a mystery

Too much wind! Also, a mystery

/ Re-Farmer / 4 Comments

Good grief! As I write this, we are supposedly at only -1C/30F, but the wind chill has us at -18C/0F.

It feels colder than that!

I head out earlier this morning to do the cat feeding and my morning rounds, while it was still dark, so that I could open the gate. The wind was already really bitter by then, though it had to have been calm during the night, as everything was covered in hoarfrost. The septic guy said he would be here in the morning and, sometimes, that has meant right at 8am, so I figured I’d better get it open early.

When he didn’t show up before my younger daughter and I had to leave, I called and left a message saying I would be gone (he would see the empty garage as he came in), but that there would be someone home, so just knock at the door as his payment was ready.

In the end, he never made it. I’ll have to call him tomorrow and see about a reschedule. The last time that happened, their truck broke down!

I headed to the truck early to warm it up and noticed that front tire with the leaky valve was pretty low, so I fired up the compressor to pump it up. Then I headed back inside, out of the wind, to text the garage. The leak seems to be getting worse, so I asked if they could order the new sensor and replace it when I come in to get the oil seal replaced later in the week.

After that’s done, there’s still two more sensors to replace.

My daughter and I had to go into town for the pharmacy, first, as she had to pick up a prescription she needed for her medical appointment. I had called in one of my own for refills, too, but their delivery from the city wasn’t going to be in until the afternoon, so I told them to include it with my husband’s delivery. I’ll be in town that day, but it’ll be to drop the truck off for my appointment, and I don’t want to be carrying meds around while it’s being worked on.

I’d received a response from the garage, confirming that they could get the sensor ordered in and done at the same time. I asked if they needed any info off the tire but when they didn’t answer before we were done at the pharmacy, we just swung by and I ran in to ask. They didn’t, so we were soon back on the road.

Headlong into the wind.

We had left early enough that my daughter and I could stop for lunch at a Subway right near the clinic. We timed it perfectly, as there was a huge rush starting, just as we were paying for our food. We were able to take our time to finish before heading into the clinic.

One of the things my daughter wanted to bring up is that she will NOT be going back to that endocrinologist again. I still think she needs to make a formal complaint over how she was treated and manhandled.

Her appointment wasn’t very long, so we were soon heading out again, this time to the nearest Walmart in the smaller, nearer city.

I was no longer driving headlong into the wind, but the route was mostly open fields at this point, so I was instead fighting to not be blown off the road!

My daughter and I had out own shopping lists, and I had one from my husband, but we even altogether, we didn’t need a lot. It was just stuff we either couldn’t get locally, or was so much more expensive locally, it was worth the gas and the side trip to get them there.

Before we left, I got a message from my husband. My mother had called. She had gotten a call from the Meals on Wheels office saying that her deliveries were cancelled, and she was wondering if I had cancelled them.

?!?!?!?!!!!!

Obviously, I didn’t. Once we were home, I called her up as soon as I could, to get as much information as I could, before calling Meals on Wheels. It was past 4 by then, and I had no idea if they would even still be open. The meals are cooked and assembled in the kitchen of an apartment building similar to my mother’s, except they offer meal service and a few other things. My mother has actually been on the waiting list for that place for a few years now.

I called my mother and she immediately started talking about what happened today, and it was a bit confusing. Basically, her Meals on Wheels delivery came at the same time as her lunch assist person. there was some sort of confusion. Why, I have no idea. This is not the first time she’s had both since her increased service. Home care is aware that she gets Meals on Wheels and were good with it. I think maybe it was the first time they arrived at the same time.

After they left, she got a phone call from the Meals on Wheels office (they don’t actually have an office) saying that someone had cancelled her service, and that there would be no more dinners from them. My mother was wondering if I had cancelled it. Of course, I hadn’t. So she wondered if my brother hand, and of course, he hadn’t either. I didn’t even have to ask him about that!

Part of what was confusing is that as she was trying to describe what happened and the confusing of her lunch assist and Meals on Wheels coming at the same time, she started talking about how she doesn’t need both. If she had people coming every day to do her meals, why have Meals on Wheels?

I told her, these meals are more complete than she would make for herself, and require more preparation than home care is able to do for her during daily meal assists, so it would be better if she kept it up. I didn’t really get to say more, but these are also the most nutritionally complete meals she has all weak.

Then she started taking that she didn’t need… and here I lose it on the words she used, because they were more implying than saying outright, but basically, she’s trying to suggest that these meals are so big, they are making her fatter, so she should probably stop. She’s been getting to the point of saying she should practically stop eating entirely, so I needed to cut that off, quickly. I told her, she’s 94 years old. She doesn’t need to be worried about her weight at this point. Who cares?

I told her I needed to call Meals on Wheels right away, because I didn’t know when they closed, but then she launched into how she takes the “pink stuff” (Pepto) and Tylenol and started going on about how she thinks her problems are her digestion (this after years of blaming her insanely healthy heart) – so basically, she was working herself up to blaming everything on the Meals on Wheels meals. I had to cut her off and say I would call her back after calling Meals on Wheels.

I was too late. They were closed.

The number I called was directly to the kitchen, but I noticed another number in my online search, so I tried that, too. That was the building’s management office. Their answering machine gave office hours, and they are open only 3 days a week, and the message added that if it was about Meals on Wheels, to call the kitchen number.

Tomorrow is Remembrance Day and I normally wouldn’t expect a call back until the day after, but they do cook daily meals for the residents, so it’s possible I’ll get a call back tomorrow.

I called my mother back and told her as much as I could. Thankfully, she didn’t try to blame her various issues on the Meals on Wheels meals again. It frustrates me to hear her trying to blame all her problems on her food, but she knows nothing about nutrition. Half the time, she’s basing things on something she saw on TV 30 years ago, or some women’s magazine that the ladies from the Senior’s Centre drop off sometimes, or something her neighbours have said, to just leaping at associations with no real connection. All the more reason for her to have those Meals on Wheels! If it were up to her, she would be seriously malnourished while convinced she is eating “healthy”.

Anyhow, I told my mother I would get back to her as soon as I knew something. I have, of course, updated my siblings about it as best I could.

I’ll be at my mother’s on Friday to get her bubble packs and do her shopping. I’ll stay to do other stuff for her, too. I should remember to ask her to take the chicken I got for her a while back, out of the freezer so I can make up another stock for her. That will give her cooked meat that the lunch assist people can use for her meals, too. This time, I want to bring one of my stock pots from home. Last time, I had to split things up between a small pot and a frying pan! I should bring a proper knife, too. She has been using what look like cheap “as seen on TV” steak knives, and is happy with them, but they really are terrible. At least for full food prep. I had to use one to butcher a whole chicken for her a while back and it was so bad, I ended up using the only other thing she had – a bread knife!

Hopefully, the Meals on Wheels thing will be straightened out by then. I’m really at a loss as to who would have cancelled her service. Unless my mother gave specific instructions, they would not have had any authority to do so. It doesn’t sound like my mother did anything like that, but she talks in circles so much, someone may have misunderstood her? I just don’t know.

I am just noticing one of my weather apps that I have on display at all times. According to that, we’re now at 0C/32F. We should keep warming up all night, to a high of 6C/43F tomorrow. It’s not supposed to be as windy as it still is right now, but still pretty windy. On Friday, we’re supposed to reach a high of 8C/46F! That would be a great day to get a few more things done outside, but I’ll be at my mother’s. Ah, well. I’ve at least got the next two days at home to work on things. Once the septic tank is emptied, I want to head over to the ejector to cut away all the weeds grown up around it, then dig more of a trench to drain the greywater towards the low area, rather than forming a pool just 10 or so feet away.

Hopefully, the septic guy will be able to come in soon! This is not a job I want to work on when it gets colder again.

Gotta take advantage of every warm day we get. It won’t be long before anything left will just have to wait until spring.

I would really love it if I could just hibernate all winter!

The Re-Farmer

Okay, this is weird

/ Re-Farmer / 5 Comments

Thanks to our vandal, we’ve got trail cams set up in key areas. After finding the lock on our gate glued a few times, back in 2018, we set one up on a tree facing the gate, and that’s how we caught our vandal in the act. Since then, part of my morning routine is to switch out the memory cards and check the files.

Sometimes, however, weather, snow, or other factors means we skip a day – or longer, if the weather is really bad. I’m not too concerned about that since, if the weather is bad enough we can’t get to the cameras, our vandal isn’t going to get at what they’re covering, either!

The corner of the property the house and outbuilding are on is at an intersection. When we first moved here, the stop signs for the road that goes past our driveway each had a name sign for our road, though. And when I say “our” road, that partly means the road is named after my family, and that name was on one of the stop signs. The roads also all have numerical designations. This is true of pretty much all the roads around us; they have a name that’s usually from a family with a long time farm along it, and a number.

For many decades, none of the roads had any names at all. Most people went by section numbers. In fact, the electric company still uses that system. Beyond that, it was more along the lines of “turn onto the gravel road and drive X number of miles…” and so on. For as long as I can remember, right at the corner post of our fence was a sign with my late father’s initial and surname on it, which helped in giving directions! As you can imagine, that made things difficult for emergency vehicles to find places, so the roads were given proper names then, at some point, got numerical designations too, and everyone’s driveway got a marker number.

Well, after we started having issues with our vandal, first the stop sign with our family name on it got knocked to the ground and the sign stolen. Then the sign with my father’s name on it disappeared. It was hard enough to get people to find us, since our physical address doesn’t exist – Google maps has several miles of the road past our driveway listed as “unknown road” – but without those signs and landmarks, it made it more difficult. So I decided to make a sign to put at the corner to make things clear. You can read about that here, here, here, and here, where my brother helped me install it far better than we could have done, with the materials we had! (all links will open in new tabs)

With the other signs going missing, I made sure to have a trail cam set for the new sign. More specifically, the area in front of it. We even got a new trail cam that could take a combination of stills and video, and we were able to mount it directly to the corner post.

Then one morning, I came out and it was gone. Ripped right off. Of course, we have no proof, but there’s only one person who would have taken it.

We ordered a new camera, which is now the gate came, and set it up on the corner post again – this time with an older camera set up to monitor the new camera!

In the end, though, we didn’t want another camera stolen off the post, so we found something we could use as a stand. The new camera couldn’t be set up on it, so we used an older camera that can only take stills, set up out of reach inside the fence line rather than on the post, and the new solar powered camera went to monitor the gate.

This set up has worked out well. Granted, we have barbed wire fences, so it’s not like a determined person still couldn’t get at it, but it works out. We do see our vandal going by ever now and then, since he lives so close to us, but since we were able to get a restraining order against him, we no longer see him making rude gestures at the camera anymore. The visible presence of the cameras themselves are a deterrent. Well. Except for the one that got stolen!

So that’s the background.

In the winter, there are always times when we can’t get at the sign cam because of the snow, but there’s less of a concern in the winter. Our vandal is in no shape to climb over the huge plow ridge at the intersection, or make his way through snow drifts, to get at the sign. I wasn’t able to switch out that camera’s card in the last little while, but was able to this morning, and this evening I was finally able to go through the files.

Yes, I did see our vandal go by in a couple of them, but I found something else far stranger.

It’s not unusual to see people stopping on the road at or near the intersection and getting out of their vehicles. This time, however, we got images of three young men walking away from their stopped vehicle towards the intersection.

Then climbing the plow ridge to get to the sign.

One of them posed in front of the sign while a second one took his photo, and the third one stayed further back.

I have no idea who these guys are. They looked to be maybe in their late teens or early 20’s, and I’ve never seen them before.

They would have seen the sign cam, of course. The sign cam may now be further back from the fence line, but it’s visible from the road. From where they climbed the plow ridge to get in front of the sign, they were facing it. The one guy who took the photo even seemed to look right at it. They had to know they were being recorded.

Whatever they were doing, they seemed to be having fun and were all laughter and smiles, but…

What on earth could there be about our sign that they’d go through that effort to get to it, and why would one of them want to have his picture taken in front of it?

It’s a complete mystery for all of us!

The Re-Farmer

More on the vehicle mystery (updated)

/ Re-Farmer / 11 Comments

I had some excellent responses to my earlier post, trying to figure out what’s going on with the vehicles. For the tire problem to be happening with one vehicle is strange enough, but our truck, as well as my mother’s car? Then there’s the oil thing, in the truck.

First, to address the tires.

Yes, cold most definitely can be a factor when it come to air loss in our area… but not this year! Temperatures have been much warmer than average in our area this year, because of the strong El Niño. We might even have a brown Christmas this year! Yesterday, as I was coming home from a dump run (my last trip of the day), it was even starting to rain. We’ve had winters where both the van and my mother’s car basically froze, saved only by the block heaters, and did not have this sort of air loss.

My mother’s car had all 4 tires replaced not long after we took over keeping and caring for the vehicle from my brother. I had managed to miss hitting some deer, but ended up in the ditch. Much to our shock, I was able to drive straight out without any stop and keep driving, but one tire went flat before we got home. After it was taken to the garage, we discovered other damage and all the tires got replaced. That was about 4 or 5 years ago and, for the amount of driving we do in general, they are still in excellent shape. It’s not like we’re commuting every day on them or anything like that. One tire is newer than the others, after our gravel road conditions caused a blowout about 3 years ago.

The tires on her car becoming unexplainedly flat has mostly been in just the past 6 months or so. I found the right rear tire flat one time, with no cause found. Once pumped up, it held it’s air fine. Then there was the left front tire. When that happened a second time, we got it checked, along with the other front tire by mistake. No signs of any leak. Then, most recently, I checked all 4 tires before going to my mother’s. The left rear tire was almost flat, the left front tire was really low and both right tires were also low, but not as much. The right rear tire was lower than the right front tire.

With my mother’s car, it’s parked in an addition to the garage and, as small as it is, it still barely fits. If I have a passenger, they have to get out of the car before I drive into the garage. In order to get in and out of the driver’s side without the door hitting a counter shelf against the wall and having to squeeze my way out, it is parked closer to the other wall, and diagonally. Which means the driver’s side tires can be reached fairly easily, the rear passenger side tire could be reached if someone really wanted to make the effort, but the front passenger side tire is virtually inaccessible. To check the tires, I have to drive the car out of the garage completely.

Thanks, Silk, for your info about the Schrader valve. I was wondering what it was called! I’ve looked at the tool you linked to. The more I look at it, the more I wonder; have I seen one of these before? With all our digging around what’s left at the farm, trying to find what’s still useful. I may have seen something like that and wondered what it was for. Or, my brain it trying to fill memory gaps. I can definitely see my late bother having a tool like that around. What I don’t know is if our vandal would have one. I tend to find that idea highly unlikely; at least not as something he would have acquired to work on his own vehicles – though he’s taken so many tools from here before we moved in, he may have one among them. Whether he would know what it is, I’m not sure.

Also… I hope that jerk you mentioned got caught and faced the consequences for his actions! Vandalizing people’s tires can cost lives!

To answer some other points brought up:

The truck is a 2011 and, since we’ve bought it, the mileage is over 240,000km/149,130m. I’ve got the vehicle’s history, and a record of the work done on it to get it safetied. It has all new tires and, while they are not the highest end tires, they are certainly not cheap. These are very good tires. We got the vehicle from the mechanic owner of the garage we’ve been going to for years, rather than a dealership. We’ve been burned by dealerships and dealership garages way too many times. I’d rather buy a vehicle from a garage that sells cars on the side, than a dealership that also has a garage, if you get what I mean.

Along with the tires, I know it got an oil change, so basically both the oil and the tires have been driven only by us since we bought it.

A few things did get missed when the vehicle was being prepped for sale. They (both our mechanic and the garage that did the safety inspection) did not see a problem with the battery; that showed up after we started driving it. The tire sensor module’s battery is not something they would have checked, either. No one bothered checking the cord for the block heater, the end of which was neatly tucked away, so no one noticed the plug had been torn off at some point. With this winter being so mild, there is no rush to get that fixed. Of course, being an older vehicle with so many miles on it, I would expect to find things that will only show up by actually driving it regularly – like the driver’s side seat belt being difficult to get latched in place.

The truck is parked in the original part of the garage (where my mother’s car is now, and where the lawn mowers, etc. are stored, were added to each side, much later on). The tires can be easily reached from all sides. However, it’s a longer vehicle, and just barely fits. In order for us to be able to close the garage door (which is broken right now, so it’s open all the time), the truck has to be pulled so far forward, it’s almost kissing the counter against the back wall. The space under the counter is open, so the front bumper can actually go under the counter, just a tiny bit. If we pop the hood from inside, we can’t access the lever under the hood to open it all the way, because it’s right at counter level. If we need to access the engine while in the garage, the truck has to be backed up. However, if someone could manage to get the hood up, they would be able to access the engine compartment from the sides. Even with the truck not pulled all the way in, from the side was the only way I could reach the dipstick.

Speaking of which…

While I was poking around in there, with a utility light hanging from under the hood so I could see, I cleaned off the top of the oil cap, then reached with my phone to take a picture. That was the only way I could see and read what was written on it!

I can just reach that dip stick from the side, enough to pull it out. If I really stretch, I can touch the cap, but not enough to open it, or add oil, without basically climbing the truck. Hence the need for a foot stool!

It never occurred to me that someone might remove the oil through the dipstick. In theory, if they could get the hood up, it could be done but, if nothing else, I would have seen some sign of that in all the gravel dust all over the engine compartment. The top of the cap was covered with gravel dust and clearly hadn’t been touched since the engine was worked on before we bought it. It was thick enough that I could barely see there was writing under the oil symbol.

While there is no sign of a leak under the truck, in the photo above, you can see there is a small section that does look oily. Again, this is something that was visible when I took the picture. Even with the work light above, it didn’t look damp like that while I was checking the oil level.

The gauge layout is completely different from any other vehicle we’ve had, and the oil gauge itself is different from any other vehicle we’ve had. My daughter actually looked it up while I was driving, shortly after we brought the truck home, so we could figure out what it was telling us, and what range for the needle to be in was good or not. That very difference, as well as the different location of the gauge, has had me checking it frequently. It’s where I’m used to the fuel gauge being, in other vehicles we’ve had, so my eyes still automatically go there first. Which is why I can be so sure the oil loss was sudden. There was also no change in driveability.

Well, I still need to head out and pick up oil for the truck – and pick up another parcel at the post office, which is closed right now, so I have to wait another 1 1/2 hours. Unless I take my mother’s car and go to town and talk to our mechanic directly, then hit the post office on the way home. I think I’ll do that.

Assuming, of course, the tires on my mother’s car aren’t low again!

The Re-Farmer

Update:

I didn’t make it into town to talk to our mechanic. Since I was going to use my mother’s car, I made a point of checking the tires, first. Sure enough, the tires on the driver’s side had lost about 10-15psi, with the front tire having lost more. It was raining/snowing at the time, so I fired up the compressor to pump the tires, rather than using the hand pump. The hose is long, but not long enough to reach both sides of the vehicle, though it turned out the passenger side tires didn’t need it.

As I was just getting onto the main gravel road, I realized going to town was not a good idea. That area that’s shaded by the trees and covered in ice had plenty of water on top of the ice. In the time it would take me to drive to town, talk to our mechanic, then drive back, it would probably be starting to freeze, and I use as heck didn’t want to be driving on that with my mother’s car!

So I stopped at the post office, which is inside a general store. They did have the type of oil I needed in stock, so I picked up a couple of litres – and a package that had been delivered yesterday, but not though the mail, so I never saw it! My husband got a delivery notification for it and was wondering. He thought it had been sent by post. 😁

Anyhow.

Once I got home, I just left the oil with the truck and headed inside. We’ve got nicer weather coming up. One of us will grab a stool, move the truck, and get some oil in there when it’s not so unpleasant out.

I was able to send the photo I took yesterday, along with a message asking our mechanic to call me when he had some, saying I had a tires and oil mystery. He didn’t see me until he was closed up for the day, but called me anyhow.

I told him about the tires on my mother’s car, first, since I’d already taken it in for him to check it earlier, and it’s an ongoing thing. Then I told him about the tires on the truck also being low, which surprised him. We’d had the warnings due to the faulty sensor before, so they’d topped the tires up for me, just in case, before, plus I’d checked the pressure before, because of the warnings I was getting.

Then I told him about the oil suddenly being low.

With that, we talked for a bit about how GM is somewhat different from other vehicles (we’ve never owned a GM before), and while it may appear really low on the dipstick, it’s probably just down one liter, not almost dry. The oily moisture visible in the photo I sent it normal.

As for the tires, while it’s possible that our fluctuating temperatures and humidity levels could be affecting the tires, it is still really strange. At one point I told him, if it weren’t for the lack of physical evidence, I’d think someone were coming in and letting the air out of the tires! His response was, knowing where I live, he wouldn’t be surprised if it was. The thing is, if someone had – even some random vandal – there would have been some sort of evidence visible. With my mother’s car, just getting the doors open to access it would have made it obvious. The doors are sagging slightly and don’t latch properly anymore, so I’ve got an old tire, with a rim still on it, in front of one door, and a metal object of some kind I found in the garage in front of the other, to keep the wind from blowing it open. In theory, they could go through the main part of the garage, as there is a doorway into where my mother’s car is, but I’ve got 6 years of collected aluminum stored in that corner, and there isn’t a lot of room to get around the front of the car. The light switch is by the double doors, too, so if someone went that way – even someone who knows the layout of the garage – they’d be knocking over bags of aluminum in the dark. Plus, there’s that dirt flour that would have shown scuff marks and tracks.

He’s asked me to bring the vehicles in, starting with the truck. He’ll take all the tires off and check them. I’ll bring my mother’s car in, another time. I don’t even need to make an appointment. He just asked me to text him, first. Today is Friday, so I’ll do that on Monday.

He’s as perplexed about the tires as I am. Particularly since it’s now happening on both vehicles!

A vehicle mystery

/ Re-Farmer / 10 Comments

My regular readers might remember a strange situation we had with my mother’s car.

The first was discovering the left from tire almost completely flat. It was pumped up and seemed fine, until it was suddenly flat again. I took it to the garage to have it checked. They accidentally checked the right front tire, which was fine, but they found nothing wrong with the left front tire, either.

Then, not very long ago, before going to my mother’s, I checked the tires and found all four of them low. This time, it was the rear left tire that was almost flat. I pumped them all up and they were still fine when I checked them again before taking my mother to the hospital for her follow up, just a few days ago.

Now that we’ve got the truck, we’ve got a vehicle with brand new tires. The onboard computer, however, started giving us low tire warnings, right from the start – even though a pressure check showed they were fine. We’re also getting a “service tire monitoring system” warning. After talking to the mechanic, he thinks it’s just a low battery in the monitor. That’s a repair by replacement. The part is not expensive, but replacing the battery was the priority for our budget this month.

The problem with having these warning lights on all the time, though, is not knowing if they’re actually legitimate or not. So when my daughter and I headed to the city today, we paused at a gas station to check the tires.

Three out of four tires were low. One, very low!

???

Then, on the trip home, I saw the oil pressure gauge was low. I am not sure if it was low as we were driving out, but I know for sure it was where it was supposed to be, the last time I drove it. I do normally keep an eye on all the gauges when I drive.

Once we were done driving around and the truck was in the garage, I popped the hood and checked the oil. Which was rather amusing, since I can barely reach the dip stick.

The oil was very low, too!

Yet, there was no evidence of a leak anywhere.

Also, I know the oil had been changed as the truck was prepped for sale, so we are the only ones to have been driving it since then. Same with the tires.

I was going to add oil to the truck, but it uses 5W30, and what we have on hand is 5W40, so I’ll use my mother’s car, tomorrow, and pick up some 5W30 and top up the truck.

And maybe find a stool of some kind that we can keep with the truck, so I can reach further into the engine compartment. I might be able to just reach the dip stick, but I can’t reach the cap to add more oil!

If it weren’t for the fact that there is zero evidence for it, I would think that “someone” has been letting the air out of our tires, but… the oil, too? No. If that was what happened, there have been tracks in the snow (for when it happened with my mother’s car), or scuffs in the dirt floor of the garage around the truck. Plus, the only person I can think of that would do something like this is our vandal, and he’s got too many mobility issues for him to have been able to reach all the tires on my mother’s car (it barely fits into the side of the garage it’s parked in, and can only be accessed from one side). Or slither under the truck to drain the oil into a pan, which is what would have had to have been done for there to be no oil on the ground under the truck.

I am perplexed!!

Aside from that, the day went well.

My daughter and I went to several places. One was a liquidation place I wanted to check out, as I’d heard they got a huge shipment of name brand pet food. It turned out to be mostly dog food, but what cat food we found… well, it may have been a deal from the regular prices for these brands, but they cost more, for less kibble, than what we have been getting at Walmart and Costco. We didn’t get any kibble, but we did get a few other things that were a good price, including a little Christmas tree. Since we will be limiting our Christmas decorating and celebrating to the cat free zone in the living room, I’d been wondering how we would find space for any of our trees. Certainly not the 6′ one, but even the one we’ve been using against the door in the dining room, well above the floor, would have been too big. My daughters have a smaller one they would set up, upstairs, but not with the kittens this year. I think it’s a 4′ tree, which would still be a bit large for what we want to do with the space.

What I got was a red sparkly cone shaped tree with baubles already on it that’s only about 2′ tall. It’ll fit on top of the piano. I later found some plain white string lights for it at Dollarama, and we already have small tree toppers that would work.

An almost instant Christmas tree!

Before we went to the Dollarama, we swung by the international grocery store for some dim sum for “breakfast” – neither of us had eaten yet! Along with the string lights we found at Dollarama, we remembered to get a small garbage can for the truck – my daughter chose one with flowers all over it. 😊 They also had more of the little puppy beds in stock, so we got another one of those, since the cats love the first one I got so much. They are thrilled with the new one, too!

One of the places I wanted to try for our shopping was Fresh Co. I keep hearing how they have such good prices. My daughter had their shopping list, so I just needed some basics. I didn’t find their prices to be all that much better, except for a couple of sales. They had bags of 4 avocados selling for under $2 a bag! These days, you can’t even get a single avocado for under $2! So I got two bags. They also had a brand of butter for under $5 a pound. They had a limit of 4 pounds, but I only got 2, since we still have plenty from the last Costco shopping trip in the freezer. Costco’s price is over $5, but in most places, a pound of butter costs almost $7 a pound – and that’s the cheap house brand or no-name ones. The other brand name butters are much more expensive.

My daughter had a longer list than me, and she wasn’t able to find everything at the Fresh Co, so we went back to the international grocery store, after I filled the gas tank. Today is Thursday, and Domo has 5¢ off per litre on Mondays and Thursdays. The gas prices had also dropped and were 138.9¢/L, so we were paying 133.9¢/L. While my daughter was at the international grocery store, I popped over to a Dollar Tree I hadn’t been to in years, just to check it out.

That done, we were going to head home, when I remembered I needed memory cards for the older trail cam, so we swung by a Staples. I only needed 8gig cards, and two of them, so I can switch cards when I do my morning rounds. The lowest they had in stock was 16gig – and they were almost $20 each! The 32gig cards were cheaper than the 16gig cards, and the sales person that tried to help me said 8gig cards would be even more expensive. I guess nobody buys such low memory cards anymore. I could have gotten even better prices if I were getting micro disks, instead, but those don’t work on the camera. If they did, I could have used the ones I already have on hand.

So now I have a pair of 32gig cards to replace the old 8gig cards for the older trail cam. Here’s hoping they’ll work! I know the cameras generally can’t handle the large memory cards, but that usually starts at 128gigs, if I remember correctly.

Once we have the spare funds, I’ve got my eyes on some solar powered trail cams. They don’t make the model we have now, but I’ve been able to find others where the solar panel powers the camera directly, rather than charging rechargeable batteries, and has regular batteries for when it’s too dark for the solar panel to do the job. There are other features I want, too, but I think that one is the deal breaker for me, when looking at the different models out there. That will mean needing more memory cards. I think I’ll buy them online, along with the camera, when the time comes!

But I digress!

We had ourselves a productive day in the city; my daughter found everything they had on their shopping list, and I got a few extra things as well.

And we have a vehicle mystery on our hands!

The Re-Farmer

Not what we planted, and self injury?

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I’ve been watching the self seeded poppies in the old kitchen garden, where one plant in particular has been growing faster than the others, with flower buds looking ready to open.

Today, it bloomed.

I did not plant this poppy.

I had figured the poppies that were showing up were from the Giant Rattle bread seed poppy we planted in the area previously. Which are supposed to look a lot like these Hungarian Blue poppies…

The tiny raised bed we have shallots in do have poppies coming up in it, too, and those are likely the Giant Rattle poppies we planted there 2 years ago, then again using our own seed last year. This is what they looked like.

Looking back at my photos, I found we did get one of these red poppies last year.

This, however, showed up after we cleared away some of the undergrowth along the spruce grove, on the other side of the house.

From what I can find, these are Double Scarlet Papasver somniferum – an opium poppy! These predate us living here, but they are not the poppies I remember my mother growing here, when I was a child.

Meanwhile, the bed where we did deliberately plant bread seed poppies that seemed to be overtaken by weeds, does have poppies growing in it. The flower pods that are starting to develop on some are more elongated than I’ve seen before. These are the Hungarian Blue that we are trying this year. At least I hope that’s what they are! The Baker Creek website has photos of the pods and flowers, but not the plants or flower buds.

Now I’m very curious about what the poppies in the shallot bed will be!

In other things, I saw Non-Junkpile today, and she has a new injury, on the other side of her head!

It’s very much like the first one, that is healed.

We are now thinking this is a self injury. She probably has a very bad infestation of ear mites, and is injuring herself by scratching.

The problem is, this is not one of the friendlies. I’ve been able to get fairly close, while there is food, but even as I tried to get a picture of the injury, she kept moving away. There is no chance of getting her to a vet. Especially since she has a litter of kittens somewhere.

There is the type of ear mite medication that can be applied to the skin between the shoulders. If we could get some of that, there is a better possibility that we could snag her long enough to apply it, than to get drops into her ears. But the clinic can’t usually give out prescriptions for cats they’ve never seen. I’ll have to see what we can figure out about that

Oh! Well, would you look at that. I’m getting messages from the Cat Lady. Maybe she has some suggestions!

The Re-Farmer

Looking for things, and finding some surprises

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The girls want to shingle the roof of the water bowl shelter. The paint I got was pretty cheap, and it’s so thin and watery, it doesn’t really cover well. The roof of the shelter is already mostly painted white, and the yellow just can’t go over it well.

We’ve been using some leftover shingles like what is on our roof now for replacing shingles that have blown off. We still have an unopened package of those in a tiny shed by the barn. However we also had shingled in the shed where the roof collapsed under heavy snow this past spring. I’ve been wanting to start cleaning that up so we can salvage some of the wood. Hopefully, we can salvage enough to build a chicken coop. I decided to start cleaning up in there until I could get at the shingles, and a couple other things I want to preserve.

I worked my way to the corner, taking out a LOT of rotten boars, beams and shingles, and was able to get out the antique plow, and the gadget my late brother made to help him install transmissions.

That plow is remarkably heavy to carry! And awkward.

Not as awkward and heavy as this thing I found under it.

I have no clue what it is.

Then I found this surprise, under an old window and sheets of what I think is fibreglass.

What a remarkable window! And the glass is still intact!

It’s now stored in the garage with the van, where I think it will be safest. I would love to be able to clean this up and find a way to use it!

The wheelbarrow has all the shingles that were in there.

I recognise those shingles. They are the shingles from when the addition to the original log cabin part of the house. I spent many hours playing on the roof and remember the colours well.

That roof was installed in the mid 70’s.

They may not be useable. If not, I can go to the other shed, where there is an unopened package of the shingles that we have right now. That was installed in the mid to late 90’s.

Speaking of things that are older than expected…

I knew that shed was old, but I did not think it was “forged nails” old!

The wooden shingles were nailed in place with more modern nails, but the boards were nailed to the trusses with forged nails.

Hundreds of them.

They are all rusted out, with many all bent up or even broken, but I would like to save as many of these as I can.

Of the roof pieces I pulled out, there were only three lengths of wood that were potentially salvageable. The rest are incredibly rotted out. There’s still lots to clean up, but I’ve already got a substantial pile for burning – after I’ve salvaged as many of the forged nails as I can! It’s the walls that I expect to be able to salvage more, and it’s going to be a while before we can start tearing those down.

Whether or not there’s enough useable wood to build a chicken coop with it, I have no idea at this point -but I’m still hopeful!

The Re-Farmer

Well, that’s a concern!

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After seeing a deer eating cat kibble out of the kibble house, it was no surprise to find the trays were completely empty and tossed about this morning.

What was alarming was the remarkable amount of blood, inside the kibble house!

I was able to get a photo after I’d straightened things out and the cats had a chance to eat. This is the largest patch of blood, but there was blood all across to the other side, too.

You can even see spots of blood around – and in! – the water bowls!

None of the cats looked injured. I was worried when I couldn’t see Potato Beetle right away, but then he came running and went into the sun room to eat.

I noticed that the heated water bowls water was frozen, so I checked through the opening in the cat’s house, confirming that it’s still plugged in. I knew the extension cord into the house was still plugged in, which left one more place to check.

That required some digging.

We have the plug ends in a waterproof cord protector. While clearing the snow from along the sun room, so the sump pump hose could be put back where it belonged, the extension cord running under the door got snagged a bit. The door kept the cord from being pulled from that direction, so this cord protector got pulled, instead. I thought perhaps it might have been enough to unplug the cords a bit, inside.

They were fine.

I did, however, find this.

More blood drops, next to the deer poop.

There was a very small blood trail up the shoveled cat path to the storage house, then it continued down the path the cats made in the snow, along the side of the building. The cat’s path then splits, with one going around the back of the building, and the other continuing across the yard towards the collapsing log building. The snow was too deep for me to follow it, but I could see a few spots of red towards the collapsing building.

I don’t hear anything on that side of the house from my office/bedroom, but the girls never heard anything either, and they usually hear all of the cat fights. My husband’s window is closest, but he sleeps with a CPAP, so he doesn’t hear anything. It’s not loud, but enough to make a difference.

For the amount of blood in the kibble house, I would expect it to be really obvious if one of the yard cats was injured, but they all look fine, running around in the sun and enjoying themselves. I stayed out to do a burn, and had plenty of time to watch them as they checked me out. No visible signs of injury.

Which is both alarming and perplexing.

Since I was outside, anyhow, I left the door to the sun room open.

Which Rolando Moon appreciated!

They all like that box with the old pillow in it best. :-D

They will be most upset, when this corner gets converted to a greenhouse again!

I’ve left the doors open slightly, and let Rolando Moon continue to enjoy her sun spot. :-)

Meanwhile…

I’m still waiting to hear from the mechanic about our van. When that’s ready, I’ll drive my mother’s car over and switch vehicles, so it can be checked again. The codes that came up for my mother’s car were not particularly informative. On the one hand, it could simply be that work was done, and the check engine like would turn off on its own after a few days. On the other, it could be transmission troubles. I’d been messaging with my brother as well as the mechanic, yesterday. My mother has had troubles with this car, with my brother getting things taken care of for her until we took that job over, for a long time. She’s told me to sell the car a few times. I mentioned this to the mechanic; he knows what budget I have left, the last of which is going towards the van right now, and that we are on a fixed income. He told me he would do a complete safety check and see what comes up, as well as looking up the value of the car. If it does end up needing more work than it’s worth, he said he’d be willing to buy it off of us for his lot. It turns out he has a few cars he sells, too. I had no idea until yesterday! I mentioned that we do need a small car for my mother, since it’s dangerous for her to struggle in and out of our van, he said he has a few smaller cars, and would be willing to take my mother’s car in as a trade.

That takes a load off. I would, of course, still talk to my mother and brother about it, if it came to that point. My brother is already up to date on the situation, but I’m not going to try to explain it to my mother, just yet. It’s entirely possible there’s no major problem at all, and all we’ll need is for the mechanic to reset the codes.

In other things, today is the first day of Lent. For the last few years, the thing I’ve given up for Lent has been Facebook. As I’ve been signing up on a number of platforms to try and move away from Facebook, I’ll be giving them all up for Lent. Even on platforms like Messenger, Signal and Telegram, I’ll be staying off groups and just using them for direct communication, and my video platforms will be reduced to research and learning videos only. Blogging will continue as usual, of course.

It’s not going to be easy. I spend way too much time online, though, so this will be a good thing. Besides, if it was easy, it wouldn’t mean much to give it up for Lent!

The Re-Farmer

Morning mystery… solved?

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Though my husband had been able to feed the outside cats this morning, when I headed out an hour or so later, I found some of the kibble trays already needed to be topped up. While I was doing that, I came upon some mysteries.

The most obvious one was the knocked over concrete pedestal. We often see a cat perched on top of it. It’s heavy, but because of the height, not as stable as I would like, which is why it’s not being used to hold the concrete Mary statue that I think it was originally used for.

This was more of a surprise.

The shrine was not maintained over the years, so there’s quite a lot of rotted wood, but what on earth could do this sort of damage? The cats like to go up here, too. Could there have been a massive cat fight? Even so, how could the cats have done this sort of damage?

Then there was this. That chicken wire is what had been protecting the cucamelon and gourd bed. Last night, it was in the upright wheelbarrow, waiting to be put away for the season.

If there had been a cat fight this violent and far ranging, we would have heard something. Wouldn’t we?

I continued my morning rounds, heading up the driveway to check the gate and switch out the memory cards in the trail cams.

I had lots of company this morning!

Though there are six cats in this photo, I ended up with eight of them, following me around!

I found it funny that Agnoos and … one of the ‘icouses (“Sadicous, I think)… found the frost covered plywood “bridge” nicer on their toes than the ground!

While the kittens kept their distance and explored the driveway and culvert, I had Creamsicle Baby, Nutmeg, Rolando Moon and even Butterscotch, all vying for attention! Creamsicle Baby in particular was so demanding of attention, he was not only winding around my feet while I walked, but even jumping up to grab my hands. I was carrying Nutmeg then, later, Butterscotch, so I couldn’t bend over to pet him. He would not let me pick him up when I tried, though.

While continuing my rounds, I made a point of checking out where our sign is going to be set up. My brother really wants to get those posts in before the ground freezes too hard. He’ll be coming out on Saturday, which is supposed to be warmer, and the posts will be installed right at the fence line, so as not to mess with municipal rules. He ended up getting four 8′ posts – two for the sign, and two, just in case. He decided to get the taller posts so the sign would be higher. If the posts are 2′ in the ground, then the top of the sign will be at 6′ instead of 5′, as it would have been with the 7′ posts he originally intended to get. Higher means more visibility, and it’ll be harder to vandalize. Sad thing to have to take into account. I’ve been sending photos of the sign in progress to my brother, and after one set of them, he answered by basically saying “it’s looking good… it’s going to get vandalized…”

With that in mind, he plans to use carriage bolts to attach the sign.

When I started working on this sign, I basically used whatever I could salvage. I found the piece of plywood in the barn, the white paint was left over from fixing the sun room door frame, I already had the reflective paint I’d bought for something else, etc.. The only money I spent was on the paint for the lettering, which I didn’t skimp on since it will be used for other things, too, and a set of craft brushes for the lettering. Since I knew the paint would ruin the brushes, I bought the cheapest ones I could find. Then my brother finds out what I’m doing, and suddenly he’s all excited about it and buying fence posts and carriage bolts! :-D The posts, alone, cost more than what I spent! So sweet of him. I’ll just have to touch up the bolts with white paint, so they won’t be big black circles in the lettering.

With that in mind, when I came in from my rounds, I paused to finish painting the sign. This time, I used a much smaller brush and used it to straighten edges, fix some serifs, and basically make it look all nice and tidy. Well. As much as I can, with my shaky hands. It’s not perfect, by any means, but not anything anyone will notice from the road.

It’s not done, and the paint has a couple of days to dry before the sign will be installed. It’s much sooner than I expected, but that’s okay. Hopefully, our vandal will find it too chilly to try and damage it.

Speaking of which, I have a court date for our restraining order, tomorrow. It’s been over a year since I filed for it. Because of the repeated delays due to restrictions and shut downs, this time the judge actually wants me there to ask me questions. Hopefully, this means it will be finally granted, and our vandal will be required to get the mental health help he needs.

Anyhow…

Once the sign was done, I finally sat down to check the trail cam files – and got a surprise!

A cow, walking up to the gate and checking it out.

!!!

The electric fence had just been fixed, yesterday!

The funny thing is, as I was walking up the driveway, I saw the hoof prints of a cow, frozen into the gravel of the driveway. I just figured they were from the cow that got caught on the trail cam, the night before.

As soon as I could, I headed back outside to check the outer yard fence line.

Clearly, something did go through here, pulling the wire into our side of the fence, but maybe a calf, not a full sized cow!

I then went to the section of fence they had gone through previously, and it was clearly where they had come through. The tall grass was trampled, and there was plenty of dung about. The one cow I saw on the trail cam clearly had company!

The time stamp on the trail cam video (it’s a good thing we have two cameras on the gate, because while both had their motion sensors triggered, the cow was visible in the dark in only one of them) was about quarter after 9pm, so by the time I was out this morning, the cows were nowhere to be seen, though I could hear them. I sent a message to the renters to let them know, being sure to tell them there was no urgency. We’ll just keep the inner yard gates closed.

The thing is; last night, while the vehicle gate was closed, the people gate was opened while my daughter and I worked in the yard. With the electric fence fixed, I didn’t bother closing it again.

So… could it be that a cow came into the yard, and did the things I found in the morning? There’s no chance of seeing tracks in the grass and leaves. I can see knocking over the wheelbarrow and pedestal, but how would a cow cause the damage to the shrine?

Is my mystery solved? Or not?

The Re-Farmer

Unexpected harvest, and other things

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We were having a lovely rain when I headed out to do my morning rounds. Though we have been getting the odd showers for the past while, things were still starting to dry out. With the high winds yesterday, I actually watered the old kitchen garden, when I noticed all the beet greens were wilted.

With the cooler temperatures and things in the garden winding down, we’re gathering things every few days or so, and the amount we harvest is getting smaller. Mostly, it’s just summer squash. My daughter had recently picked summer squash, so when I went through the garden beds this morning, I wasn’t expecting to actually pick anything.

I was rather surprised to find even a few larger summer squash! The Magda squash have been slow growing this year, so finding two of them large enough to pick is a treat. There are lots of little sunburst pattypans, and after my daughter had already picked the larger ones, I certainly didn’t expect to find more so soon. Yes, I know they can get much larger, but this is the stage we like them best. The only thing that wasn’t a surprise was the big zucchini. Usually, we pick the squash soon after the flowers fall off, but the flower on this one was solidly attached. Even though it was of a size we would normally pick it at, we left it. When I saw it this morning, I just had to pick it. Any bigger, and it’s going to start getting becoming a winter squash! :-D Maybe some day we will let some zucchini reach that point, but not this year. :-)

We are supposed to continue to get showers through the afternoon, but I’m hoping things will have a chance to dry up a bit. I really want to tackle that tree that came down in the wind. We really need to get started on any high raised beds for next year. If we can get even just one bed done, I will be happy. I also need to prepare three beds for the garlic we ordered. I were intending to order double what we got last year, but after talking about it with the girls – and looking at our budget – we got the same amount as before; a collection of racombole, purple stripe and porcelain music, 1 pound each. Though the beds they were planted in before are available, we want to rotate them into other beds that did not have alliums in it. Unfortunately, those beds are still being somewhat used right now! However, if I am able to get enough out of the tree to build a high raised bed, it will have fresh garden soil and amendments added to it, so it won’t matter if it’s in a location that had onions this year.

If it’s too wet to break down the tree today, I should still have tomorrow. The weekend is supposed to get quite hot, and we’ve got plans for Saturday. Next week, we’re supposed to get several days with rain, and then things start cooling down a fair bit. As long as I can get enough pieces cut, while it’s dry, we can get some progress on a bed.

Though our overnight temperatures have not been cold enough for frost, some of the more delicate plants were showing signs of what I would otherwise consider frost damage. Some of the cucamelon leaves are showing signs, and part of a Ozark Nest Egg plant had a vine that was growing the highest, suddenly start dropping this morning.

Everything is all winding down, which means things are getting busier. There’s a lot of work to prepare beds for next year, and getting it done often depends on the weather.

In other things, I’m happy to say that since we installed that shut off valve and, in the process, adjusted the pipe so it wasn’t touching another one, and padded it with vibration reducing material, that very disturbing noise we would sometimes hear seems to be gone. It’s hard to say for sure, since the noise didn’t happen every time the well pump turned on, but so far, it’s encouraging.

Something else seems to have gone away.

The woodchucks.

I haven’t seen any of them in almost a week, now. Usually, I’d at least see one peaking out of the entry to their den under the pile of wood, or eating the bird seeds near the living room window but, lately, nothing. I was wondering if they might have gone into hibernation, so I looked it up. They tend to hibernate from October to February, so it’s still too early for that. But then, the sites also said they mate after the come out of hibernation, and we so them going at it in the summer, so who knows.

Very strange.

Not that I’m complaining! :-D

Our 2021 garden: some pruning and cleanup – and we are forewarned!

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While doing my rounds this morning, I decided it was time to do some pruning and clean up around the squash and melons.

With the summer squash, I cut away a lot of the bottom leaves, and anything dead or dying. The zucchini didn’t really need it, but the sunburst squash needed quite a bit.

Noting for next year: while I am happy with training the summer squash to grow vertically, and will probably do it again next year, I now know to make extra certain the support poles are more secure. I thought they were, but as you can see in about the middle of the squash bed, one of them has fallen right over under the weight of the squash attached to it – and I’d already added a second support pole with it! The zucchini on the far right of the photo is also tippy.

We are in a strange sort of state right now, where the squash and melons are continuing to bloom and produce, recovering for the extreme heat and dryness over the summer, but also dying off as they reach the end of their growing season. A couple of Halona melon plants were completely died off and got taken out. The single melon on the ground ground had come loose from one of those.

The three biggest Red Kuri squash are coming along nicely. The mottled green one is quite noticeably bigger. With the colours and slightly different shape, I find myself wondering if it got cross pollinated with one of the nearby Teddy squash.

Speaking of which…

There’s a new one! Of the two plants, one of them now has four squash developing on it. :-)

After I finished pruning the squash and melons, I went through the other beds, doing a bit of cleanup, and found this.

We’ve somehow lost a sunflower!

It doesn’t even look like it was bitten – there is no sign of critter damage anywhere. It looks almost as if it were cut! It’s also in the middle of a row, in the middle of a sunflower block.

Very strange.

I took the seed head inside and put it in a very small bowl, shallow enough for the barely-there stem to reach the water. :-)

As I was finishing up in the garden, the grader went by on the road, and the driver stopped to talk to me. He let me know that he’d seen a black bear – a big male – on our quarter section, and he thought it was heading for the newly dug out gravel pit for water. He’d actually seen 7 bears, just today! The most he’d ever seen in one day – and it wasn’t even 11:00 yet, at the time I talked to him. He suggested we might want to pick up an air horn to carry with us, so if we see a bear, we can use the noise to scare it off.

One of our neighbours, about a mile away, has been posting photos of a bear that’s been raiding – and destroying – his bird feeders. I would not be expecting any to come to our feeding station, though. With both bird feeders broken, I’ve just been tossing a scoop of seeds directly on the ground, so there’s not a lot to tempt them. Especially since we have zero saskatoons and chokecherries this year, and almost no crab apples, thanks to that one cold night in May. Even the ornamental apples in the old kitchen garden, which would normally be full of tiny bunches of apples, and birds eating them, have nothing. No hawthorn berries, either. Between the drought and the wildfires, this loss of berries would be quite widespread, and the bears are starving at a time they should be building up their fat reserves for the winter.

I really appreciated the grader driver stopping to let me know. I have never seen a bear in our yard, but this is not a normal year, so we will have to keep our eyes open!

The Re-Farmer