and this province really sucks compared to where we lived before when it comes to healthcare. At least living here is less stressful than when we were living in a housing co-op in the city.
Today, however, was the first time he actually got out of the house for any length of time, since the last time he had to get some blood work done.
Bonus on our daughter treating us to take out. Both of the girls have been having a rough time the past few days, though for different reasons. Especially my younger daughter. She’s been caning it a lot lately.
It still seems to strange that I’m the most able bodied person in the household now.
…
… I say, as I can feel the entire left side of my body starting to stiffen up.
Time to grab some food so I can take my anti-inflammatories and probably a painkiller, too.
Being broken sucks. Still, I was able to get quite a bit done today, and I’m happy with that. Even if the new tool I got doesn’t quite live up to expectations. It really has been a good day, overall! We have much to be thankful for.
Right now, there’s basically nothing in the garden. The herb bed, amazingly, is still chugging along, but everything else is done for the year. So, when I do my rounds, I don’t check the garden beds like I do throughout the growing season.
Which is why I had such a surprise today.
When the septic guy showed up to empty our tank, I stayed around on kitten duty, to keep them away from the open tank. A couple of cats wanted to hang out.
I had to pick up and carry Sir Robin most of the time, because he was so curious. When I put him down to look at things, he stayed close and even posed quite nicely for me.
Fancypants, here, is more feral, but still very curious, so I was keeping a close eye on him.
His going into the area fenced off from the deer, to protect the tulips and apple tree, is why I was there to spot my surprise.
First, it was seeing fresh green leaves poking up where the saffron was planted, two autumns ago. I’d seen some sprouting in the spring, but then they disappeared and I thought they died off. Their first growing season was much the same. It’s really hard to keep this area clear of the creeping bellflower that threatens to choke out the tulips. The crocuses are much more delicate. Plus, these are zone 4 corms, and we’re in zone 3, so I really wasn’t expecting much. Just hoping.
Today, I found fresh new saffron crocus leaves coming up! In November!!! These are supposed to bloom in August, never mind start coming up.
When I first started taking pictures, I actually missed it.
Yes. That is a spent saffron crocus flower laying on the leave litter!
The plant just to the right of it in the picture has what looks like a flower bud ready to open soon.
!!!
I opened up the makeshift gate in the fence wire to get better pictures, which you can see in the rest of the photos of the slide show above.
Yes, I picked the flower.
We have our very first saffron threads from our first blooming saffron crocus!
We’ll keep an eye on the flower bud over the next few days, to see if it opens or not. If it does, we’ll pick that, too, for a grand total of 6 saffron threads. 😁
The clusters of crocus leaves are looking strong and healthy, now that their competition is died off for the winter. They also look like they are spreading, even though they’ve barely survived their first two seasons.
I’m just blown away. I honestly thought they’d died off. I knew, when I bought these, that their chances of survival would be low, so this is just really awesome.
We’ve got a few more warmer days, but before the ground freezes, I want to put a nice, thick mulch of leaves over it. I don’t want to put it on too early, as that would smother them. If the long range forecasts are at all accurate, we could possibly wait as long as another week and a half, but I don’t want to wait too long, either! I think I might need to look at the overnight lows more than the day time highs when deciding when to cover them.
Ghosty loves that cat bed so much, she’ll curl up with any other cat that’s in it! This time, it’s Beep Beep, one of the originals cared for by my late father. She is very likely Ghosty’s great-great-great-grandmother or aunt.
Ghosty is probably the most intelligent cat we’ve ever had – and the reason why I feel like crap today, due to lack of sleep. Once we’re all in bed, she starts getting into all the things she knows she’s not allowed to while we’re up, and I’m the only one that can hear when she does. Particularly when she starts digging into things at my desk in the wee hours. She does it when she wants the kibble bowls topped up, because she knows it will wake me up, and she doesn’t stop until it’s been done. This morning, she dug into my organizer tray, pulling out all sorts of stuff and knocking one of my speakers half off the desk, which I discovered hours later.
I actually got the girls to do the outside stuff this morning, so I could get back to sleep, but it just wouldn’t happen, mostly because of the cats! Then I had the disorienting feeling that it was about 4pm, only to look at the time and see that it was noon. My daughters are feeling the same way, today!
The Re-Farmer 