Medical

Low battery

/ Re-Farmer / 2 Comments

I made it into the city today, to attempt our monthly shop.

I am definitely running low on batteries right now. I hate shopping at the best of times.

These days are not the best of times.

But before I explain that, let’s have some cuteness! How about some hugging kitties?

The cats have a habit of taking over my bed. There is always a row of them along my pillows, all mashed together. I just couldn’t resist getting a picture of Leyendecker and Keith all face-smashed together! Then there’s David, hiding his face in his paws… so cute!

Cabbages, I’m happy to say, is completely at home with the rest of the cats. Now if only she would be as comfortable with us humans! We can sometimes pet her and even pick her up, but she is not a fan of human attention, except for the occasional ear skritches.

Her siblings outside are almost more accepting of human attention!

Well, okay. Maybe not.

That doesn’t stop them from following me when I do my rounds!

One of the bigger cats (Nostrildamus, I think) burrowed these hiding places in the snow. From the gate, all I see are little ear tips above the snow, twitching in pounce mode, waiting for another cat to walk past on the driveway. :-D

I got the rounds out of the way early and didn’t even go through the trail cam files, other than to verify that the new camera had thawed out enough to start recording again. Then it was off to the city to see if I could do the monthly shopping.

My first stop was at a particular Walmart where I’ve never had problems before, but I’ve heard of some people having issues every now and then. It’s at least twice the size of the one in the smaller city I went to last month, and better stocked, so I thought it was worth a try.

It wasn’t.

Now, one of the things that had become part of the monthly shopping routine is that we would have breakfast in the city. That’s not really an option anymore, but I figured I would pick up something I could eat in the van at Walmart. I know it’s said, never go shopping while hungry, because you’ll end up buying things you shouldn’t. For me, it’s the opposite. The hungrier I get, the less I want to eat. The less I want to be around food. I’m more likely to walk away without buying anything at all. And if I let it go for too long, the sight and smell of food makes me feel physically ill. I end up having to force myself to eat at least a little bit to get back to having a normal appetite. Along with feeling physically ill by the sight of food, I also start to become … less patient, shall we say, and oddly weepy.

I had not reached that point when I arrived, but my tolerance levels were definitely on the low side.

I came in with my shield, got a cart and, while I was using the hand sanitizer before going through their barrier, the staff from the sanitation station on the inside of the barrier came over and asked if I had a mask. I told her I was medically exempt and that the shield was my compromise. That went back and forth a bit, then she looked over to a little station on the outside of the barrier and said she would get someone. There were two people at that station and one of them came over and asked if I had a mask. I said I can’t wear one. He started to say something about the shield and a mask, but I honestly couldn’t make it out though his mask. :-/ I did hear him say he would get me one and he went back to the station.

I was blocking the way, so I moved over to where he was and told him, I can’t wear a mask. I have a medical exemption. The shield is the best I can do. He ended up handing me a paper ear loop mask and told me to just hang on to it in case the inspectors give me a hard time. Great. Whatever. I turn to the barrier, and there’s a woman on the other side – another customer – who’d been watching me and she started waving a mask still in it’s packaging at me. As best as I could make out, I think she was saying she just bought a mask and… she wanted me to take it? But she just watched me being given a mask just like what she was holding… and I was wearing a shield… so… ???

At that point, I just couldn’t handle it. I’d already put up with hassles from the staff who seemed to think that a person who can’t wear a mask and is wearing a shield instead, should be wearing both. I didn’t need to be hassled by customers, before I even fully entered the store. I turned around and left.

Once back in the van, I messaged my husband and, by the time I finished, I was in a better frame of mind.

The next stop on my list was an international grocery chain that I knew would be okay. And it was. I was able to go in, do my shopping, and no one batted an eye at my shield instead of a mask.

This is the place where I like to pick up our fresh produce in non-Costco sized quantities, as well as stuff in their international aisles that we just don’t find anywhere else. This place is awesome. Best of all, they still have their hot take out food section open, so I was able to get some Chinese food to eat in the van. By then, it was almost noon, and I was reaching the “so hungry I want to throw up” stage.

This is not the place where we pick up the cat food and litter, though, and we were pretty much out of both. Normally, I would have picked up part of that at the Walmart, with the rest at Costco.

I decided to try the Costco. Which is half way across the city from where I was.

When I got there, the parking lot was full, and there was a line all down the side of the building.

It was warmer today, but not that warm.

I found a place to pull over long enough to send an update to my family, letting them know I was going to go to the Walmart in the smaller city I’d gone to last month. They might not have as much inventory, but I knew I would at least be allowed to shop and not get hassled.

So it was, again. I had no issues at all I did get some odd looks from costumers, and at one point, while I was loading the cart with bags of cat food alongside the litter boxes, a couple of ladies in the same aisle were looking at me and whispering at each other. I could make out just enough to know they’d said something about the shield. I was going to be a while, so I shoved my cart into a corner and waited next to it, and they rushed past me. I kept running into them as I continued shopping, and every time we crossed paths, they would give me looks over their shoulders.

*sigh*

By the time I was at the cash desk, however, I was having a really hard time with shortness of breath. I hope those Mingle Masks I ordered come in soon; I’ve been told they don’t create that problem. I started chatting with the cashier and made a point of saying how much I appreciated that I don’t get any hassle there, and mentioned what happened at the other Walmart. Even with her mask, I could see how startled she was. Then she told me about her mother, who basically hasn’t left the house in 8 months. Her mother has PTSD and can’t wear a mask. They were going to try a shield, but haven’t been able to find one (they used to be available at that Walmart, but it looks like a lot of places have simply stopped carrying shields). I ended up telling her about the Mingle Mask and recommending it, based on the experiences of others.

I gotta say, I was really glad to get outside, where I could take the shield off an finally breathe again. I was so disoriented by the end of it, I almost walked away without paying!

By the time I got home, I was too drained for anything else. I must have looked it. As the girls were unloading the van, my older daughter took one look at me, and asked if I was up to going to the dump, or leaving it for later.

We left it for later. It was only open for another hour, and I would have needed more than that to recover enough for another trip out!

We’ll have to make another trip to get the rest; I got most of what we needed, but not necessarily in the quantities we need for the month.

I did splurge when I spotted a few things that I grabbed while I could.

One of them was this soil test kit. We had looked for one last year, and they were completely out of stock all summer. I couldn’t find them anywhere! This has enough to do 40 tests, so we will be able to use it on different areas as we decide on where to plant. It tests the pH, which I already have a meter for that just needs to be stuck into the soil, but it also tests for nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium. That will be useful information.

The other toy I got was a battery tester.

With the trail cams each using 8 batteries, and those batteries draining much faster in the winter, we have a LOT of batteries accumulating. The dump has a special shed to drop off things like batteries, so we don’t put them in the garbage. Plus, while some batteries may not have enough juice for the trail cams, that doesn’t mean they are actually dead.


The first batch of batteries I’d tested were the frozen one’s I’d switched out of the new trail cam.

They still had full power!

Then I went though the old batteries boxes.

This first batch is all of the batteries that are not usable. Some of which I didn’t even test, since they’d started leaking!!

And yeah, that’s an old DSLR camera battery in there.

Some of the batteries in there were ones that we found while we were cleaning the place up after moving here. I have no idea how old they might be.

The next batch are the batteries that are still usable.

All the batteries in here were either in the green zone, or the very small, yellow “low battery” zone.

All 276 of them.

They may not be usable in the trail cams, but we can use them for other things. Like the battery operated string lights we have in the hallway in place of night lights. We used to use night lights all over the place, but this house doesn’t have many outlets, and there are none at all in the hallway. We rather like being able to see well enough to not trip over cats in the dark, while also not having to turn on the hall light and blinding ourselves at night.

Aside from these, there were some AAA and D cells that had full charge, too.

That little meter has already paid for itself, many times over.

As for me, I’m looking forward to Sunday actually being a day of rest. After today, I need to recharge my own batteries!

The Re-Farmer

Frosty morning, and… stuff (updated)

/ Re-Farmer / 4 Comments

I headed out to do my morning rounds a bit on the late side, yet there was still frost in the air!

It was looking downright foggy, in fact.

Everything looked like a fairy tale, sparkling away!

Even the ugly wires used for fencing looked beautiful. I love how the lichen on this fence post looks, all frosted up!

Taking photos was a bit of a challenge at times, though!

They just wanted to keep their paws warm. Butterscotch didn’t even growl and hiss at Potato Beetle when he jumped up my back!

While checking out the garden areas, I could see from the tacks in the snow where the deer have been going around. I knocked some of the frozen crab apples they can’t reach, down to the ground. The sunflower stalks have been completely denuded, except for the tallest ones. Those were denuded as high as the deer could reach! :-D

The birds are eating the sunflowers a little bit.

I bent all the taller ones that still have leaves and seed heads, so the deer can now reach them to nibble on.

Part of the reason I was out later was because I got a phone call from my older brother this morning. He called me back while I was out, and he is keeping my updated.

He got a call from my mother, very early this morning. Her stomach has been hurting since Friday, and she wanted him to drive her to the hospital.

Keep in mind that, for him, it’s a 1 1/2 hour drive to her place, but only 20 minutes for me – and I have her car. She wanted him to drive her, though.

*sigh*

Getting information out of her was like pulling teeth, of course. In the end, though, it sounds like she has been eating too many oranges. It also sounds like she has really bad gas. She has acid reflux, which she doesn’t understand no matter how many times I’ve tried to describe it to her. I’ve given her easy to read, colour coded lists of what she can safely eat, and what she should avoid. The lists have disappeared. All citrus fruits, tomatoes and onions are things she should avoid, but she loves them and eats them anyway. Small amounts wouldn’t be an issue, but mandarins are in season now, and cheap, so she’s been buying them by the box full. She does think it might be the oranges that are causing her grief, but she thinks that, because the price went down and they’re from China, she had to have eaten a bad orange.

*sigh*

Anyhow, after updating me on the situation, my brother called the health line, since it’s been made clear hospitals really don’t want people going in right now. The health line couldn’t tell him much, since they were not talking directly to my mother, but in the end he was told to take her in, simply because of her age.

*sigh*

My brother called me back on hands free, while we was on the way to pick her up to update me.

*sigh*

…

I just got a call back from my brother. He has dropped our mother off at the hospital. It seems she also had breathing issues at night (which she often has, while trying to sleep) and nausea (also not unusual for her). They were able to take her right in, but he couldn’t come in with her. He did have a chance to explain things to the person at the entry – particularly about our mother’s difficulty in understanding the questions she is being asked. My brother was told he could go home, but with how long the drive is, he’s just going to hang around town until it’s time to pick her up or they call him. He was satisfied that they were taking her seriously and taking good care of her, so there’s that, at least.

So today will be a day when I stay close to the phone. :-/

The Re-Farmer

Update: Well that has to be the fastest ER visit ever! My brother called the contact number to check on our mother, only to be told they were just finishing with her and he could come pick her up. She’s got some anti-biotics, and she’s good to go.

Well… I suppose that’s one way for my mother to get my brother to “visit” her… :-/

Well, that didn’t work out

/ Re-Farmer / 7 Comments

Today was the day I was to finally face our vandal in court, in regards to the restraining order I’ve filed against him.

Nothing came of it.

The court date was cancelled.

I didn’t know that, of course, so I did my rounds early and made the drive out. We’ve had some snow last night, making the roads unpleasant, to that took a bit longer than expected. I’m glad I left as early as I did, but was wishing I’d left even earlier as I got stuck behind slow moving traffic!

I’d say my first warning that things were off was when I walked into the building, and there were no security guards in the lobby at the doors. In fact, aside from one person I saw going to the court office, the place was a ghost town!

I went down the hall to where the courtroom was, only to discover there were two of them, and nothing to tell me which was going to be used. Among all the Covid signs for distancing and sanitizing (oddly, nothing about masks, though we are under a mandate) I found some giving instructions to wait in the hall until one’s particular case was called, but that was it.

As I sat and waited, another group of people came down the hall, asking each other which court room they needed to go to. They eventually sat and waited, too. I didn’t pay much attention to them until I heard one of them coming back down the hall, saying “there’s no court!” They all left at that point, but it wasn’t 10:00 yet (the time court was scheduled for), so I waited until it was past 10, then headed for the lobby.

I could see into the court office, where someone was being served, and another person was waiting in the lobby, so I went back and forth between the two for a while.

Perhaps 20 minutes had passed by then. The longest time I’ve worn the face shield, and I was starting to struggle to breathe.

Short of breath

This really surprised me, and I tried to ignore it for a while, just lifting the shield a bit to breathe from under it every now and then, but it kept getting worse.

(image source)

Eventually, it was my turn to go into the court office, and I asked about what was going on.

All court dates have been rescheduled to Dec. 18.

Well; I guess I should say court sessions will restart then, because there is no way weeks worth of court appointments will happen on one day. I’m going to have to call them to find out what the rescheduled date will be.

While our province has been under “code red” lockdown for about a week now, this morning “enhanced restrictions” kicked in. I’m guessing that’s why court was cancelled, though no reason for it was given.

As we talked, she had to step away to double check for some of the questions, and I was increasingly struggling to breathe. Once I got answers about the court date, I asked about my options in regards to serving our vandal my defense papers for the suit he’s brought against me. I’d checked the tracking number last night, and it hadn’t been picked up yet. What do I do if he refuses to accept it? She had to get someone else to answer me, because she didn’t know, and that person was on the phone. So I sat and waited about a minute.

By the time she got to me, I was so short of breath, I could hardly speak. I quickly got my answer (if he refused it, the post office would return it it me, and I’d have to serve him in person), I rushed outside and tore the mask off.

I could not believe how much trouble I was having! My breathing wasn’t obstructed at all, yet I was struggling!

I walked the block to the van and ended up sitting there for maybe 10 minutes, with the window cracked open, because I was too dizzy to safely drive.

Why was I having to much trouble??? All I could think was that, as I was sitting with the shield on, I spent much of the time looking down at my phone. The shield was right against my chest while my head was down, which probably prevented proper air flow.

Since I was in this city, I had some shopping to do, I stopped at the small Walmart that was on my way home. I figured I would have no issues, since I would be upright and walking around.

I will say that, while everyone around me was wearing masks, I had zero issues from anyone about wearing a shield. No hassles at all.

With the “enhanced lock down”, all sorts of aisles of “non essentials” were blocked, displayed wrapped up in plastic, and other displays had signs saying “not for sale”.

I was able to get the cat litter and bird seed I needed, then went through the groceries. I had a hard time finding some things, so it took a while.

By the time I was heading for the cash desk, I was struggling again, light headed and using the cart to stay upright. There was no line, though the cashiers had customers, so I didn’t have long to wait before I was guided to one that was almost done. I was so out of it, I walked right past the “stand here” line on the floor until another staff member let me know. I think the first staff member saw I was having a hard time, and let me know I could go to a different cashier, where the customer was faster at paying. I got my stuff paid for, rushed outside and removed the shield as soon as I could.

Promptly breathing a lung full of cigarette smoke, from a group of people smoking nearby.

*sigh*

It still wasn’t as bad as trying to breathe with the shield.

I got to the van and spent some time outside, bagging my stuff (I don’t bother bringing bags in, since I can bag things better myself at the van). It was enough time that I was able to recover.

I am totally blown away by how much trouble I had. This was not at all expected.

As I’m finishing this up, I still need to head out to pick up my husband’s prescription refills. From the pharmacy that will no longer let me in, even with a shield.

And now I know even a shield is a problem for me, at least after a while.

This is so ridiculous.

The Re-Farmer

Shielded

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I am so very glad I was able to patch up the broken pump shack window yesterday!

The winds started picking up last night, and they were still blowing this morning. It may have only been a couple of degrees below freezing, but it was bitterly cold in the wind. When I came out of the house, the cats were running around, eager to be fed – then disappeared back into the cat shelter right after eating! The kibble house and heated cat shelter are working out very well for them.

I headed out to the town my mother lives in, late in the morning, to fill out an incident report about what I’d heard outside her door on Friday. I used my computer to write out a description of what happened and what I heard and printed it out first. I’ve unfortunately had to do quite a few incident reports in the past, so I knew what information was needed. My hand writing has been getting really bad, with my finger joints and wrists giving me grief, so doing it on the computer, with my ergonomic keyboard, makes it easier for me – and for whomever has to read it!

When I got there, I found the woman I’d spoke to on the phone had just left, but the woman who answered the door knew who I was and why I was there.

I found out some interesting things, in the process.

When I called about what I’d heard outside my mother’s door, they already knew about it. I thought that perhaps the woman I’d seen outside the doors, making a phone call, had already called to complain.

I was wrong.

It turns out the second person in the hallway was the woman I was talking to!

They are not allowed to say anything themselves, nor file complaints, so she was quite happy that I was able – and willing – to do it. She had even talked to my mother, just this morning, and my mother was telling her she didn’t want me to “start a war” by filing an incident report.

The incident report was made, however. It was mentioned that they didn’t file ones my mother was willing to sign, because she was the only one willing to do so, and they didn’t want to make her more of a target. It reminded me of a PIPA workshop I’d attended, where it was specifically asked if the name of the person complaining can be given to the person being complained about. The answer was no. That would be a PIPA violation. So I brought up about the names falling under PIPA, but I got the impression that this was not what they were told. I hope they take the time to confirm it, because while the authorities that complaint goes to have to know who is making the complaint, they should not be telling anyone else who they are.

The report I made is now waiting for the person I was supposed to meet with. I hope to get a call from her, later.

When I was done there, I swung by the grocery store – where I know medical exemptions are honoured! My mother had called me last night and asked me to pick up some milk for her, so when I was done there, I gave her a quick call and met her at one of the doors to her building. She passed on to me the face shields my brother had left for me.

She, however, was wearing a mask under her nose again.

*sigh*

I told her she needed to wear the shield, and she said she would. But then, I’m sure she told my brother she would wear the shield, too!

I’m actually looking forward to seeing how these work out. There have been times, most recently while cutting wood in the past few weeks, where I should have been wearing a dust mask. However, I have far less trouble breathing sawdust than I do with wearing a mask. Even wearing the protective glasses are an issue, because they change how my regular glasses sit on my face, making it hard to see and focus. Not something you want, when using power tools! Depending on how these fit, I might be able to use these, instead. I have seen face shields used in that way before, though I’m sure they were far more heavy duty that these, but I don’t need heavy duty for what I do.

I’m amused that the packaging says they are to prevent “fluid splashing”. That’s one way to put it! :-D Ironically, the one problem I foresee with wearing one of these is that, if my cough kicks in, I won’t be able to cough into my sleeve or cover my mouth as easily, with the shield in the way. I don’t want to actually cough on the shield, any more than I’d want to cough into a mask. That’s just disgusting.

Hopefully, my mother will actually wear hers, and we will both be shielded from harassment.

The Re-Farmer

Pariah

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Hmmm…

Rolando Moon is looking a bit like how I feel!

Warning: venting ahead!

Today was a mix of good and bad.

The kitties are always part of the good. :-) Rolando Moon was especially wanting attention this morning.

My main thing today was to help my mother with her groceries, so she could get more than what she can carry home in her walker. With that in mind, I called the grocery store first, asking about medical exemptions to the new mask mandate. This municipality has been under one for a while and we had no problems before, but the province is putting on the pressure, so I wanted to check. I was assured it was not a problem; I was just asked to let the cashier know when we came in.

Then my mother called. She was ready, so I ended up leaving early.

The caretakers in her building are still harassing her, so she was waiting for me outside one of the side doors. With a mask on under her nose. :-( At least she can breathe, but she may as well not be wearing it! She tried to say, it keeps her mouth warm. :-( The harassment is definitely getting to her.

She wanted to go to the pharmacy first, which I was not expecting. I did have my exemption card, and a printout of the new mandate’s medical exemption portion, ready. Of course, I kept my distance from everyone but my mother, and didn’t touch anything but what she needed help with.

It wasn’t good enough.

I got kicked out.

The irony of it is, when a manager was brought over to tell me they would not recognize the medical exemption in the mandate, he was wearing a gappy mask, and pulling on it as he spoke. So he wasn’t wearing a mask properly, himself, but it’s me they’re worried about? They (he and the woman who first tried to make me wear a mask) kept making comments about protecting their staff – from me! – and they were following some other guidelines, instead of the mandate. I was treated like a pariah.

My mother, whom they know by name, with her mask under her nose, was allowed to keep shopping. I did mention she was exempt, too, but they didn’t care. So utterly arbitrary.

Thankfully, she did not need much there, and I waited for her outside. Like I was some kind of leper.

The grocery store, on the other hand, was awesome. I told the cashier we were exempt, and that I’d called ahead about it, and she said it was fine. A friend of mine works there and we started to chat a bit. I told him what happened, and he was flabbergasted. He told me of a person he knows that cannot wear masks. When the mandate came in, she was laid off. Permanently. Which is illegal, but they did it, anyway.

When my mother was done her shopping and I was helping her at the cash desk, I made sure to tell the cashier how much I appreciated that they don’t discriminate against people for their medical issues, and to please pass my thanks on to management. She was very understanding about it. I suspect she’s seen a lot of this.

Once back at my mother’s place, she was acting like she had to sneak me in through the side door, out of fear of the caretakers. Once we had her groceries inside, I took a printout of the relevant portions of the mandate to tape to her door, making it as small and neat as I could. She has a mask exemption card there already, but medical exemption section number in the current mandate has changed, and I don’t know when I can get an updated one.

Then I stayed for a little while to chat. Not long after, we heard voices in the hall. No big deal – until those voices stopped outside her door. We could hear two people talking about the portion of the mandate on her door, and how “she had to do that…” because the section numbers had changed.

Then the person doing most of the talking said, “she can’t be allowed to get away with that” and “this shouldn’t be here”.

!!!

My mother recognized one of the voices as one of the caretakers.

Clearly, this person was aware of the exemptions, but didn’t want people in the building to know about them, or actually use them.

They continued talking and I got my phone out to try and record it, but it’s really hard to hear. I did catch the “shouldn’t be here” comment as they were walking away down the hallway.

I didn’t stay much longer. As soon as it was quiet, I left.

As I did, I saw two people sitting outside the main doors, watching me. Both pulled their masks down while I was walking to the car and, as I was leaving, I could see one of them on her phone.

It could have been anybody, or the woman making the call could have been one of the two people we heard in the hallway.

As soon as I could, once I was home, I made a phone call to a social worker who has been trying to help my mother. When last I spoke to her, she’d given me the number for the housing department responsible for the building my mother lives in. I told her I’d tried calling, left message, and there has been no response. She was not surprised. I told her there was another incident.

She told me she just had another incident, too, but to go ahead and tell her mine, first.

I knew immediately they were related.

I told her what happened, and she was able to put names to the voices we heard. We had a pretty extensive chat about the whole thing.

I’ll also be coming in on Monday to write an incident report.

As for her incident? Yup. It was related. There was a complaint about my mother and “she can’t be allowed to get away with this” along with the accusation that my mother was lying about her medical issues. I’m guessing the person I saw outside her building, making a call, was the person who phoned to complain.

Since I was there to hear what they said first hand, and I don’t live there, I can make the incident report myself. Something a lot of the people who live where my mom does either cannot do, or are to afraid to do.

I was also encouraged to file a human rights complaint about what happened to me, too. I’ve also been encouraged to go to the media.

On the one hand, I really don’t want that added stress. On the other, the stress of all this is already there.

This is all so very wrong.

The Re-Farmer

A Lazy Day

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Gotta start with some morning smiles!

Nostrildamus aka Nosy, really wanted attention this morning! Even the Spice Boys let me pet them. :-)

Rolando Moon kept following me around while I did my rounds, then again when I made a quick trip to the post office (timed it badly, though; they were still closed for lunch, so I couldn’t pick up a parcel) and to pick up a few things. (I did phone ahead to ask about medical exemptions to the mask mandate, so I had no issues while I was there.) When I got home, Rolando Moon met me at the gate and kept following me!

I was still taking off my shoes and jacket when my husband suddenly asked, “who’s this?”

Rolando Moon had snuck into the house while I was carrying stuff in!

The other cats absolutely surrounded her, sniffing away. Amazingly, she wasn’t growling or hissing at any of them while they did! Even more surprising was Fenrir, who was not only sniffing her, but rubbing her face against Rolando’s. I wonder if she recognized her? At some point, though, there was a sudden scuffle. My daughter broke it up, and when I opened the door, Rolando bolted for the great outdoors. :-D

Meanwhile, today was a completely lazy day. I did not continue any of the stuff I’d started yesterday. It was a dark and dreary day, and by the time it warmed up to a decent temperature, what little light there was, was gone.

Tomorrow will be colder still, but I’ll be out helping my mother with her shopping. We’re supposed to warm up again on Saturday, but it’s also supposed to rain. We’ll see how that works out.

So I guess today was a day of rest and recuperation. My wrist and hands have been giving me grief, and working on those trees yesterday didn’t help. I am pretty sure I broke a finger a while back. Nothing major, but I think I may have had a linear fracture. I’d been trying to look behind something in the barn, not realizing the far end was under some metal bars leaning in the corner. One of them fell towards me and I’d blocked it with my hand. It hit the side of my pinky finger. That was weeks ago. I can now feel a lump where the metal hit the proximal phalange, and it still hurts. While cutting back the maple trees yesterday, I kept bumping it, or what I was going would put pressure on it, reminding me that yup; I probably broke it! No point in getting it checked, though. After all this time, it would just be confirming whether or not there was an actual fracture. It would be good to find out what’s going on with my wrists, though. Not with all the restrictions in place right now. People have been refused emergency care for broken bones until they got tested and quarantined already, and that was before the current mandates were put into effect.

It looks like I won’t be going back to the one hardware store anymore, either. I got an email back from the manager I’d written to about them refusing to honour my medical exemption. From the looks of the response, they spend quite a bit of time working it out. In the end, though, if a person cannot wear a mask, they cannot come into the store. They can phone ahead, order online, etc., then have things brought out to their vehicle and pay for them in the parking lot.

Like lepers.

All this for .28% “active cases” of the Wu Flu in the entire province, most of which are in the city, and of those, they’re almost all in particular nursing homes, or people who were already in the hospital for other things. The percentage of people in hospital with the Wu Flu is .01%, with .001% in ICU. The total death rate for our province since spring is .006%. Yet people are acting like it’s the Bubonic Plague, which killed an estimated 30% – 60% of all of Europe’s population. Worse, is the increased level of cruelty, harassment and abuse I’m seeing surrounding the mask issue, all from pro-maskers.

At times like this, I wish we could be living even more isolated than we are already. :-(

The Re-Farmer

I need some cat therapy

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The kitties were very happy to see me this morning!

Okay, so maybe is wasn’t me they were happy to see, but the food I bring!

The heated water bowl was partially frozen again, so I had to lift the roof to plug it back in. I’ll have to go through my work station in the basement to find an appropriately sized hook to support the cord.

Which I will do later, because my morning was dedicated to a more unpleasant project. I have been putting together a package to bring with me when I go to apply for a restraining order. Thankfully, the type I’m after covers more “minor” stuff, like believing there is a threat to property. Which has already happened. I would have a more difficult time proving my need for, say, a protection order for stalking.

Before our move, we unfortunately had to deal with the police and court system quite a bit, and it left me incredibly jaded. Thankfully, I had long developed the habit of journaling and documenting things to share with family far away. It didn’t take much more to switch focus to document things for police files and courts.

As much as I try to keep everything organized on my computer, it still took some digging. Especially since I was going back to 2018, to establish a history of vandalism, as well as the more recent stuff showing that, whatever program our vandal was required to go through, it didn’t help.

The hard part is going to be going through what I have to present my case for an involuntary psychiatric assessment. It’s not like I can give them a bunch of electronic files and expect them to go through it all. I’ll have to select images and screen captures to print out and, what will be most difficult, transcribe some of the voice mail messages that this person has left. I’ve had to do similar documentation of many hours of security videos, before our move. Two others had already started to but had to stop because of how traumatic it became. It takes a lot for me to reach that point, but even I had to stop after a while. In the end, it was futile, since the police wouldn’t do anything about it, anyhow.

It’s particularly hard to disassociate when you’re right in the middle of the events that need documenting, and that’s what I’m dreading about all this. We’re talking about having a person arrested and forced into a psychiatric hospital for evaluation against their will. This is a big deal, which has a lot to do with why I haven’t done this since the police first started recommending it to me. It seems to be the only way to get this person the help they need. If he doesn’t get that help, it’s not going to stop, and will likely get worse. I need to make a really solid case, and while there is plenty I can produce to show this, going through it all is going to be really unpleasant.

So, I’ve got my work cut out for me over the weekend; Monday is the earliest I can make the drive and start the process.

I had really hoped living out here would mean getting away from stuff like this.

It’s still better than what we left behind, though.

The Re-Farmer

Thanksgiving lunch, mulch experiment and outside kitten progress

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Lats this morning I headed over to my mother’s place with a turkey dinner to have lunch with her.

On the way out, I spotted three sets of ears in the window of the cat shelter.

Tiny sets of years belonging to the little kittens! I didn’t dare go closer for a picture, though, because I didn’t want to startle them away. There may have been more cats inside with them that I couldn’t see, too. I’m so glad to see them in the shelter, rather than hiding under it!

My mother and I had a very nice lunch and visit (how visits turn out is always touch and go with my mother! LOL). I brought a mask exemption card to tape to her door, and another she can carry with her. Hopefully, that will help reduce the harassment from the caretakers. Unfortunately, I think more has happened than she is telling us, because she kept insisting she “doesn’t want a war” and even started asking me not to call the housing department responsible for her building to talk about the caretaker’s abusive behaviour. She wore a mask – under her nose! – to meet me at the side door that’s very close to her own apartment door, and even in that short distance, by the time she was back in her apartment, she was struggling to breathe. She had also mentioned to me on the phone, waking up and struggling to breathe again. So I brought a foam wedge we got for my husband that he ended up not being able to use. Depending on how it’s positioned, it can be used under the knees, to lean against while sitting up in bed, or to sleep in an inclined position. The doctor had recommended trying to sleep more upright to see if that helped. When she saw it, however, she flat out refused to even try it and told me to take it home. Eventually, she said it was because it looked ugly! Which I highly doubt is the real reason. Frustrating!

Still, it was a good visit and my mother was very happy I was able to come over. I think the pandemic social restrictions are really getting to her. There used to be many events and gatherings, either in her own building, or in nearby venues, that she attended. Now, there are none. It seems the only real “social” interactions she’s getting these days are with the nasty caretaking couple. The restrictions seem to be bringing out the worst in people. I think she is getting very lonely, and some serious cabin fever!

Once at home, I took advantage of the warmer weather. With the garlic ready to be picked up when the post office opens tomorrow, I was thinking of how I wanted to mulch the beds. The straw is not breaking down as I had expected, and I decided to try an experiment.

Using the new push mower to chop it into smaller pieces!

The bag filled up very quickly, but it wasn’t until I had already started that I realized I’d forgotten to check the height of the mower. It was at 7; the highest setting! So things weren’t quite as chopped up as I wanted.

I lowered it to 3 and that chopped things up much better.

It took only 2 bags to fill the wagon, it’s so fluffy. LOL I laid out a tarp near the beds the garlic will be planted it, to make it easier to work with when it’s needed – plus I can fold half the tarp over the pile to keep the wind from blowing it away.

Unfortunately, I had an unexpected problem.

The new lawn mower stopped starting.

Right from the beginning, it was harder to start, but every time I had to turn it off to empty that bag, it kept getting harder to restart it until, finally, I just couldn’t start it at all. It had been so easy to start, before! In the spring, when we had so much rain, I was using it a lot and had no problems. Then the rain stopped, and the grass never really got long enough to make it worth cutting again. So it’s been sitting in the garage for the last couple of months. That on its own should not cause the problem. I couldn’t find any reason for it. It just won’t start. After getting only 2 1/2 wagon loads done, I finally gave up.

I will just have to take it in to the small engine shop in town to get it looked at, later in the year.

So the experiment worked, as far as chopping up the straw to make a finer mulch. It was just the lawn mower that failed!

After giving up on that task, I took the time to take the sun room replacement door off in preparation for painting the frame. I plan to get at that as soon as possible tomorrow morning, then go to the mail to pick up our bulbs. I will get the garlic in, while the girls will be doing the digging to get their flowers in.

While working at the door, I spotted this.

That is two little kittens in there! One of the orange tabbies, and Creamsicle Jr. As I walked around after taking the picture, Potato Beetle came out of the entry. I hadn’t seen him at all in there!

So I decided not to go inside after taking the door off, and stayed to see if I could get the kittens to play.

I had a target in mind.

This little lady. In the interest of trying to reduce future litters, we are hoping to get her friendly enough to bring her inside.

Yeah. I know. We have too many cats inside already!

Nostrildamus, meanwhile, couldn’t get enough attention! It was only a couple of weeks ago that we were lucky if we could pet him at all. Now, he’s all over us, asking for pets! He still doesn’t like to be picked up, but he does like chewing on fingers!

The two napping in the shelter eventually came out to see what was going on, and joined in on the play. I was able to pet the little orange one – the smallest of the 4 younger kittens – and even managed to pet Creamsicle Jr. a bit. The calico, however, would not let me touch her! However, my daughter came out to join me for a while, and she tried to play with them. Not only did she get the calico close enough to pet, she was even able to pick her up! Only briefly, and she didn’t like it, but she didn’t run away after jumping down, either.

Aside from Nostrildamus, we seem to be having a better time of socializing Butterscotch’s second litter than the older kittens. Though it didn’t help that Butterscotch was around and growling all the other cats away, including her own babies!

Still, we have made some socialization progress!

The other little orange kitten came by later. That one, the gender is still in doubt, but from what little we’ve been able to see, I suspect it is female.

I thought it was supposed to be rare for orange tabbies to be female, but here, they seem to be the majority! Of the older kittens, Nostrildamus is the only whose gender we are sure of. His one confirmed sister is now inside, but with the luck we’ve been having, his other sibling and Rosencrantz’s baby are also female! And we can’t get anywhere near any of them. :-(

Ah, well. We will just have to do what we can. Mostly, I’m just really, really glad the little kittens are going inside the shelter.

The Re-Farmer

Got a new toy, and dealing with unexpected issues

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“Only” 10 yard cats showed up for breakfast. :-)

This morning, after doing my rounds and feeding the felines, I headed into town to run a few errands. This included stopping at the post office in our little hamlet. Which is also a liquor store.

I bought a whole lot of wine.

Or, should I say, my daughter did, since she paid for it. :-D

We don’t actually want the wine, but it came in 3L jugs. We need to rack our hard apple cider, and I’ve been hesitating because we only have gallon jugs (4L) to rack into. With using unfiltered, raw apple juice, there is going to be a LOT left behind when we siphon off the liquid, and 4L jugs would have left a lot more headroom than there should be.

The 3L wine bottles will be perfect carboys.

We will just have to drink a lot of wine over the next couple of days! :-D

I hope it’s actually good wine. I’m not a wine drinker to begin with, so chances are pretty high I won’t like it. :-D

I was happy to see the waterproof cord protectors came in in the mail, so that’s another step closer to winterizing the cat house.

Once in town, I made a point of stopping at a local business that had been getting threats, including death threats, for putting up a humorous sign saying “face diapers” were not required to enter. I’d talked to one of the owners online, and wanted to stop in in person to show them some support. We had an excellent chat. It turned out the owner has a health condition and cannot wear a mask. Even though there is no mask mandate, some of the local businesses are refusing to allow anyone in without a mask, even if it means discriminating against people on the basis of health, so he wanted people to know everyone was welcome in his business, with or without a mask. It was good to hear that, for all the threats and efforts to cancel his business out completely, he’s now busier than ever! It’s a printing business, and he gave me a bunch of business card sized notices of exemption, citing the relevant portion of the mandates (for those municipalities the province put mandates on) and phone numbers.

One of them will be going on my mother’s door, and I’ll be giving her one to carry with her, too.

After visiting the shop, I went to the other hardware store in town, hoping they might have something I could use to cut the piece of door frame for the sun room. Even just clamps, so I could use the reciprocating saw.

I ended up leaving with an inexpensive jigsaw.

My new toy got a major workout today! It even went through hidden nails.

But before I started that, I ended up spending some time on the computer, emailing with my siblings about the situation with my mother. Then I called her and asked for the name and number for the social worker she deals with. These are the people she talks to when there are problems where she lives. She didn’t want to give me the number, saying she didn’t want to make trouble with the caretakers. She had found a note under her door saying that I should be wearing a mask in the building, but it was not signed or anything. She’s pretty sure who left it. We talked about how she should not be wearing a mask, and she again said she didn’t want to make trouble, and just takes it off her face when she needs to breathe. !!!! I convinced her to give me the information, and promised to be nice to them. :-D

It turns out that the number was for a senior’s office, and while they often do things where my mother lives (until they got canceled by the pandemic restrictions), they don’t actually have any say in what goes on there. That falls under a provincial department.

When I called them, identifying myself and my relationship to my mother, then told them what happened, they immediately came to the same conclusion as my mother about who left the note. At one point, I was talking to two people on speakerphone, and they seemed so incredibly happy that I was calling on behalf of my mother. It turns out they have been trying for years to get this caretaking couple fired, due to their horrific and abusive behaviour towards the seniors in the buildings they work in – not just the one my mother is in! – but they have the residents so intimidated, no one is willing to write a formal complaint to the provincial department that manages the building. It turns out this couple has especially targeted my mother, who stands up to them the most. The ladies I spoke to vehemently agreed that my mother should not be wearing a mask, but she has told them she’s afraid of what would happen – meaning how the caretakers would react – if she didn’t. !!! They have already threatened to get my mother evicted, and it turns out they’ve threatened the job of one of the social workers, too!

In the end, I got a name and number for the person they’ve been working with at the provincial level, and they were thrilled that I was willing to call with a complaint (because even if they witness something, they are not allowed to say anything themselves), asking me to let them know how it works out.

When I called the number, though, it went straight to voice mail, so I left a message saying I wanted to talk about elder abuse towards my mother. I will try again tomorrow.

Once I did as much as I could with that, I headed outside and started to set up to use my new toy.

I was being watched!

Sibling snuggles!

So adorable!

Of course, once I started making too much noise, they ran off.

With my daughter’s help, I was able to cut the marked area off the piece of frame. Then we set it in place and…

… made a new mark to cut it again.

Finally! We can close the door with the frame piece.

I had considered screwing the pieces in place, but in the end, decided we’ll just nail them.

The crazy thing is, with all the buckets, jars, tins and plastic margarine containers full of nails all over the place, we have absolutely no nails that we can use to put the frame pieces in!

We’ve got lots of roofing nails, though. :-D

So tomorrow, I will make another trip into town.

Once the frame pieces are back, we will remove the door and use the pieces I cut off the frame on one side, to add to the frame on the other side, so that the door will hang straight, even if the sun room itself is now shifted.

It is all a horrible, messy looking patch job, but until we are in a position to replace the entire door frame, it’s the best we can do for now.

I’m glad I found that little jig saw. It still had a hard time cutting this surprisingly hard wood. That is also managed to cut through some hidden nails, barely slowing down, is bonus.

I will have to make a point of stocking up on spare blades. I foresee using this baby a lot, in the future!

Once we did as much as we could with the door, I had a chance to paint the other side of the support post for the old platform bird feeder. I’ve already picked up a new hanging feeder to put on its hook, ready and waiting. For now, I will not be trying to put on a new platform, and will just leave the little support pieces for that, where they are.

If all goes well, we should be able to set it up by the end of this week. I’ll just have to pick up some more bird seed. :-)

The Re-Farmer

It wasn’t supposed to rain today

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All the forecasts showed the rains would be passed by this morning. Instead, we’ve got three large systems heading over us.

Which meant the cat food containers I put by the cat house were full of water.

At least all the food that was in them was gone, first.

I dragged over the saw horses and made them a quick shelter.

I reached into the cat house to grab the container in there to fill, but it was gone. Not just pushed back, almost out of reach, as I’ve found it before. Nope. Completely gone!

There was another container that I’d had that disappeared. I figured it got pushed under the cat house, but with this one completely gone, now I wonder!

The girls heard skunks fighting last night. I wonder if they could have dragged them off? Is that a thing skunks do?

Hopefully, the rain will be done by this afternoon, when we’re supposed to have quite pleasant temperatures. We were going to put the sheets of insulation around the bottom of the house today, as well as cover the septic tank for the winter, but we’ll see how wet it still is.

Well, now… The phone rang while I was writing this. My mother called to let me know she found a note slipped under her door, saying “your daughter has to wear a mask.” When I brought up medical exemptions, and that she shouldn’t be wearing one, either, she told me that they don’t understand that. She doesn’t want trouble, so she wears one and just pulls it away from her face, or under her neck, when she can’t breathe.

*sigh*

That is a problem to deal with another time! For now, I need to head to town to pick up a prescription refill for my husband, at the pharmacy where they are more sane about things like this!

The Re-Farmer