Okay, this is early, but I’ll take it as a good sign.
The mulberry bushes we got last spring were so tiny, we ended up just potting them up and keeping them indoors.
They grew quite a bit, then dropped their leaves in the fall. So for the past few months, we’ve been looking at bare branches, hoping they were still just dormant and not dead.
Well…
They are definitely not dead! There are tiny leaf buds all over both trees!
It’s early for them to be coming out of dormancy, but for now, I think they will be okay. We will start hardening them off in the week or two before our last frost date, and hopefully, this will mean nice, big, strong saplings to transplant in June. This variety is supposed to be hardy to our zone 3, So as long as they get a good start, and nothing eats them, they should be able to handle our winters all right.
I’m looking forward to seeing how they do. They are supposed to get quite tall, so they will be planted near the lilac hedge, along the north fence. While they are small, the lilac hedge will shelter them, and when the get bigger, they will fill in gaps in the hedge the deer are getting through.
We still have not been able to start seeds indoors. I need access to the aquarium greenhouse, but we’ve got too much shoved in front of it that we don’t know where else to put. Like an armchair that needs repair. It will probably have to get moved to the storage house, but there’s too much snow in the way to carry something like that.
We really need to get those onions started soon, though!
I woke this morning to find a message from my early riser brother, asking me if I could meet him at my mother’s to help with the phone again.
Of course, I said yes. I don’t mind changing my plans for him!
So while my mother was in church, we went in and fiddled with her phone. While the call blocking device is set up and working, this was call blocking through the phone system, which was intended to block thousands of known scammer numbers, plus any numbers manually entered.
Last time, while going through the process to activate it at my mother’s phone, then adding numbers, we kept getting a busy signal, instead. After many calls and an urgent call to tell them – again! – to NOT call my mother (they did, anyhow, which really got her going) nor send over a tech (they had someone booked!), because our mother would not understand any of this, my brother finally got through to someone who knew what they are talking about.
After the new guy went over the file, my brother got many apologies. It should NOT have been so much trouble.
In the end, it turned out the blocking service was something that needed to be turned on at the junction in my mother’s town. However, the system is so antiquated that they weren’t sure it could even BE turned on.
Well, it turns out it could, so now my brother needed to activate it at my mother’s phone.
Which he did, then tested it by blocking his work cell phone number, then trying to use that phone to call our mother.
It worked, but when he went to add our vandal’s numbers, he got a message saying the service was turned off.
So he went through the process again, turning it back on and adding in two other numbers our vandal is known to use.
They couldn’t be blocked.
They are cell phone numbers from a different company. Only the land line, which is with the same company as my mother’s, could be blocked.
In the end, my brother erased the one number that worked and shut the system off. He was willing to pay a monthly fee for this service, but there’s no point if it can’t block numbers from other service providers. He’s going to simply cancel the service.
We are very glad the physical device is set up, so there is at least that! Our vandal still can’t call our mother and leave abusive messages anymore.
That done, we went through a few other things and did minor repairs. Then we started talking about the peep hole in my mother’s door.
Since things are being left at our mother’s door, and we have no confirmation on who it is, even though it can only be one person, my brother has been looking up peep hole cameras, with motion sensors triggering them to take images. It would have to be completely stand-alone, since our mother has zero ability to understand technology.
That led us to looking at and measuring the peep hole on her door.
Which was covered with packing tape she used to stick a plastic picture on the door.
I think it’s a place mat with a scenic image on it, but I’m not sure.
It got moved, but not until after my brother tried looking through it, and found he couldn’t see anything.
After it was moved, he still couldn’t see much.
Oh, you could see light, and the contrast between the wall across the hall and the hall carpet, but my brother remembers being able to see more of the hallway. I even stepped outside so he could look at me through the peep hole, and he couldn’t see me!
Looking at the outside of the peep hole, we discovered it had something on it.
After trying to scrape it clean, we’re pretty sure it’s Krazy Glue.
How long it’s been like this, we have no idea. My mother doesn’t use the peep hole (I think it’s low enough for her to look through). My brother thinks it’s been at least a year since he’s looked through it. I can’t remember if I ever fid, but if I did, it would have been shortly after we moved to the farm.
So… yeah. At some unknown point, it seems that someone put glue on the outside of the peep hole, rendering it useless.
Of course, we can think of only one person who would do that, and that would be the same person who glued the locks on our gate a few times.
Just suspicion, on our part, of course.
So my brother is now thinking if it’s worth spending the money on the peep hole he was thinking of getting, if it’s likely to get vandalized like that.
No decision has been made.
When our mother got back from church, we had tea and lunch waiting for her. She was expecting my brother, but he didn’t know if I could come, so he didn’t say anything about whether I would be there.
We had a nice lunch, then talked about a few things that needed to be discussed, from letting her know what we fixed, to addressing letters she received but didn’t understand.
When it was time to go, my mother started giving us a hard time about leaving so soon, even though we’d been there with her for quite a while. After parting ways, I made a quick stop at the grocery store to get more cat kibble. *sigh*
It was an awesome day to be out and about!
No surprise that -10C feels really warm right now, but check this long range forecast out!
They’re actually expecting us to go above freezing at the end of the month!
Of course, this will change several times before we get to the end of the month, but it’s been pretty consistently saying we should at least be just a couple of degrees below freezing.
Since I will be driving to the city around that time, I’m quite happy to see this.
I’m also going to be very happy to pick 6 my computer, too! I’m quite looking forward to making these posts on my ergonomic keyboard again, instead of tapping on my phone!!
Interestingly, as I check the weather app this evening, we have actually warmed up a bit from this afternoon. We are at -14C right now. We are at -16C when I headed out shortly after noon to run errands.
But then, there is the windchill.
It feels like -27C out there!
To be honest, when I went out to feed the cats outside somewhere between 4 and 5 pm, it felt colder. The wind is from the south, which means we are getting the full force of it.
We really need a windbreak on our south side!
I’m so glad that heat lamp for the outside cats came in when it did!
When I came out to feed the yard cats this morning, I found quite a few things knocked about! It wasn’t too bad, this time. Unfortunately, they’ve knocked everything off the counter shelf a few times. Even the sheer of insulation I added, so they wouldn’t be sott8ng on the metal surface, as well as to block the gap in the back, at the window. Come springtime, it’s going to be quite a job to clean it all up. Especially the various containers of screws and other small stuff like that. I have no idea how they managed to knock some of this stuff off
This morning, I counted only 23 cats, including this beast.
He even let me pet him, though he ran off when one of the socialized males came over, demanding pets. Looking through the bathroom window a little while ago, I could see him in the upside down box that is supporting one end of the platform. I’m amazed he could squeeze into there, he’s such a big boy!
I really hope we will be able to snag him for the cheap spay/neuter day next month. We have kept the large carrier in the sun room many times, but I have never seen him check it out. He’s so big, though, he wouldn’t have a lot of room in there! It’s one thing to have Leyendecker in there, as he’s pretty calm about the whole thing, and quite another to have a big cat that’s still pretty feral!
Of course, it’s a moot point if he’s not around that morning. We shall see.
In other things, little Spewie got quite a workout yesterday.
I’ve driven through the snow to reach the house a couple of times, so I used the tire tracks to decide how much to clear. The truck might be good for getting through, but we still need to be able to walk around it.
We now have enough space to drive in, turn around, and get close to the house. I even cleared more towards the sun room, so that it’ll be easier to unload the kibble bags straight to the old kitchen.
Or, to load the truck from the old kitchen. We are overdue for a dump run. At least it’s not as much of a problem to store the garbage bags in the old kitchen until we make the trip, this time of year. The garbage bags all freeze. Summer is a whole different story but, barring the vehicle troubles like we had last summer, we can make the dump run more often in the summer.
The dump is open for longer hours today, so I plan to head out this afternoon. First to the dump, then to the pharmacy. My husband told me he needed more insulin by Saturday (today). What he neglected to tell me is that he’d already called it in. If I’d known that, I would have picked it up before getting Soot Sprite from the vet!
Communication? What’s that? 😆
Anyhow.
Now that the vehicle lane in the inner yard is cleared, I’m hoping the much warmer weather we’re supposed to start getting next week will have some actual melt and clear even more. When we do our big shopping at the end of the month, I want to be able to get as close to the house as possible to unload! Using the wagon to drag load after load from the garage through snow covered paths, as we’ve done the past few winters, is not fun at all!
While it’s still -23 or -24C right now, with no wind chill, our high today is supposed to be a balmy -15C this afternoon. By the middle of next week, we are supposed to reach highs just below freezing!
For well insulated cats like Brussel, here, it doesn’t seem to make much difference how cold it gets! The less fluffy cats prefer to hang out in the cat house or the sun room. 🌞
My goodness, Brussel does look permanently angry, though! 😆
Speaking of warming up, the upside cats were so happy to have access to my room – and bed! – again last night! My attempt at napping before getting Soot Sprite was disrupted by their antics, so I was really flagging. I finally gave up and went to bed at 8:30, which is insanely early for me. I barely got under the covers before I was surrounded by cats snuggling against me, with 2 or 3 right on me. Butterscotch was in her usual corner on my bed again – she quite enjoyed her night with only Soot Sprite in the room, and wasn’t impressed that they were allowed in. She did allow Cheddar to cuddle next to her, while she used my hand as a pillow, and even tolerated our greasy grandma slithering off my hip and squeezing herself between them and my face, demanding pets. She is a skinny cat, and likes to take advantage of all the body heat she can borrow!
Unfortunately, she makes the most disgusting noises while grooming. 😆
I was so tired, though, I still managed to fall asleep and stay asleep until about 5:30! I can’t remember the last time I got more than 4 or 5 hours of sleep in one stretch.
That I managed to fall asleep at all, never mind sleep all night, is very unusual!
As for Soot Sprite, he commandeered my daughter and slept in her arms for a couple of hours. My daughter is, unfortunately, paying for all the squirming and crawling around under the kitchen sink the other day, and couldn’t lift her arms above her shoulders, then got stuck cuddling the little voidling for hour. He’s another one that has to borrow body heat from others!
I was able to pick him up early. He was completely quiet the entire time, from the clinic to bringing him into the house.
Then, as I went to park the truck, my daughter let him out of the carrier, and he went into overdrive. Not the reaction to expect from a still sedated cat! He was running all over the place!
He also had a whole series of cats following along, trying to sniff his remaining nibby bits as he ran around.
He has finally calmed down and, as I write this, is wandering around the dining room.
While at the clinic, I remembered to go through the list of cats they have on file with us. Some have been adopted, while others have disappeared or passed on. Turns out they had Potato Beetle as two cats – Potato, and Beetle! 😆
While at the counter, one of the staff came by and asked where we found Soot Sprite, and whereabouts we live. I was a bit confused by the question, and just said, in our yard. She was wondering if we were missing a kitten that looks like Soot Sprite. She recently found one!
It turns out, she is a neighbor! She lives off a road a mile north of us, so she takes a paved road, another mile north, to get to her place, rather than the gravel road past our place, So while we live on the same cross road, she has never gone past the intersection near us. I would have driven past where she is, but all the houses along there are hidden by trees, so I only have an idea of her geographical location.
I mentioned we have a lot of black cats this time around, and that the number of cats outside at our place ranges from about 23 to 37, so I couldn’t know if any wandered further her way. Now that I think about it, though, she did say she’d found a kitten like Soot Sprite. Any kittens his size and age have been staying close to the house. My guess is, it would be from another farm out her way.
Though it probably has the same daddy that produced so many mostly black cats at our place!!
Unfortunately, while paying for the neuter and claiming Soot Sprite, I completely forgot to ask her name. That’s not a problem, though. We’ll be back there again, often enough. They take good care of our felines!
Well, Soot Sprite is at the vet right now, getting his nibs nipped.
While we are expected to reach a relatively mild -18C this afternoon, it was -23C with a windchill of -29C when I headed out to start the truck and let it warm up, first.
I am so grateful to have a garage!
Original source unknown.
Normally, we’d plug in the block heater if overnight temperatures are expected to drop below -20C. With the truck needing to have the cord replaced, I would have waited until the afternoon before going anywhere.
The truck started just fine, though, and had no issues with the drive in.
I was concerned the Soot Sprite might be too small for the procedure, but he weighed in at just over 5 pounds. With so many bigger cats, he feels like a feather. I honestly wasn’t sure if he was over 2 pounds, which is typically the minimum weight they prefer.
Oh!! I just got a text from the clinic! Everything went well and he is resting. Pick up time is at 2pm!
Considering no one else was there besides staff when I dropped him off, and I dropped him off a bit early, they most have got started on his as soon as I left!
One down, several more to go! The February spay clinic will have Soot Sprite’s siblings and The Beast (who is as tiny as he is) and Wolf Man (who is not tiny at all!). I’m more comfortable bringing The Beast in, now that I know Soot Sprite weighed what he did.
I wonder if I can get away with a nap before picking him up. I was awake most of the night. Butterscotch and Soot Sprite enjoyed being in my room, without the other cats. The other cats, unfortunately, where either clawing at my door, or all over my younger daughter as she tried to sleep.
I’ll try for a nap. I don’t want to be falling asleep while driving to bring Soot Sprite home!
The hot water tap on our kitchen faucet has been dripping for quite a while.
When we replaced the entire tap and faucet set, choosing a design that allowed us to fit out large stock pot under it, the cold water connector hose needed replacing. There is a lack of shut-off valves in our plumbing, so when I got a new connector hose, I made sure to get the type with a built-in shut-off valve, and hot one for the hot water, too.
The hot water hose, however, was fine and did not need replacing. So the second new hose, with the shut-off valve, was set aside.
You probably see where this is going.
In order to fix the leaking tap, we would have to close the main shut-off valve from the pressure tank. Which means no water for the house.
Which is why the drip didn’t get fixed.
We even took advantage of it and would put containers that needed to soak before washing, under the drip, where the container would soon be filled.
The drip, however, has been getting worse and eventually became more of a trickle than a drip.
So the first thing that needed to be done was to replace the connector hose with the new one with the built-in shut-off valve. That way, the hot water to the dripping tap could be closed, but the rest of the house could still have water.
Of course, this was not an easy job. It should have been, but it wasn’t.
You see, someone – most likely my mother, in her younger days – painted the inside of the cupboard under the sink.
Including the copper water pipes.
And the connectors.
My daughter had to cut through what turned out to be layers of paint to cut the copper pipe. The connector hose may still be good, but it’s painted into place. This was old, oil based paint, too, which gives an idea of how long it’s been there!
Once the connector hose was cut off, she then spent at least half an hour trying to scrub the paint off the end of the pipe, as well as smooth the inside edges of the pipe, which were too jagged from being freshly cut, to install the new connector hose.
My daughter is the only person in the household physically able to crawl under there, but she’s pretty broken, too, so it was quite painful. All I could do was hand her things and keep the kittens away.
It did get done, though. I turned the main water back on so it could be tested, and everything worked.
She could finally shut off just the hot water, and start taking the tap apart.
This is the cartridge she pulled out, AFTER I scrubbed it in the bathroom sink.
The part between the two black O rings was completely black, like what is still in the crevices of the white plastic. The metal inside the hole is supposed to be silver.
When we shock the hot water tank with hydrogen peroxide, which requires shutting the water off to the hot water tank and partially draining it, the water runs black when we next use it. Not only was this cartridge all black, but the space it sat in was all black, too. My daughter cleaned out as much of that as she could, while I cleaned the cartridge.
There was the possibility that it would stop leaking after getting all cleaned up, so after I took a picture of the cartridge, plus the numbers on the bottom, she put it all back together, and turned the water on.
There was nothing.
She turned on the cold.
Nothing.
She had mentioned that the pressure was low when she first tested it, but now, nothing was getting through at all. In fact, she had thought I’d turned the main shut-off valve, off again.
On a hunch, I started taking off the end of the faucet, where the aerator is.
Though the taps were off, water started to spray out as I unscrewed it! Once I got it off, we could see the problem. The screen inside was completely full of black gunk!!
Without the aerator, suddenly water could flow again!
I went and scrubbed the aerator in the bathroom sink while my daughter fiddled with the kitchen sink.
Once the aerator was returned, we ran the hot water for a bit, then shut it off.
Drip.
Drip.
Drip.
*sigh*
Well, it was worth a shot. At least it wasn’t a trickle anymore.
After all that, my daughter went to shower while I headed into town.
There are 2 hardware stores in town. One, I won’t go to anymore, after they kicked me out for being medically exempt from wearing a mask during the illegal lockdowns and mask mandates. (Yes, they actually were illegal, and there are many court cases going through the system now. I don’t think the governments have won one, yet.) I didn’t even want to go into the store to shop, but had gone to the cash desk by the doors to pay for a car wash. The location got blacklisted as unsafe to go to by many others who could not wear masks. After how badly they treated their loyal customers, none of us are going back there anymore.
The other hardware store, however, was fantastic, so I go there all the time now, even though they are a smaller store and have a much smaller inventory.
When I got there, I had someone offering to help me right away, and I showed her the picture of what I needed. She found the part for me on the shelf. The package number was different from the number on the cartridge itself, but they were in clamshell packages, making them easy to open and confirm the numbers there. To my shock, one cartridge cost almost $25!!
Then she realized it was a Moen product.
Moen has a lifetime guarantee on their products.
Which means I should be getting a replacement cartridge for free.
She ended up getting the manager over to talk to me about it. It turns out they have a stock of replacement parts that are sent to them for free, to be used for these sorts of times. What was on the shelf is stuff they have to pay for, so they couldn’t give those out.
He looked in their supply, but they did not have the cartridge I needed.
He then recommended I try the other hardware store, or another place I’d never been to before. As far as I knew, they were mostly a lumber and landscaping place.
When I said I wouldn’t go to the first place, he didn’t even blink, and said to try the other place. I’ve had this manager help me a number of times, and I get the impression he hears that a lot.
Well, I’ve been wanting to check this place out for a while, and if they had plumbing supplies, this was as good a time as any.
Oh.
My.
Goodness.
This is going to be a dangerous place for me to go to, with money!
Yes, their focus is definitely on their huge yard, filled with lumber and landscaping supplies. The store itself is relatively small, but covers all the bases for basic hardware supplies. I had no idea there was a third hardware store in town! And I’ve known about this place for years. I’ve even gone to their website, which turned out basically be a single splash page.
I didn’t see the cartridges I needed in their plumbing section, so I went to the counter. I explained what I needed, and that the other hardware store thought they might have inventory of the free replacement part I needed.
It took him a while, but he did find the part. He’d never had to check the number on the cartridge itself before, and they are darn hard to see when you can’t open the packaging!
Then he asked me how many I needed. I’d hoped to buy a spare, until I’d seen the $25 price tag, so I told him I needed one, but if I could have a spare, that would be great!
So he gave me two! Since I didn’t have the packaging product number, he said to try it out, and if it didn’t fit, bring it back and he’d help find the right one.
He was really nice about it, too.
That done, I ran a couple more errands, then headed home. As soon as everything was put away, my daughter started on the tap.
Which was easy to do, now that it has its own shut off valve!
It took some fussing, but she got it in and put back together. Then there was the test!
She ran the water for a bit, then shut off the tap.
Drip.
…
…
…
Nothing! It’s fixed!!
It was a big, messy, painful and frustrating job for my daughter, but she got it done. I’m so grateful for her being able to do it. Otherwise, we would have had to call in a plumber to replace that connector hose, or keep having to shut off the main water valve and leaving it off until it was fixed.
She did a great job!
As for me, I want to get a look at that aerator and see if I can take it apart to clean it, like we have to do with the one in the bathroom. That one builds up with scale and rust. This one would have that, too, but now we know the black stuff that’s in the pipes after we shock the hot water tank is more of a problem in the kitchen.
The Re-Farmer 