After seeing my weather apps flashing warnings for the blizzard that, thankfully, missed us, now I’m seeing new alerts.
This time, for extreme cold.
Which is NOT missing us!
The -23C/-9F is one thing. The -36C/-34F wind chill is something else. And look at those overnight temperatures! Yikes. Thankfully, the wind is mostly from the north. One of my daughters and I were out there for an hour or so, shoveling out the paths, so we were mostly sheltered. Not so much when my daughter was clearing the paths to the compost pile, back of the garage, and the outhouse. I had to use the wheelbarrow to clear away snow closer to the house, since the surrounding piles are too high, and the snow just falls back into the paths in that area, but at least I was out of the wind!
The temperature has actually dropped in the short time since I took this screen cap, and I’m now seeing -25C/-13F with a wind chill of -37C/-34F.
Previous long range forecasts had us warming up again right now, which clearly isn’t happening… but then, they never included another blizzard, either. Now we’re seeing the cold staying for four more days, before things are supposed to start warming up, and keep slowly warming up into March.
We’ll see how accurate that turns out to be!
Having a bit of garden therapy after shoveling snow was nice, even if it was just a tiny bit. It’s not like the seedlings need much tending.
The onion trays are starting to look a bit hairy – and not just from all the cat hair all over the top of the soil (and everywhere else in the house… LOL). With this tank being a bit cooler, and not having a heat mat under it, today was the first time they needed a top up of the water in the aluminum tray underneath them.
As for the big aquarium greenhouse, I decided to switch things around.
The two rows of gourds had been next to the end of the tank. Yes, there’s insulation against the glass, but it still gets pretty cool, with that end of the tank next to an outside wall. The heat mat below was also a bit off centre, so the canteen gourds would have been getting ever so slightly less warmth from below. I decided to move the gourd end of the tray to the middle, away from the colder side of the tank, making sure they were completely over the heat mat as well.
There is still just the one luffa growing. There are more Cup of Moldova tomatoes coming up than expected! My daughter had issues with seeds sticking to each other, while she was trying to plant just 4 or 5 per pot. I’d like to simply transplant the extras, while they are still tiny, as demonstrated in this video.
The problem is, we don’t have any more cat-proof space for more pots. We could bring in the mini-greenhouse from the sun room; that would give us space for 3 trays of the size the current pots are in, but we still haven’t figured out how to keep the cats from clawing their way under the plastic cover again. At least not without making it just as impossible for us to get in, as needed. I hate the idea of “wasting” thinned seedlings, if we don’t have to! Especially since the Cup of Moldova tomatoes are the ones we want lots of, for preservation purposes.
Ah, well. We’ll figure it out! Thinking about such things is great garden therapy, when it’s so frickin’ cold outside. :-D
The predicted blizzard conditions we were getting warnings about, passed well to the south of us. Once it swept down from the mountains and across Alberta, the system made its way mostly along the Canada/US border.
I guess there are some advantages to being further north!
What we did get was wind.
And deer.
Five of them!
The two in front are our usual visitors. The three in back are new ones. As least, that we’ve seen. For all I know, they visit when we’re not around to see them.
Unfortunately, the three visitors decided the chokecherry and saskatoon twigs were delicious!
After I took the video, I turned the living room light on, so they could see me, then waved my arms around like a fool. The two regulars ignored me, but the ones eating the twigs went away. And that’s all I wanted!
The two regulars came back later.
They were digging down really deep into the snow, to try and find more seeds!
This is what the area looked like this morning, after I put more seeds out.
That deep hole is almost completely filled in, and the snow is hard packed, from the high winds.
This wasn’t the only area blown over. I actually had to push my way through a drift, just to get outside!
It even drifted into the kibble house, though the cats did a good job of flattening it.
Check out the heated water bowl!
After knocking the snow out of the kibble trays and putting food out, I dug out the water bowls, knocking a thick layer off the top of the heated bowl. There was still water in it, though it was lot enough the cats would have had difficulty reaching it through that hole.
I ended up letting Potato Beetle out of the sun room this morning. He’d trashed a few things, trying to get out. He’s not injured anymore, and the only reason we were keeping him in was to prevent other cats from attacking him again. He was happy to be out, and hopefully, he will manage to keep away from whichever cats have been aggressive towards him.
Once the sun room door was open, though, Agnoos, Tuxedo Mask and Chadiccus were right in there! So I left the power bar on, for the light, heat bulb and the other heated water bowl, and left the doors open. When I was done and ready to come inside, I left the doors open just a little bit, so the cats can go in and out. I think there might have been four in there, at the time. We’ve since spotted Tuxedo Mask through the bathroom window, in his favourite spot on top of the board the heat bulb’s fixture is attached to, and under the light. The plan is to close the sun room all up again, after we go out and shovel out at least some of the paths – the wind chill is still pretty extreme right now – but we might have difficulties getting the cats out when we do! :-D
The Re-Farmer
ps: Just for fun, I compiled some short videos I got of the piebald deer, a few days ago. Turn your sound up, and you’ll hear the purring and chomping noises from Susan, who kept trying to eat my phone while I was taking video!!
There are so many people posting video and live streaming what’s going on in Ottawa right now, it’s hard to keep up.
One of the most insane things is that Parliament got shut down yesterday. The irony of using the Emergency Act to shut down Parliament, when they are supposed to be debating about invoking the Emergency Act, is off the charts. This video explains a lot of the Parliamentary process, with questions answered.
This is Andrew Scheer, who used to be the leader of the Conservative Party, and was Leader of the Opposition until 2020. Personally, I think the Conservatives have seriously dropped the ball on things, and have done a terrible job as Opposition, contributing to the state we are in now, but there is a lot of good information in this video.
One of the black marks of yesterday involved an elderly woman being knocked over and trampled by police horses. There are a lot of histrionics about what happened, with many claiming she died of her injuries. She did not. Family has spoken out. She did suffer a dislocated shoulder and, of course, it hurts, but she is otherwise fine.
The really insane thing is that the Ottawa Police are lying, repeatedly. They have claimed that the protesters were being aggressive to the police. They were not. They tried to claim a bicycle was thrown at one of the horses – complete with an aerial image with an arrow pointing to the walker on the ground, as if it was the “bicycle” in question – which did not happen. As the video above shows, there was a bicycle in the crowd, but it wasn’t near the horses, and the guy had complete control over the bike the entire time.
The Ottawa Police chief resigned not long ago, and his replacement resigned after only 2 days. I don’t know who they have now, but they seem to have found someone who is completely on board with police brutality.
While I’ve been able to confirm that the woman is all right, I have not been able to find out anything about the guy. From different angles of video I’ve seen, he tried to shield her with his body before they both got pulled under the horses. It didn’t look like they were together, but just happened to be next to each other. Of course, there are people saying that he’s dead, or critically injured, but usually from the same sources still trying to claim the woman had died.
What was interesting to find out is that she is Mohawk. Strangely, when it comes to protests right now, even though all peaceful protests are still allowed if the Act is invoked, certain “classes” or protesters are exempted from our Prime Dictator’s list, including the Indigenous, refugees and illegal immigrants.
Which kind of shows just how our current federal government views our First Nations people.
Pissing off the Mohawk is not a good thing. Just look up the Oka Crisis of 1990. Which, even though it involved the police, the military, a whole lot of guns, and the death of a soldier, did not result in the invocation of the 2 yr old Emergency Measures Act.
Oh, and while the police in Ottawa were going after peaceful protesters, there was an actual eco-terrorist attack.
It was reported approximately 20 people, some armed with axes, were attacking security guards and smashing their vehicle windows. It was initially reported that some CGL employees were trapped, but all had managed to safely leave the area.
Upon police attendance at the 41 km mark, the roadway had been blocked with downed trees, tar covered stumps, wire, boards with spikes in them, and fires had been lit throughout the debris. As police worked their way through the debris and traps, several people threw smoke bombs and fire lit sticks at the police, injuring one officer.
Amazingly, while looking up a link to the story, I actually saw a headline claiming the attack was done by “Anti-Vax protesters”.
Insane.
The Ottawa Police are not the only police branch that’s openly and brazenly lying.
I remember seeing the first story when it came out – complete with the photo – and how it was confirmed by the RCMP that the incident was unrelated to the Coutts border protest. Then suddenly, the same photo was being posted with a story about the Coutts protest being raided. Except I’m pretty sure the protesters had already cleared the area before the story “broke”.
The problem with the Federal government, legacy media and the police lying so much is that everyone is busily recording everything and posting it online for all to see. Like this one.
You can see that the police moved in all at once, on an order, not due to any aggression on the part of the protesters. The woman that was injured (not seriously, thankfully) is a reporter for Rebel News, which is funded mostly by donations. No government money. Our current federal government has been trying for years to shut them down, or at least prevent them from being part of the Press Gallery, but the courts ruled against the government on that one.
I didn’t see any tear gas in the above video. People are saying pepper spray has also been used. The Ottawa Police have claimed no pepper spray has been used. They may not have been using pepper spray, but from videos I’ve seen, they were definitely spraying something onto the protesters.
Another thing that’s been happening is a whole lot of arrests. Apparently, over a hundred. However, there are many videos out there of people who had been cuffed, taken away… then released soon after. They were arrested for “mischief”, but never told what they had done that they were being arrested for (one video I saw, a guy was arrested for flying a Canadian flag on the side of the road!). They were driven anywhere from 15 minutes away, to 1 1/2 hours away, before being released. Many described being “dropped off in the middle of nowhere”.
They all made their way back to the protest site.
Of the violence that has happened, it has ONLY happened at the instigation of the police.
In reality, there is a lot more of this.
While the government continues their action, and organizers are being arrested, they’re not succeeding. As I write this, there is a back-up convoy on the way, and I know many people who are either already on their way in their own personal vehicles, on their way.
This is far from over.
Which reminds me; the police themselves are creating their own blockade, unlike the protesters. Word is, they will be preventing food from entering the city, which will then be blamed on the truckers, as an attempt to turn support against them. Divide and conquer. This is as much a psychological battle as an ideological one.
On Monday – two days from now – there is supposed to be a vote in the House of Commons. The NDP are siding with the Liberals, so unless there are enough Liberal MPs that break ranks, the invocation of the Emergency Act will be approved by the House. However, it still needs to be voted on by the Senate, and they have stopped Trudeau in his tracks before. This is not the first time he’s made a power grab. Just the most blatant.
Assuming our Prime Dictator doesn’t decide to just suspend Parliament entirely.
This morning was another contradictory one, where the temperature was pretty decent and warming up, but the winds made it insanely bitter outside!
I got some photos yesterday, of the piebald deer visiting again. Her face was packed with snow, from digging under to find the seeds that had been blown over.
Check out where she is, in relation to the bird bath! For the snow to be that high – and hard backed enough to hold her weight – is really something!
The piebald chases these two away if they come around.
I got this photo before heading outside this morning. They’re really digging into the snow to find seeds! When I came around with my little bucket of feed, they ran off, but watched me from the trees. When I next looked through the living room window shortly after finishing up outdoors, they were already back.
The outside cats were quite enjoying breakfast, sheltered from the bitterly cold wind that was coming from the south.
We are still getting blizzard warnings. One patch of snow has already passed us by, and we did not get much snow, compared to areas to the south of us. There is more visible on the weather radar I can see is on its way. The forecasted high has dropped, while the expected amount of snow has increased.
Thankfully, we can hunker down and wait it out. I feel for the people who have to drive in this!
While tending the seed trays last night, I spotted a new first sprout. This morning, it was big enough to get a photo of.
Barely!
There in the middle, you can just see our very first Purple Beauty pepper sprouting!
Which means that, at this point, the only thing in the tray that has not had any sprouts at all are the canteen gourds. The luffa still has just the 1 sprout. It looks like all the tomato seeds have germinated by now, and there are more eggplant and onions sprouting, too.
Oh, there are no Wonderberry yet, either. They are the ones planted in the double cups next to, but not on, the heat mat, so that might be why.
I am very happy with what looks to be a very high germination rate, so far!
We had some concerns about a red spot on the incision showing up, but it seems to be almost gone now.
Beep Beep is one of the cats we’ve been allowing in to “meet” Nosencrantz and Butterscotch, even though she tends to be one of the meaner cats. Butterscotch has snarled at her just like any other cat that goes by, but Beep Beep has been pretty laid back about the whole thing.
Doing the morning rounds today was surprisingly painful. Yesterday was colder, but there was pretty much no wind and bright sunshine. I did the shoveling without even wearing gloves. This morning, though we were at a much milder -19C/2F, the wind chill was -32C/-26F. It still is the same as I write this, several hours later. That wind burns!!!! My fingers got colder in the time it took to set out kibble and water this morning, than in all the time it took me to shovel, yesterday.
We had snow all night, but not a lot of it. Mostly lots of wind. The bulk of the system passed to the south of us. We still have blizzard warnings, which is supposed to hit us tonight and through tomorrow. Tomorrow, we’re supposed to get 10-15cm/4-6in of snow and high winds. They’re not saying we’re supposed to get a high of -9C/16F, but with 42km/h winds (26mph), it’s going to feel a LOT colder!
Looks like we’ll be digging all the paths out again.
Potato Beetle is still in the sun room. My husband spent some time cuddling with him, because he was lonely. Potato Beetle, I mean. Not my husband. ;-) That gave me the chance to get a good look at the wound on his neck.
I got a better look at the older wound on his forehead, and that’s healing up quite nicely. He’s managed to clean himself up, so there was no longer a big dark patch of dried blood on his neck and ear. I also could not find the wound! I could feel a small lump on his neck, but not see anything but a bit of matter fur. Potato Beetle let my husband skritch his neck in the area, so it’s clearly not hurting him. This is encouraging. From the size of the blood patch, I thought he might need stitches, but it looks like he lucked out again. The last time we thought he might need stitches and took him into the vet, he had several puncture wounds on his back leg – likely from a coyote – but did not need stitches.
This boy has probably used up a few of his nine lives!
Still, we’ll see about keeping him in the shelter and safety of the sun room for a bit longer.
Well, I’m happy to say that I did make it into town today, and was able to pick up some more wet and dry cat food.
But, before I get into how that went, I have Cabbages news!
The cat lady contacted me about her wanting to drop off her own carriers in town for me to pick up and use, since the next cats that go to the vet for their spay and vaccinations will not be coming home with us. This way, we won’t be trying to figure out when/how to get our carriers back for the next pair of cats.
She also let me know that Cabbages is doing very well right now. In fact, her husband is saying she’s starting to get too fat! She’s still on a special diet, and getting weekly vet checks to make sure her brain is okay, and that there is no relapse.
Now that she’s better, she has no time for the cat lady anymore! She only has time for her 5 yr old daughter, who dresses her up and has tea parties with her, every day.
*melt*
As we were talking, I found out something surprising. I had understood that, after the adoptable cats had their visit with the vet, they would be going to fosters for recovery, then adoption. No! They will be spending 2 weeks with the cat lady to recover, then going to the fosters while they await adoption!
As the intake person, she is not allowed to adopt any of the cats, as that would be a conflict (the organization she’s with pays for all the food, etc. for the fosters, who are volunteers, not employees). She mentioned saying goodbye to a tuxedo they had for 30 days that just went to a new home this week, and how the entire house was in tears over it. She sent a picture, and he looks SO much like a tuxedo we had years ago, it was disorienting. This was something the family and I have been talking about; how hard it must be to spend to much time caring for cats, then having to say goodbye to them, over and over.
Cabbages is a different situation. They took her in without the usual process, because Cabbages was sick, then took on all the expenses themselves. Cabbages will have been with them for a lot longer than 30 days by the time she’s ready to go to the forever home the cat lady found for her. This is not through the organizations normal adoption process, either.
Which just blows me away, because they spent a LOT of money out of their own pocket to save Cabbages’ life!
If you would like to contribute to our fundraiser to reimburse the cat lady for Cabbages’ vet bills, click on the button below, or click here. If you would like to read more about it, click here.
What an amazing family. I am just so happy we connected with them when we did!!
Meanwhile…
Before heading out this afternoon, we set up the sun room for Potato Beetle, who is being beat up by other cats and getting injured. My daughter had gone out a few times to find him, but it wasn’t until I headed out to the garage that I spotted him in the outer yard and was able to grab him. I left him to my daughter’s care and headed into town.
I had been afraid of this. The big bags of kibble have been out of stock a lot for months, now. As you can see, they had a sale on, too. At Walmart, I can get big bags of dry kibble – if they’re in stock – at an better price, but driving to a city was not an option today. The big bags are typically 7kg (about15lbs) in size, which is why I like to get the Kirkland brand at Costco; they are 9kg (almost 20lbs) and a better price. The remaining smaller bags that you can see at the top of the photo are 4kg (almost 9lbs), and their full price is the same as the sale price for the big bags! I didn’t have a choice, though, and had to get 2 of them. At least I was able to get some wet cat food at a sale price, though not in a case, as I normally would have gotten, or even the types I wanted to get. The cats prefer the shredded or chunky cat food, but there was just one type of shredded left, so I got some pate as well. Enough to last us until next week, when hopefully there will be more inventory and we can get more.
After picking up a few other things while I had the chance, I sent a quick message to let the family know I was on the way – and that I’d forgotten to grab the wagon before I left. So when I got home, one of my daughters was waiting for me at the garage with the wage, to help me bring things in. I tried to quickly get into the sun room to tend to Potato Beetle so she could bring the wagon in for unloading, but he was right at the door when I opened it, and got out. It took a while, but I was finally able to get him and bring him back. At least that gave my daughter time to unload the wagon, and even refill the kibble bin. Fresh kibble was enough to distract Potato Beetle enough that he didn’t try escaping again.
I still couldn’t get too close a look at his wound; I just see a dark patch of dried blood on his neck fur. Which hopefully means there is no gaping wound hidden by his fur. Hopefully, he will be content in the sun room, with his very own food and water, litter box, cozy beds and even a heat lamp – and no other cats trying to beat him up!
When Potato Beetle came back after being missing for months, he had been the aggressive one, attacking other cats, but never to the point of injury like this. We don’t know which cat did this to him, but I have my suspicions it was The Distinguished Guest. My daughter thought it might be Agnoos.
Well, at least he’s safe in the sun room for now.
It will be good when he is finally brought in to the vet, then adopted out. He can be such a sweet, snuggly box, and I think he’ll make an awesome house cat. Plus, no more injuries from other critters!!
I am not going to say a lot right now, because I’m a bit out of the loop at the moment. About all I can say is that, right now, Canada has taken political prisoners, through the Emergency Act.
There are a few videos I’d like to share, but I haven’t found them in a format that I can embed into WordPress. So I will start with this, which was included in an email I will share part of, below it.
Many citizens believe the Emergency Act is already in effect, by the mere use of the word “invoked”.
This is not the case.
The government has 7-days within which to provide details as to which section of the Act is to be invoked and how the measures are to be carried out.
Then the House debates, they vote on it and IF passed then it will go to the Senate.
The Emergency Act (EA) must not and cannot override the Constitution (Charter of Rights & Freedoms) and the rationale to implement the EA must be demonstrably justified by the government.
Many have stated that the Federal Government never invoked the Emergency Act for the Covid-19 calamity because, in order to get this passed, they would have had to produce ALL scientific evidence available to support the narrative and not just cherry pick which science suited their agenda.
And, since Teresa Tam was a no show on February 11th after she had been invited to discuss the science with Dr. Paul Alexander, Dr. Hodkinson and Dr. Byram Bridle, one could assume that just maybe the scientific evidence her department purports to have — either does not exist, is flawed or is not comprehensive enough to support the imposed restrictions and mandates.
The only way to understand the actions of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau over the past two weeks is that he wants the Freedom Convoy protests in Ottawa, which so far have been entirely peaceful, to descend into a violent confrontation between protesters and police.
Everything Trudeau has done, from his initial dismissive remarks about the protesters being a “small, fringe minority” with “unacceptable views,” to his ongoing refusal to meet with them, to the unprecedented invocation of the Emergencies Act this week, has served to escalate the situation in Ottawa and increase the likelihood that it ends in some kind of violence.
The same day that videos emerged of Ottawa and Quebec police gearing up to go after peaceful Convoy supporters in the capital, the Ottawa government has warned protesters that their pets may be confiscated following their arrest.
Moreover, position statements issued by the Ottawa Humane Society reveal that they may unilaterally euthanize any animal that they deem to be “not suitable for adoption.” Arbitrary behavioral and health tests would be used to make the call.
These decisions about the life of a trucker’s pet would, thus, be made without their consent or knowledge while they are imprisoned for indefinite periods of time via the Emergency Powers of the Trudeau regime.
I find the above link particularly… coincidental, considering this came out after a popular video started making the rounds, of a trucker and the puppies that were just born in his truck.
Mainstream media and political hacks have been working overtime to paint the Freedom convoy that converged on Ottawa on January 29 as an “insurrectionist movement” full of “white supremacists”, “Russian stooges”, and “Nazis” out to “overthrow the government”. Even the Bank of England’s former governor (and World Economic Forum Trustee) Mark Carney chimed in on February 7 stating that “this is sedition” and that “those who are still helping to extend this occupation must be identified and punished to the full force of the law”. Carney, the perennial financial darling of Goldman Sachs and the City of London (and Prime Ministerial hopeful) called for a targeting of all those who donated money to this domestic terror operation.
Faced with an organic civil rights movement of blue-collar truckers, farmers and tens of thousands of supporters who have convened on Canada’s capital to demand a restoration of their basic freedoms, the current Liberal government has failed to show even an ounce of humanity or capacity to negotiate. This shouldn’t be a surprise for those who have seen the hypocrisy of neo-liberal “rules-based” order ideologues in action over the past few years who are quick to celebrate the “liberty” of citizens of Ukraine, Hong Kong, or Xinjiang when the outcome benefits the geopolitical aims of detached technocrats hungry for global hegemony. The moment genuine self-organized labor movements arise demanding basic rights be recognized, then the masks comes off and the rage of tyrants show their true faces.
Wherever you live in the world, don’t think that this won’t happen to you. Even here in Canada, many are in denial over what is happening right now.
There is much more I could share, but things are happening so fast, it’s hard to keep up, and I just don’t have the stomach for it right now.
Be well, my friends. Stay strong. Love, laugh, sing and dance. Our joy is the greatest weapon we have. Tyranny doesn’t know what to do with it.
First, to follow up on my previous post, I was able to get my mother’s car started. I left it to run for a bit before moving it to the other part of the garage – and plugging it back in again!
While it was running, I decided to use the time to dig out another cat path.
Because I’m a suck that way.
This is a path to a shed that’s slowly collapsing, and is in view of the security camera live feed. I constantly see the cats struggling through the snow to get through. I got about 3/4s of it dug out before moving the car, then finished it almost the rest of the way.
I left the shovel at the end for scale. There’s probably about 2 inches or so of snow on the ground.
I didn’t dig any further, because I know there are things buried underneath, and the snow level starts to drop there, anyhow. It was actually an easy dig. Once I broke through the harder packed top layer of snow, the snow under it was very loose and crystalline, making it light and easy to shovel.
I had closed up the doors to the garage, and the doors where my mother’s car normally gets parked have a old tire in front, to keep them from opening (I really hope we can replace those doors this summer!). The tire warms up nicely in the sun, so it’s a favourite spot for cats to hang out, out of the snow.
Potato Beetle was sitting on it as I started my way back, so I paused to pet him, immediately noticing what looked like fresh blood in the fur in an ear! It took me a while to find it, but he has what looks like a fresh wound on the side of his neck. All I could really see was a dark patch in his fur. It wasn’t actively bleeding, and I couldn’t look too closely, but I am concerned.
Potato Beetle seems to now be at the bottom of the pecking order, and a target. After talking about it with the family, I turned the power bar back on in the sun room, for the light, heat bulb and heated water bowl. There is still food in there, and I’d been letting cats in while doing my rounds, to nibble on it. Potato Beetle has been the one that tends to go in there the longest. He was born in there, so he’s very comfortable with the sun room.
One of my daughters has brought in a litter pan, and we’ve set the box nests up again. Now, we just have to find him again. We will bring him into the sun room for his own protection, and to hopefully get a better look at the wound.
Spring cannot come soon enough. Potato Beetle is on the adoption list, but the outside cats aren’t going to be done until the inside cats are adopted out.
As I am writing this, I can see cat after cat on the security camera live feed, using the path I dug out!
Let us now think of spring, and green and growing things.
Like onions!
This is the tray that first starting showing sprouts, but only now are they big enough to actually show in a photo. I got mixed up about which onions these were. These are the Red of Florence onions, not the yellow bulb onions I got in my head for some reason. I mean, it’s not like we forgot to label them or anything! LOL
Just this morning, we finally saw sprouts in the other two trays. Here, you can see a little clump of Oneida onions sprouting in the middle, and a couple more little sprouts in the bottom left corner.
It’s really hard to spot the sprouting Tropeana Lunga in this tray. Again, bottom left corner of the tray.
You can even see an Oneida sprout near the edge of the other tray.
I must say, having things sprouting right now is a huge psychological boost!
Having said that, I just got some messages from people I was going to meet at the grocery store this evening, and it’s just been cancelled, due to the blizzard conditions we are supposed to have by then.
So it looks like I’ll either be driving in now, or waiting until Sunday.
Butterscotch and Nosencrantz are still being kept apart in my bedroom/office (which is about twice the size of the sun room they just spent 2 weeks in), but we are allowing some of the more chill cats in and introducing them.
Nosencrantz will sometimes hiss at cats when they come too close, but not always. Lots of tentative sniffing going around. Then I put Nosencrantz next to David, and she lay down beside him, all snuggled up, for a while.
David is a favourite snuggle cat. It’s not unusual to find two or three other cats using him as a pillow, or mashed up against him.
Butterscotch, on the other hand, has discovered the laundry basket bed in the corner of my closet, and moved right in. The few times she’s come out, she’s tucked herself under a chair and snarled at any cat that comes into view. Which seems to confuse the other cats, because they typically didn’t even notice her until she made noise. However, if I am petting her as they go by, she is fine and even allows some sniffing to happen.
The forecast we had for things to slightly warm up turned out to be completely wrong. Early this morning, we hit -40C/-40F, and that was without the wind chill. So I waited until things “warmed up” to -27C/-17F before I headed outside. I hoped the cats would stay in their shelters longer if I did that, but no. They were outside, waiting for me, when I came out! They are made of sturdier stuff than I am!
Nutmeg is tired of winter, too!
I got word back from our mechanic about our van. It’s going to need a new alternator and, after taxes, we’re looking at close to $600. So that’s going to have to wait until the end of the month, and we’ll have to juggle our budget to pay for it. Until then, we will thankfully be able to use my mother’s car.
This morning, I decided to move it from the addition on the garage it gets parked in, and into the main garage area where the van is usually parked. Where her car is, the doors don’t open well, one of them is breaking, and it barely fits. We pull in closer to the inner wall, which means if I have a passenger, they have to get out before hand, because the door can’t open. The outer wall has shelving and a counter against it. I park at a bit of an angle, so that I can open the driver’s door enough to get out comfortably, without the door hitting the edge of the counter. If we have anything to unload in the back seat, it has to be unloaded before doing into the garage.
Which is a distraction that can lead to forgetfulness.
After clearing the snow and opening the doors, I discovered I made a dumb.
I forgot to plug in the car.
No surprise that it wouldn’t start.
I plugged it in, then continued clearing in front of the garage. It’s just light snow, but not something I want to build up.
Because we are now getting blizzard warnings, too!!!
Today is Thursday. Apparently, it’s supposed to start snowing tonight, and keep snowing through Saturday, when it’s supposed to warm up to -12C/10F, and get as much as 10cm/4in of snow.
*sigh*
Before heading inside, I tried starting my mother’s car again. It sounded better, but still wouldn’t start, and I didn’t want to push it. It sounds like the battery is frozen. My mother’s car has a block heater, battery warmer and trickle charger, so it should just need a bit of time. I’ve left the south facing doors open, so that the sun can warm up the black car a bit, and will try again later.
I can’t believe I forgot to plug it in. :-(
This is not a minor thing.
Years ago, while living in BC, my husband and I rented a car to surprise the family with a Christmas visit. The rental car didn’t have a block heater; no rental place we called had cars with block heaters. We stopped for the night in Swift Current, Saskatchewan, when temperatures plummeted to -61F/-78F with the wind chill. Much to our surprise, it started in the morning, but broke down soon after we reached the highway. This was in the days before cell phones, so my husband got out to walk for help. Stupid dangerous, but he got picked up by a tow truck. We spent another 3 days in Swift Current, waiting for the car to thaw out in a garage, before finally taking the train the rest of the way. We eventually learned that the engine block had cracked in the cold.
Thankfully, we haven’t hit temperatures that severe, but it can still do damage. And with the van at the garage in town already, this is our only transportation.
After coming back in and talking about it with my husband, he told me something I hadn’t known. My FIL had forgotten to plug in his car, the night my MIL had a brain aneurism, shortly after New Year’s. They didn’t live far from the hospital, but the car wouldn’t start, and he had to wait for an ambulance. Given the circumstances, it would have made no difference if he’d gotten her to the hospital sooner, but for a long time after that, in the winter my FIL would regularly ask my husband if he remembered to plug in our vehicle.
This is not something to take lightly. Especially when living as relatively isolated as we do, now.
I will give it a bit more time, then try and start it again. I’m supposed to go into town to pick up some things at the grocery store today. Before the blizzard hits! We’re running low on cat food again.
*sigh*
February is always the hardest month of winter. Everyone is so tired of the cold and snow by then. This year, we had those few really warm days that teased us with hints of spring. Looking at the long range forecast, immediately after the blizzard is done, temperatures are supposed to drop again, then slowly get milder through into March.
