More convoy talk

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A lot of people are following this story, so I figured I’d make a separate post to talk about the Freedom Convoy.

To start, I just have to share this news conference, from Keean Bexte of The Counter Signal. I absolutely recommend watching the whole thing.

As of this writing, the GoFundMe is over $8.8 million. If you listen to the interview above, they say they have the resources to stay in place for several years, if necessary.

Years.

And convoys are still arriving. There are so many convoys out there right now, they’ve lost track.

Meanwhile, truckers that weren’t able to join the Freedom Convoy in Ottawa have been holding their own protests at their provincial legislatures and at Canada/US border crossings.

There are people I know who are there in Ottawa, including neighbours, and I follow many others who are there. So I’m getting a lot of uncensored, first hand commentary on what’s going on – though it’s so huge, even that is barely touching the surface. The atmosphere remains incredibly positive, uplifting and united.

Our mainstream media, of course, isn’t reporting that.

One of the things people are suddenly clutching their pearls over is that protestors *gasp* draped Canadian Flags on a statue of Terry Fox, along with a paper sign saying “Mandate Freedom”. Terry Fox is a major Canadian hero. They are claiming the statue was “defaced”.

Seriously. They are actually saying that the statue was being defaced by the Canadian flag.

There have been other reports focusing on portraying the protestors in the most negative light. In one of them, a horde of protestors supposedly pushed their way into the soup kitchen of a homeless shelter, demanding food. The shelter organizers claim they were able to diffuse the situation by giving them soup.

To say that doesn’t pass the smell test is a massive understatement. There has been so much food, and other supplies, already donated to the convoy that people who approached truckers, intending to donate food, instead found themselves being offered food from the truckers! There is more than enough food for everyone. No one actually part of the protest has any reason to go to a homeless shelter for food, nor would they “demand” food from a homeless shelter.

An exception to that statement just showed up in one of my groups. If you can read the screen cap below, there are truckers on an isolated part of the highway, barricaded by the police.

So any troubles truckers are having to get food is outside the city, and deliberate. From the timestamp, this is was posted 2 hours ago, from the time I’m writing this.

While I have no doubt the incident at the homeless shelter happened, there is no way this was done by genuine protestors in Ottawa. Quite a few people have been outed for inserting themselves as if they were part of the protest, while doing things like carrying Nazi flags.

There has been an interesting thing going on. Communications are being blocked. Anyone could download the Zello app and listen to chatter on the CBs. There is no longer a signal. I’ve tried to listen in myself, but it’s dead. People have talked about other communication troubles, widespread enough to suggest they are being blocked externally.

Our media’s representation (and lack of it) of the Freedom Convoy is even being blasted by other countries, as in the video above.

You know things are bad in Canada in regards to the restrictions, when they are commenting on how extreme it is, in Australia.

How the media is handling this was the topic of conversation with Viva & Barnes. This is an excerpt of their regular livestream from a few days ago.

Viva and Barnes are both lawyers, so they provide some very interesting perspectives.

Most people know better than to listen to our own mainstream media, not to mention most of our politicians. However, there are still those who swallow the narrative, hook, line and sinker. They have gleefully accepted the notion that the truckers are white supremacists, Russian operatives, or whatever favorite derogatory narrative fits their preconceived notions, all on the edge of violence, and no amount of first hand evidence will change their mind. It’s bizarre to see, but they are most definitely in the minority. You can easily tell the difference between those who support the truckers and those who don’t. Supporters are overflowing with excitement, passion, love, hope and joy, and it’s infectious. The detractors are angry, condescending, insulting and dismissive. Mostly, though, they are contemptuous of people they clearly see as beneath them, and unworthy of being viewed as even human. It would be an interesting psychological study to look into how their views of humanity developed into what they are now. It is so opposite from what is happening across the country right now.

For many years, my biggest frustration with my fellow Canadians has been apathy. We’re so busy being “nice” and “polite”, it’s been destroying our country. With my own family having escaped the evils of both Nazism and Communism, I could see the road we were going down, and it was incredibly alarming. It is one of the reasons I am so thankful that we were able to return here to my family farm, and escape the city. Now, for the first time in my life, I see that something has broken. Something has snapped. A dam has broken, and there is no stopping the waters pouring through. Canadians have been pushed to far, and the apathy has been swept away.

Our country will be a completely different place, when this is over.

The Re-Farmer

Our 2022 garden: preparing to start seeds indoors

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Last year, we converted two unused aquariums into greenhouses, where we hoped to protect our seed starts from the cats.

It mostly succeeded.

Today, I prepped the tanks for this year’s seeds.

The small tank – a 20 gallon tank – was a real problem with the cats last year.

Even when we pur the original hard cover back on at the end of the season, using the space inside to store the light, etc., the cats still got into it!

The foil around the back and sides were to provide reflective light for the seedlings. As you can see, the cats have torn up the foil, and even left scratches in the rigid insulation at the back!

Last year, we had tried using the lid that came with the tank at first, but the cats would reach through the opening for the water filter in the back, even if it meant fighting past whatever we put to block the opening. They managed to reach in and pull up the seed trays, anyhow. Having to block everything meant no air circulation, so what the cats didn’t destroy, mold did it’s damage. I finally rigged a window screen and that worked, though it was far too late to save the onions we’d tried to start in there at the time.

This tank will be for onions again. After seeing that onion seeds can be planted very close together, and they don’t really get transplant shock, I’m hoping to be able to get all 5 varieties of onions we have in hear.

The problem is the size and shape of the tank is too small to fit any of the commercial seed starting trays we’ve been using. I want to be able to water the planting trays from below, which meant having to find something to use as a tray for the water.

I decided to try aluminum oven lines. They are pliable enough to bend to size, and strong enough that I could fold corners without it tearing. It’s not deep, but it doesn’t need to be.

There’s still quite a bit of space left. If needed, I can fold up another tray and overlap them. I’ll just have to make sure they are attached to each other with a water tight seal. Or we can just use the doubled Red Solo cups again, and not need to have a tray under them at all.

Then the screen window was brought back into action as a cover. A pair of 5 pound hand weights get added to the back, in case a cat walks onto the overhang in front. The metal screen is strong enough to hold their weights. The heavier cats don’t try to go up there, just the tiny ones, so that has worked out. If necessary, we have more weight we can put on it. At some point, I want to build a screened cover to fit, but that’s not an urgent thing.

Since we can’t change the height of the light fixture, the egg cartons are being used to bring the seedling trays closer to the light, and can be taken out to lower the base as needed.

One thing we found last year is that this room is pretty cold, which is why we added the insulation around the back and sides. It was still difficult to keep it warm enough for the squash and gourds we had in there. Onions are a cool weather crop, so they should be fine in here, as far as the temperature goes.

Then there was the big tank to do.

I had to take out the biggest pot with an aloe vera in it to make space for the boxes that are being used to raise the seedling tray closer to the light. Previously, the boxes were under that sheet of insulation at the base to create a raised floor, but with the plants still in there, we can’t do that this time.

This is where we will be starting the luffa, and probably a few other gourds, at the same time as the onions. They will need the heat mat we got for under the seed trays, which is why they have to go in this tank. The mat won’t fit in the small tank. Right now, the mat is under all the trays and pots, so the weight can flatten it out a bit. There’s just enough room left to hold the curing Tennessee Dancing gourds.

At some point, we’re going to have to take the other aloe vera and my daughter’s orchids out. We’ll need the space for the tomatoes, eggplant and peppers, which are the next earliest seeds we need to start. After that, we will need space for the winter and summer squash. Hopefully, by the time they need to be started, we can start moving the onions into the sun room. The orchids (you can see one has started to bloom again!) are here because it was too cold for them to hang at the window in winter. The aloe is there to keep the cats from digging in the pots.

Which happened with the one pot I did take out, while I was setting things up in here! I caught Nicco, inside the barriers I put around the aloe vera. She’s so long and skinny, she snaked her way through the gaps! The little beast!

We had another, larger pot with an aloe vera in it in. It had been okay for months but, a few days ago, we came out to find the pot all dug up, and the only remains of the plant in it were a couple of leaf tips. We never found the rest of the aloe, and have no idea what happened to it! I’m sure we’ll find it, desiccated, under the couch or in a corner somewhere, months from now. :-D

As you can imagine, I’m not too keen on taking the plants out of the tank. They’re doing very well in there! But we won’t have a choice.

We have many things we need to start indoors, but a lot of them will have only a few seeds per packet used. Particularly with the squash and gourds. For the tomatoes, the paste tomatoes are the only ones we will be planting a lot of, since those are determinates being grown specifically for canning. The others are indeterminates and will be more for fresh eating, so we won’t need more than a few plants of each. We have enough varieties that, in the end, there should still be quite a few to transplant in the spring.

The other major thing we will need to start indoors will be the kulli corn, but those won’t need to be started until about the middle of May, at which point the sun room will be warm enough to use.

We are expanding the garden a lot this year, and will be expanding it more again, next year. I expect to be expanding it every year for quite some time. Which means that we will be needing lots of room to start seeds indoors every year. Until we are at a point when we can get a greenhouse or polytunnel, a goal of mine is to set up a corner in the sun room for starting seeds. We’d need grow lights, so that we wouldn’t have to constantly turn the trays for even sunlight, and we would need a heater sufficient to keep the room – or at least that corner – warm enough for germination. Or use more heat mats, but there is no outlet in that room. We are using an outlet in the old kitchen, with an extension cord running through a window to a power bar, right now. So warming the room would be more practical than using heat mats.

It’s funny. As we work on what we are doing this year, my mind is already on what will need to be done next year.

And the year after.

And the year after that…

As we work on things, we get a better idea of what plans we have will work, what needs to be modified, what needs to be re-priorities, or dropped entirely.

I don’t think we’ll ever reach the end of that process. Which is good, because figuring it all out is a bit part of the fun!

The Re-Farmer

Quick Cabbages and kitty update

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I just wanted to make a quick update post, before writing the post I intended to. :-D

I have been in contact with the cat lady. I let her know that Butterscotch and Nosencrantz are snagged for their trip to the vet tomorrow. I had gone to spend some time with them, just before I contected her. They were both loafed on the swing bench and, to my surprise, Butterscotch was all over me, purring her heart out, wanting pets and skritches. So much so, she was bowling right over Nosencrantz, who was looking pretty stunned. :-D

I was able to give Nosencrantz some attention. This is the first time we’ve been able to do more than just pet her and occasionally pick her up, outside. I was noticing her behaviour while skritching her ears and gave them a closer look.

She has ear mites.

*sigh*

It’s not a surprise, but with all the yard cats we’ve brought inside, we’ve never seen ear mites before. We have been very fortunate, that way. I called the vet clinic to let them know, and it turns out treatment for ear mites is on the list, along with deworming and vaccinations. All of that, plus getting them fixed, for only $75 a cat!! Oh, how I appreciate connecting with this organization. After all this is done, I plan to continue donating to them, as we are able.

We’ve got these two booked for tomorrow, then Beep Beep and Fenrir on Feb. 7. Talking with the cat lady, we confirmed Feb. 23 for two more inside cats for adoption; we will need to decide which ones go first.

She also passed on the e-transfer information, which is to the organization that is covering the rest of the vet bill. Since my husband’s disability payment came in early, I was able to make a payment in advance. I can make payments as I am able, as long as it’s paid off by the end of the year. She has a budget from this organization, and I know any payments made allows her to have more budget to help more cats, so I was happy to make a payment now. That, and I don’t like unresolved line items in my budget.

The payment for my PAL is driving me nuts. I have no idea when my license will be processed and the payment will come out. All I know it that is should be within 4 months, and I’ve got about 3 more months to go.

Anyhow.

She also updated me a little about Cabbages. She is eating roast beef!

She sent pictures, which I am not asking permission to use right now, but the difference in her is amazing! She has quite clearly regained some weight. In one of the pictures, she was eating shredded pieces of beef. The last pictures we saw, she was eating meat mush. So that is another encouraging sign!

Cabbages and Turmeric

The photo above was taken just after New Year’s. According to the vet, she would have been already starting to get sick, but we saw no signs of that at the time. She’s isn’t back to how she looked then, but being such a little cat to begin with, even this little weight gain makes for a very dramatic difference.

She is set to visit the vet again, soon. I really look forward to hearing what he has to say!!

If you would like to read more about Cabbages and our fundraiser to surprise-reimburse her for vet expenses, click here. Or, you can go straight to the fundraiser page here.

I am so very happy and encouraged by how she is doing. What a fighter!

The Re-Farmer

Snagged some kitties and, can you see them?

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This morning, my morning rounds included snagging outside cats.

Not these ones.

The heat bulb inside the cat’s house is clearly working!

Nosencrantz was easy. When I go to fill the kibble tray under the shrine, she always goes to eat there, instead of the kibble house. The tray is there because Rosencrantz had Nosencrantz and Tosencrantz in the junk pile on the other side of the fence. We wanted to make sure they got some food and didn’t have to push their way through other cats at the kibble house to get food there. Nosencrantz still prefers to eat at her own personal kibble tray. :-)

Butterscotch often joins her there, but not this morning.

She’s in the corner, on the left. After I finished with the food and water, she wasn’t there anymore. I finally found her eating at the kibble tray on the outside of the kibble house.

She is why we had to make sure to snag them early in the day. Nosencrantz hangs around but, after breakfast, Butterscotch will take off and we might not see her again until the next morning.

When I picked her up, she was pretty good with that and enjoyed her ear skritches.

Then I started walking to the sun room.

Oh, she did not like that!

I managed to hang on to her and get her inside, but she immediately started trying to get out. Nosencrantz was already settled and eating, but Butterscotch started jumping up the door to reach the window. I had both outer doors closed, and we’ll have to be careful to keep them that way. When we turned the sun room into a maternity ward a couple of years ago, bringing a very pregnant Beep Beep and Butterscotch in to have their kittens where we could socialize them, we still had the old, broken storm door on there. It had a screened window that couldn’t be closed. No matter how many times we patched that screen up, she would tear her way through.

I’m sure she remembers being able to get through the closed door.

I left them be while I finished my rounds, making sure to message my family that they were there, and Butterscotch wasn’t happy. My husband came in to visit with them for a bit, where he found Butterscotch somewhat settled on a pillow. He was able to pet Nosencrantz, but that was it.

When I got back, she was prowling around. She even was standing on her hind legs, looking at the highest shelves we stuffed with gardening supplies, trying to see if she could jump up there.

We will need to check on them a few times and make sure they are doing well and getting along, then to take away the food and water bowls when it’s time for them to fast.

We have 2 carriers to bring them to the vet tomorrow morning. We’ll have to make sure Butterscotch goes into the hard sided one, because she’ll be able to tear her way out of the soft sided one. Thank you again, M, for gifting the kitties with that hard side carrier!

After finishing my rounds, I went through the trail cam files and was very amused by some files on the sign cam – aside from many files of the roads being cleared. They broke out the big plow, that’s higher off the ground and has a MUCH bigger front plow attachment. The snow was too deep to see clearly, but I’m sure the side plow attachment was quite a bit bigger, too. Beautiful machine!

The deer much prefer to use the nice, clear roads to move around!

I just had to put in the arrow to show where the second deer is. This is the mother and her little one we see outside our living room window all the time. Her little one is almost fully grown now, but still small enough that only it’s ears showed above the snow piled up on the sides of the road!!

The date and time on about half the files from this camera were completely wrong. It got so cold, the batteries “died” enough that the camera reset itself to the default time and date. When it warmed up enough that the batteries started working again, all the files after that started from midnight, Jan 1, 2020. LOL There were also a lot of black files, because there wasn’t enough power for the infrared flash.

It’s supposed to stay warm enough over the next while, that this should not be a problem.

I just got a phone call while I was writing this. The vet clinic was confirming tomorrow’s appointment for Butterscotch and Nosencrantz. Drop off time is 8:20, and no food after 8pm tonight. She did say water was okay. I double checked, because the cat lady had said no food or water. Which is good. I won’t want to be fussing with the heated water bowl, if I don’t have to.

We will be in touch with the cat lady tonight; she was planning to call us to follow up on these two. I look forward to hearing how Cabbages is doing, too. The fact that we haven’t heard from her means that Cabbages has not taken a turn for the worse, at least.

If you would like to read more about Cabbages and our fundraiser to surprise-reimburse her for vet expenses, click here. Or, you can go straight to the fundraiser page here.

Today’s focus will be to keep an eye on Butterscotch in particular, and try and keep her calm.

The last time we tried to bring her indoors was when we set her and Beep Beep up in the basement to have their kittens. When we had no choice was to send her back outside, with Beep Beep adopting her last, surviving kitten, it took months before Butterscotch would let us come near her again. I expect, after she is recovered and we can let her out again, it will be at least that long before she trusts us enough to pet her again. But it will be worth it. I get the impression she is so done with the whole “mother” thing! I’m sure she’ll forgive us. ;-)

Eventually.

The Re-Farmer

As set up as can be, and fundraiser update

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Well, we’ve been doing as much as we can in the sun room for now. It’s as ready as we’ll be able to get it, for Butterscotch and Nosencrantz’s recovery period.

We were able to tape up the wire on the old heated water bowl, so it can now be safely used again. The wire itself is not damaged; just the outside was cracked, right at the bowl. Thankfully, we’ve got a tape that can handle that tight of an area. If it hadn’t worked, we have a silicon sealant we would have used.

The main concern we have is with Butterscotch. We’ve used the sun room as a maternity ward before, for Butterscotch and Beep Beep to give birth in. Beep Beep handled it well, but Butterscotch tore her way through the old door’s screen to escape, no matter how many times we patched it up. She was more than content to leave Beep Beep to take care of both litters and probably wouldn’t have come back, if she hadn’t needed to nurse. She is not going to be happy in here. I do hope that, at least for the first day or two after surgery, she will be too drugged up to go too wild. It’s certainly going to make it interesting to go through here to get kibble and seed. Most likely, we’ll put a carrier in with her, and close her up until I’m done going in and out.

As we expect Butterscotch to basically tear the place apart while in there, my daughter and I bagged up the sunflowers heads, and they are now stored in the old kitchen. We’ve packed the top shelves against the window with as much gardening supplies as we could jam in, then made beds on the two bottom shelves. Then we tried to make the rest of the shelves and surfaces as impervious to destruction as we could.

I picked up a new litter pan for the sun room, since we’re using it for yard cat recovery so often. It’s set up under the swing bench. The heat bulb is ready to go, with scrap pieces of rigid insulation as walls, because there will be a cold draft from those windows, and more on the floor so they can eat and drink with their little toe beans kept off the cold concrete.

The plan is for Butterscotch and Nosencrantz to be brought in tomorrow, after we do the morning rounds. They have even been staying together when I put the kibble out, so they will be easy to catch at that time. They will have their own food and water until evening, at which point they will be put on a fast until after their surgery.

While organizing the space as best we could, one of the concerns is that, in her displeasure of being trapped in the sun room, Butterscotch might start attacking Nosencrantz. Since Butterscotch is not ever going to be an indoor cat and is not up for adoption, she has to stay in the sun room during recovery.

There is no such requirement for Nosencrantz. She will be adopted out. After they are fixed, vaccinated and de-wormed, and the non-adoptable indoor cats are done, we will start getting the adoptable indoor cats done near the end of February. We will bring them in to the vet in the morning, then the cat lady will pick them up in the evening and take them to the fosters for recovery before going to their forever homes. Then we will start working on getting the outside cats caught and done. They, too, will be taken to the vet in the morning, then the cat lady will pick them up in the evening.

It just doesn’t make sense to send Nosencrantz back outdoors after recovery, if we’re going to have to catch her again for the cat lady to take. Plus, if we bring her inside right after the surgery, there is no chance of Butterscotch going after her. This will also give us a chance to socialise her more, before the cat lady is ready to pick her up.

The next few months are going to be pretty cat crazy!

Speaking of the cat lady, I am incredibly thankful that there are already some fundraiser donations!! You can read about the fundraiser here or, if you wish, go directly to the donation page here. It just blows me away that she has been so willing to take on the expenses for Cabbages vet care, and going above and beyond in treating her. She even sent pictures (which I won’t ask permission to share right now; this fundraiser is a surprise, and I don’t want her to know about this blog, yet. :-D ), and Cabbages was eating out of a bowl and looking so much more alert.

I have not heard any news today, yet, which tells me that the recovery continues. It’s still “no news is good news” right now. Cabbages is being lavished with care and attention, and I have full confidence and trust in the cat lady, to do what’s right by her, however things go.

I am so thankful that we were connected with her when we did. The timing was downright providential!

The Re-Farmer

Happy Freedom Day!

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What a difference between this winter and last winter!

Though Chadiccus doesn’t know that, since it’s his first winter.

I’m sure the older cats are appreciating it, though!

Last year, we could barely go anywhere because it was too cold for our vehicles. At one point, we even had to ask my older brother to do some shopping in the city for us, because we couldn’t use our own van, or even my mother’s car. They started but, my goodness, the noises the engines made!

This winter, we’ve been able to head out as often as we needed – or wanted – to. I think I’ve gone somewhere almost every day this week!

With Butterscotch and Nosencrantz being dropped off at the vet on Monday, the earliest we expected to be able to do our Costco trip to the city would have been Tuesday, so I decided to pop into town after doing the morning rounds and pick up a few things we figured we’d need. It was disappointing to walk around the grocery store and being the only person open faced again, but not surprising for this town. At least I don’t get harassed in this grocery store. When I was done, I made a quick stop at the garage to finally book a much needed oil change. I kept forgetting to phone. Not a single sign on the door for the illegal restrictions. Gosh, it was so wonderful to see a beautiful, open face. It’s amazing how much removing people’s faces causes stress and anxiety that isn’t even noticed until it isn’t there. Anyhow, with the oil change booked, that makes Wednesday the earliest we’ll be able to head into the city, so I’m extra glad I made a small trip, today.

Today is Freedom Day. In support of the Freedom Convoy, all businesses have been asked to open fully, without discrimination or segregation. The main convoy has reached Ottawa, though it may well take days for them all to stream in. I’ve heard there are six convoys in total, coming in from different directions. Our Prime Dictator and his family have apparently been whisked away somewhere, for their “safety”, while the media continues to prime viewers to expect violence. As has happened before Antifa riots, people have reporting seeing trucks unloading piles of bricks in the area, while others are reporting finding piles of bricks already in place. Whistleblowers within the federal government have warned of paid agitators. Within the convoy groups, those who have reporting finding these bricks are being encouraged to report them to the police, and the constant thread is to encourage people on site to not allow themselves to be goaded into doing anything stupid. Considering that the overwhelming atmosphere among the Freedom Convoy supports is more like a massive, joyful, exuberant celebration, it would be pretty easy to spot the agitators.

Support continues to be overwhelming, and overwhelmingly positive. The GoFundMe now exceeds $8million, and armies of people are cooking, baking and donating food and beverages. Businesses that used to sell maybe 4 or 5 Canadian flags in a year, have been selling as many as 150 in a day – if they have any left to sell at all, anymore. Farmers in the area have plowed snow clear on their fields for truckers to park their rigs and get some sleep. Support flows in from around the world, with many forming convoys of their own.

It’s absolutely amazing.

Now we just wait and see how our governments respond. Whatever happens, this is big enough to affect even us, in our little hidden pocket of the world.

The Re-Farmer

More normal things, and freedom convoy talk

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Phew.

After writing and update about Cabbages and announcing a fundraiser for her, I figured I should post about less exciting things. :-D

This afternoon was my day to visit my mother and help her with errands. She wanted me to “not be in a hurry” and not have to rush home, so… I had to rush out earlier to make sure I got to the post office before it closed to pick up some packages. :-D Mind you, the only reason it was a rush was because of how much time I was on the phone, being updated about Cabbages by the cat lady, so that was quite acceptable.

She had actually called at first to talk about these two. She still has the cat carrier she borrowed to carry Cabbages, and she wanted to make sure I didn’t need it before Monday. We do still have 2 more carriers that we can use. Butterscotch is Cabbages’ mother. It will be good to finally get her fixed! Nosencrantz isn’t even a year old yet, and she is easily twice the bulk Cabbages ever was!

After leaving kibble in the tray under the shrine, I turned around and saw this.

Seeing how deep the snow is, in relation to the size of the cats, is just funny.

They just love the paths we’ve dug for them. :-D

Once I was done with the morning rounds, and the call from the cat lady, it was a quick run to the post office to get what turned out to be two parcels, not one, then to my mother’s. While I was gone, the girls did some work in the sun room in preparation for having Butterscotch and Nosencrantz recovering in there. After one section was reorganized, they made sure to cover the windows where the inside panes have cracked, with some sheets of rigid insulation, so there would be no chance of them hurting themselves. Tomorrow, I’ll work on it some more, as I’ll be going through some of our seed starting supplies, plus I want to bag up the sunflower heads that are still there. They got knocked about a bit when Tuxedo Mask was recovering in there, and I know Butterscotch will be far more destructive!I made sure to stop at the gas station to pick up some chicken and wedges for lunch, first.

I had a good visit with my mother while we had lunch, which with my mother is not guaranteed! She didn’t get to her usual criticism until after we were done and the groceries were put away. LOL The first stop she wanted to make was to a small department store, which I took advantage of. The handles on her walker wiggle, and while there are knobs on the outside that can be turned to tighten them, I can see the screw heads on the other side, turning instead of tightening. I never have the right tools handy to deal with that, so I picked up a multi-tool, to keep in the zippered pocket under her walker’s seat. I paid for it right away, so I could use it to tighten her handles while still in the store. They still wiggle, but it won’t tighten any more than they are. Hhmm.

While there, I was also happy to see a new display of Jiffy pots that can be buried directly into the soil when it’s time for transplanting. Those will be perfect for the squash and melon starts. When I did our Walmart shopping, yesterday, they didn’t have any of these in stock yet.

After that, we did her grocery shopping. I had been encouraging her to stock up as much as she could, just in case. She’s been seeing about the trucker convoy, too, and she has started to understand what I was trying to explain about potential supply shortages. We’d talked about it before we left, and even from the incredibly horrible news coverage she has been seeing, she recognised how utterly ludicrous is was for our federal government to impose the new restrictions on truckers. I was quite happy to see her doing things like picking up larger sizes of things she would normally get. Her needs are small, so it doesn’t take much for her to be stocked up for quite a while. I am hearing about shortages in the city, but so far, that has not been an issue in the smaller towns. I recall, when the shutdowns first happened and people were panic buying, it was similar; things ran out in the cities, but not so quickly in the more rural communities.

As for the freedom convoy itself, it’s just amazing! Not only are we getting thousands of trucks coming in from the US – and from what I’ve heard, none are being stopped at the border! – but there are now freedom convoys being organized in countries around the world!

The excitement and sense of unity it has generated is absolutely amazing. The level of positivity is infectious and inspiring.

There are still the detractors, of course, that are doing everything they can to mock and belittle the truckers and anyone who supports them. Most of it is parroting the media and government narrative. One example was some commenter who, after reference was made to the convoy stretching across Manitoba, from border to border, was to along the lines of “truckers can’t do math, huurrrr, duurrrr…” Apparently, this person thought it meant the people were saying it was bumper to bumper trucks across the province. With so many trucks, there is no way to know how many there are at any given time. On the open highway, they have to spread out. Those big rigs need a lot of space if they have to make an emergency stop. Plus, there would constantly be trucks going in and out of the convoy, as they stop to gas up, eat, use a bathroom and sleep. So of course, the convoy itself is going to be really stretched out in places, while packed together in others.

There are still people saying the GoFundMe was frozen. It never was. As I write this, more than $7.5 million has been raised. Yesterday, the money started to flow. The last I heard, there were about 100,000 registered truckers in the convoy. The first priority for the funds it to reimburse truckers for fuel. Then, as needed, to reimburse for the costs of food and lodging. The organisers have been working closely with GoFundMe to make sure everything is above board.

The mainstream media and our federal government have, of course, been increasing the negative narrative. Most people know better than to rely on them. They are acting as if the truckers are intending to stage a violent insurrection, and invoking the fake-news “insurrection” in the US last year, every chance they get (never mind that the FBI itself concluded that there was no insurrection). The Counter Signal published about internal documents leaked, exposing how our government is treating this though violence is a given. You can read about that here.

What is happening is priming. The federal government and the media that relies on them to keep them from going under are doing everything they can to create the very situation they are condemning, even though it doesn’t exist. It has been very obvious, from the beginning, that violence is exactly what they want. They are trying to create a self-fulfilling prophecy. It would be just the excuse our Prime Dictator needs to do what his father did when he was PM; declare martial law.

Make no mistake. If there is any violence when the convoy arrives tomorrow, it will not be instigated by the truckers, but with the media and the feds already priming viewers to believe the truckers are evil incarnate, they expect people to believe them.

There is a problem with that expectation.

The past two years has seen our “leaders” doing everything the can to divide us. It’s been masked against the unmasked, the vaccinated against the unvaccinated, the believers against the heretics. The only acceptable thing we are supposed to shoot for is complete acquiescence.

However, this convoy has done the opposite. It has united this country at a level I have never seen before. Yes, people are angry, but that anger is being channeled into unity, positivity, excitement and joy.

These are people who are fighting for our freedoms with a giant party. Do people want our “leaders” to step down? You bet. That is because they have failed us, over and over. This gets twisted into being “hateful”, “anti-government” and “dangerous.” These leaders have imposed restrictions and mandates that have destroyed people’s lives, even causing developmental delays in children that they will probably never recover from, devastated the physical and mental health of our nation, and yes, even killed people, whether through deaths of despair, or from not getting diagnosis and treatment in a timely manner, to harmful treatment protocols. And when people try to stand up to what is happening, these “leaders” cry victim, while calling their victims the abusers. Pure gaslighting.

So what is going to happen over the next few days? Who knows. Our Prime Dictator has announced that he was exposed to Covid 19. While a rapid test came up negative, he says he’s going to isolate himself for 5 days, following the Ontario Public Health recommendations. The problem with that is, those recommendations actually say that a fully vaccinated person – which our Prime Dictator claims to be – does not have to isolate if exposed to someone with Covid. They’re just supposed to keep masking and distancing and watching for symptoms.

Meanwhile, in Ottawa, areas of the city are being marked off for a “special event”, so that people won’t be parking on the streets.

But only for 2 days.

Which suggests they expect it to all be over within 2 day, or at least under 5 days.

The truckers plan to stay there until all mandates and restrictions are lifted, however long that takes.

Thousands of them.

That doesn’t even count supporters that aren’t truckers.

How will our leaders respond?

Only time will tell. Whatever it is, it will affect every single Canadian, and possibly have ramifications around the world.

The Re-Farmer

Cabbages update – and fundraiser announcement.

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We had not heard from the cat lady about Cabbages for a little while, which was a “no news is good news” situation. Today I had to run errands with my mother, so I sent a quick text to let her know that, if she needed to call us, to please call the land line.

I didn’t even get a chance to tell the rest of the household to keep a handset near them, when I got a call.

So here we have a very encouraging, do we dare say hopeful? update.

Cabbages is still a very sick kitty, but she is not in the hospital anymore. She is back at home with the cat lady and her family.

Cabbages has been eating, though only while being actively fed. If the food is just left with her, she doesn’t eat. She didn’t like the baby food they tried, but she will eat roasted drumsticks that have been chopped fine for her.

She is being given an antibiotic in pill form, once every three hours.

Yes, you read that right. Every three hours. They have alarms set to go off every three hours. The vet even texted her at 2:30 am to make sure Cabbages got her pill!

Her entire family is in on this one. Even her 5 yr old son is spending hours with Cabbages. *melt* This sort of thing is old hat for their oldest, who is right in there with helping with the treatments and feeding. They’ve done this a few times, it seems!

Cabbages is fighting off the pills, which is understandable to begin with, but these are apparently huge pills that have to be shoved down her throat, and they can’t be broken up (they become too bitter).

I was told Cabbages was “still” doing the head pressing thing against their hands; something which is a warning symptom. This surprised me, because Cabbages had never done that at all, when she was still with us.

She is on valerian as a preventative for seizures. She has never had a seizure, but as she became sicker, it was something she became more at-risk for.

A panel of vets got together to talk about her. She is quite the unicorn, and they are all flummoxed by her condition. The notion that she was born with some sort of congenital defect has now been rejected. Other vets thought that she absolutely had to have come in contact with, or ingested, anti-flea substances, but we have never, ever, had anything like that in our household. We don’t do the collars. Fleas aren’t a problem here.

The other vets also brought up the possibility of Cabbages ingesting some sort of narcotic but, again, that’s just not possible. We don’t have the kinds of drugs they were talking about in the household, and even with the prescription drugs, great care is taken to make sure none get dropped, etc. Standard stuff, really.

The other vets actually recommended euthanizing Cabbages, but the vet that’s caring for her said he would work with the client some more. The cat lady is willing to keep trying, as Cabbages is showing signs of improvement.

Cabbages is moving around more, and her balance is getting better. Her vision is also improving. She has even had a bowel movement in the litter box; the first since they’ve had her. With all the medications she’s on, it was a real mess, but it shows her system is still working.

The conclusion remains that this is toxoplasmosis and a related bacterial infection that has crossed into her brain, however they haven’t ruled out that she might have a brain tumor. Her blood tests show no signs of cancer, but with all the meds she’s on, it’s possible that affected the test results. The only way to know 100% is with an MRI. There is only one MRI in the city available for cats, and it costs $3000 to use it, so that’s not going to happen. Especially when that is far less likely to be the cause of her illness.

So they will continue to treat her with these rare antibiotics (now in pill form, rather than IV) that can cross the blood/brain barrier, valerian, etc., and keep hoping. Even as we were talking on the phone, the cat lady mentioned she had drumsticks in the oven to spoon feed Cabbages.

She also mentioned in passing that all this has now cost them $1200 in vet bills. If Cabbages pulls through, she is still looking at months of treatments before she is in the clear. The organization that the cat lady is connected with covers the vet and food bills for cats that are with fosters, all funded by donations, but the vet services they provide is typically for things like vaccinations, deworming, and discounted spay and neutering. They balked at taking in such a severely sick cat and adding more to their vet bills – but they did offer to help cover some of the cost of euthanasia. :-/ I understand why they would have to draw the line, but sheesh!!

So the cat lady continues to pay for all this out of pocket.

She is not at all asking for money; in fact, she regaled me with stories of how she has a terrible kitchen because the money intended for renovating it went to treating their own two cats that had gotten so sick, she actually sent them in to be euthanized, but with the help of this vet, they found a way to treat them. There is a reason he gets called “Jesus”! The kitchen renovation money got all used up, but the cats are now recovered and thriving, and her family feels it was worth every bit of it.

As I was thinking about it today, I decided to start a fundraiser for her, as a thank you surprise. With that in mind, I have started a fundraising goal on our ko-fi account for Cdn$1500. It is set to accept as little as Cdn$1.

The final vet bill will probably be more than that goal, but it’s above what she has already spent, and there’s no way to know right now how much it will be.

We will be paying her for getting the other cats fixed, of course, but that is through her, to the organization. This would be completely separate from that. She’s paying out of her and her family’s own personal income, and she is the one that will be the recipient of the fundraiser, not the organization.

With that in mind, if you would like to contribute towards Cabbages’ vet bills the cat lady is paying for out of pocket, you can click on the donation link at the top, right of this post, or click here.

Thank you!

The Re-Farmer

Our 2022 garden: T&T order, and McKenzie seeds

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Well, this is it. Today, I placed my last order for our 2022 garden. While I was doing the first half of our monthly shop, I also picked up some pea seeds. I am now done ordering things we are planning to grow this year.

First, the peas.

There are so many varieties of peas, I have been struggling on which ones to pick. While at the Walmart, I saw a new McKenzie Seeds display, and finally settled on one. As much as I love edible pod peas, I decided to go with shelling peas.

Some selling points on these: very productive, heat tolerant and disease resistant. Plus, of course, they’re supposed to be tasty. While I hope we don’t get another drought this year, our summers to get as hot as our winters get cold, so heat tolerant peas are a good thing.

My daughters are not big on peas, but they have never had peas, fresh from the garden. The ones we grew last year did not really produce, due to the heat (just the odd pod, here and there), then the green peas got eaten by a groundhog! The peas sown late in the season, in with the corn, were planted for their nitrogen fixing qualities, and the few pods we got were there only because we had such a long, mild fall. Nothing reached their full potential in flavour. Hopefully, this year will be different, and we will get lots of delicious fresh peas!

Once I got home, I placed an order with T&T Seeds.

All images belong to T&T Seeds.

First up is Jerusalem Artichokes, or Sunchokes.

I just ordered the smallest size; a 10 pack. A friend on a neighbouring farm successfully grows them, so I know they will grow here.

We’re sort of taking a chance on these ones. We’ve never tasted them before. I’ve never even seen one in real life before. However, these are something that can easily be propagated from year to year, and are supposed to be quite delicious. If we like them, we have another good storage food to add to our inventory of foods for self-sufficiency.

If not, well, they are in the sunflower family and have pretty flowers.

We will be planting them in a location that can be permanent, so not anywhere in our main garden areas.

Covington Sweet Potato

This one is pretty much just for me, as I seem to be the only person in the family that actually likes sweet potato, so I got the smallest option; five slips.

This variety is the only short season variety of sweet potato that can grow in our zone that I have found. I think I will make a grow bag or two from our feed bags, and set these up somewhere near the south facing side of the house, just to hedge my bets, though I would need to make sure there is space for the vines.

Highbush Cranberry.

The girls and I debated whether to get Highbush Cranberry, or more raspberry bushes. We decided to work with the raspberries we already have, and go for the Cranberry. I ordered two.

In cleaning up along the east fence line in the spruce grove, I actually found an American cranberry (at least that’s what Google Snap told me it was). It now gets light and everything, but I would like to transplant it, eventually, to a better location. Not sure where, yet.

Forage Radish

Also called “tillage radish.”

We had tried to plant a daikon type radish to help break up the soil in the corn blocks last year, but I think something ate them shortly after they sprouted, because they all just disappeared. So I was quite excited to find these forage radishes.

They are sold as a green manure and a type of cover crop. They get planted, then left to die off. Their roots can reach up to 6 feet in depth, boring into the soil as they grow. After they die off and decompose, they leave behind root channels that other plants can take advantage of.

With our concrete-like soil, filled with rocks, the plan is to basically just scatter these in strategic areas, so we got the 500 gram/1 pound size, which can cover 5,500 square feet. I don’t expect to use it all this year, but who knows.

So that is it for this year’s seeds and trees, though it’s entirely possible we might still order more. I forgot to order more alternative lawn and wildflower seed mixes from Veseys, but those would be sown in the fall, anyhow. We shall see how the ones I sowed this past fall turn out, this spring.

We still have a monthly “seed” budget, though, and now it will go to other things we need. I did pick up more potting soil today, as we will be starting onion seeds and luffa soon, and have lots more seeds to start over the next few months. After much searching, the girls and I found some netting online that we will be using to help protect our garden from critters. It’s a netting that is 14 x 200 feet. We can get one roll this month, and another roll later. Some of it will be used for the temporary fencing we will need to build around larger blocks, such as the corn. We can also cut it to the sizes needed to cover individual beds. We simply have too much ground to cover, and beds spread out in too many places, to fence it all in from both deer and smaller critters. Particularly since so much of it is still temporary. We’ll also have to figure out what best to use to support the netting, in the different ways we plan to use it, and get what we need for that. We are shooting to have consistent sizes on the permanent raised beds, so that any protective covers we build will fit any raised bed. The low box raised beds are 3 feet by 9 feet (because that’s the size the boards I found resulted in). The high raised beds will all be 4 feet by 9 feet, but with the thickness of the logs we are using, the planting area inside will be smaller, and the 3×9 covers should still fit. Other beds, such as in the old kitchen garden, are oddly shaped, so they will need completely different ways to protect them from critters.

Little by little, it’ll get done!

The Re-Farmer

The derpiest derp, and call update

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Well, I’m happy to say that at least my court conference call was over with quickly!

I already knew it was just to be rescheduled, but the last time I had to do one of these, I was on the phone for nearly 2 hours before they got to my file. That was with criminal court, which is provincial, and they are incredibly busy. This was for civil court, which is federal, and there was only maybe 2 other files being addressed at the same time. I never heard how many exactly, because our vandal’s file was the first one called. We got a new date – in April – and that was it. We were done.

This suddenly freed up my morning, so I decided to do the Walmart part of our monthly shopping. We were running low in cat kibble again – I don’t think we’ve ever gone through so much in one month, since we’ve lived here! Mostly with the outside cats. Yes, we’re feeding 20 cats out there, but we’ve had about that many in previous winters, too, and they were much harsher. Interestingly, while we have never had so many cats inside before, they aren’t going through anywhere near as much food. At least with the dry kibble. The inside cats get wet cat food once a day, too, and there’s definitely more of that! :-D

As I was getting ready to head out, I spotted our regular pair of deer outside the window, digging an ever deeper hole in the snow, where the seeds are scattered. I quickly took a couple of pictures with my phone, but it wasn’t until I uploaded them that I realized I hit the jackpot.

I love catching the deer in the middle of making funny faces, but this one is easily the derpiest of derpy faces, I have ever caught!

Isn’t that just priceless? :-D Even with the poor quality (my phone is terrible for zoom), I love it!

The Re-Farmer