Cat Therapy

Ugh.  It feels like it’s been a long day already, and it’s not even noon.

I got home from taking my mom to the hospital for her injection early enough to do that outside cat stuff, so I got a bit of feline therapy for stress reduction.

It was much appreciated.

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Nasty Crime Boy was even extra friendly today, gracing me with licks and love bites on the fingers; his way of showing affection.  Butterscotch and Rolando Moon all let me pet them, too.

I think I’m ready for a nap.

The trip with my mom was fast.  I got there early and she let me put her brace on, which is a huge step forward.  Then she got in my van and tried to take the frog off my dash.  It didn’t come off (yay Fun Tack!).  Instead I got yelled at for worshiping frogs, being brainwashed by negative and evil people, and how things like frogs and snakes are ugly, therefore they are of the devil.  I should have Jesus things on my dash, and not worship frogs.  I told her I don’t worship icons.

Thankfully, that didn’t last long and we didn’t talk at all for most of the trip in.

Once at the hospital, she didn’t even have to leave the waiting room.  A nurse came in and gave her the injection right there, and we could leave right away.  I did confirm we’re coming back tomorrow.  Her eye is looking better, but I can see a couple more days of this.

Which is not making my mom happy.

If she were unhappy because it’s hard on her body, or she’s tired (and I can see that it is taxing on her, physically) and so on, that would be great.  But that’s not what she complains about.  It was back to wanting a second opinion and eventually got around to the doctor not being able to speak English well (she speaks English just fine; she just has a strong accent) and other criticisms of the doctor herself.  It’s all about race.

*sigh*

Even when I got her home, her racism came out, all because of a stamp on some mail she got, honoring a black woman.  I even looked up who she was and read out some of her accomplishments, but nope… that just made it worse.

*sigh*

I was glad to leave.

Maybe tomorrow she will be better.

I’m going for a nap.  After I get some more fur therapy.

The Re-Farmer

Un. Be. Lievable. Part 3

I can’t believe it.

I thought for sure, after I finally got the paperwork I needed to transfer my driver’s license, and actually GOT my temporary license, I was done.  It was over.

But noooo….  That would make life too easy, wouldn’t it? Continue reading

Critters, and ID Update. Yay!

Okay, so let’s end the day with things that don’t involve messy mystery clean up jobs!

Nothing like our critters to make me smile again. :-)

All of them seemed unusually active today.  Maybe spring is in the air?

While walking away from the door to feed the cats, several of the usual friendlier ones already in the area, I caught sight of the Mothman out by the other house, running away hard, in great leaps and bounds though the snow!  I don’t think I’ve ever seen the Mothman move at anything faster than a barely quick walk before!

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At best, a few of these guys let me pet their backs while they ate, and they didn’t seem to like it that much.  Squishum wouldn’t even allow that.  Even Rolando Moon, who came in later and will usually come right up to me, stayed away.  Only Butterscotch let me touch her, though she was moving around too much to properly pet her.  As I walked out of the yard to go read the electricity meter, she kept running ahead of me a few steps, stopping, running ahead a few more steps, then stopping again.  There was something odd about how she was moving, as if she didn’t like her paws touching the ground.  Then she would stop and chew on the bottom of a paw.  I think she might have had ice and/or snow stuck to her paws or something.  The only other time I’ve seen a cat walk like that was when it accidentally stepped on a piece of tape, and it got stuck. :-D

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Even the blue jays were so active, I could hardly get a photo of them.

Then the deer showed up.

All 5 of them.

Barbecue came first, then Mama and one of the twins, which was very unusual.  The other twin made its way through the spruce grove, instead.  Then they chased Barbecue away from where he was eating.  Hungry Girl made her way in through the trees, too.  Then, for the next while, they kept chasing each other off.  Mama and the twins took over the feeding station for a while, as Hungry Girl and Barbecue hung out in the spruce grove.  Eventually, they would make their way over, and more chasing would happen.  Not the usual short little chases, either, but big leaping chases, out into the garden.

It’s always something else to see a deer at full speed.  They can really move!!

With all that, I did get quite a few pictures.  This one has got to be my favourite!

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What a sassy Mama!

Who know deer could wink? :-D

I also love this one of Hungry Girl.

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Meanwhile, the squirrel is just sitting there, watching all the crazy stuff going on.

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In between all this, I made my trip to the post office and got my marriage certificate (yay!) so after lunch, my younger daughter and I went into town to FINALLY get my driver’s license transferred over, as well as mail off the forms to finally get our health care cards for this province.

I think it still ended up taking an hour to process the driver’s license transfer!  Thankfully, between all the paperwork I had, she was able to get it done.  Because I was able to get my old file number from the last time I had a driver’s license in this province, she was able to look it up – and my old photo came up for her!  She commented on how different I looked.  Especially the glasses. :-D

She did a whole bunch of form filling, taking extra care to make sure all the names and dates were right, I got my photo taken, then she got on the phone to get an override of my old license done.

They put her on hold.

Twice.

That done, she started to input the new information, but had to start over part of it, which meant I had to get my picture taken again.

I commented on how much more difficult all this was from how it used to be. She got a slightly wild look in her eyes as she nodded in agreement.  I added that seemed to get more difficult only recently.  The wild look came back to her eyes as she nodded and said that yes, yes it has!

I feel for the staff that needs to do all this.

Finally, everything was filled out.  My old driver’s license was photocopied, then she blacked out the bar codes.  I got the photocopies along with my original paperwork, after those got copied, too.  I paid for it, which turned out to be $50 ($20 for the license, $30 for a fee!). After that I had to sign something like 5 different forms.  Then, miracle of miracles, I got to sign my new temporary driver’s license!  My permanent one should arrive in the mail within a few weeks.

It’s done!  Finally done!

Then next time I’m back there, it will be after our van is saftied, and I can transfer the insurance and registration.  Which hopefully will be ready to do before the end of this month, so I don’t have to pay cancellation fees.

I’m just to glad it’s all finished now!  The rest of the family still needs to do their IDs, but I’m the primary driver, so it was more of a priority.

What an ordeal!  So glad it’s over!

The Re-Farmer

Okay… this is the worst find yet

I thought, after the horror tunnel, desiccated mouse carcasses, and other strange things we’ve found while packing up and cleaning away 4 decades of my parents’ stuff in our new home, I would have been beyond getting surprised by things we find.

I was wrong.

I must admit, it’s not so much the contents, but the circumstances of it.

Though we really don’t have the room for it in the growing pile in the dining room intended for the shed, I am just really not happy with having the litter box in the dining room, even if it is in an out of the way corner.  Having cleared everything else away, I decided to move the dresser and the stuff on the wall out of the little nook they’re in, so the litter box can be moved away from where we eat.

After removing the drawers, the first thing I discovered was a scale under the dresser.

Why is there a scale under the dresser?  It’s not like it was accidentally pushed under it.  It was way in the back corner.

Okay.  Fine.

I start moving the now drawerless dresser.

*clatterclatter*

A broken broom handle, with masking tape on the broken end, falls to the floor.

It had been between the dresser and the bit of wall on the bathroom side.  I had noticed that something was there, but forgot about it before moving the dresser.

Okay.  Fine.

I carefully pull the dresser out, hearing all sorts of crunching, grinding noises from the floor.  Oh, dear.  I called for a daughter to help carry it, since it sounded like pulling it along the floor would cause damage.  However, as I maneuvered it out a bit more so a daughter could grab it from the other end, I found it was really, really light, and not making the noise anymore.  So I just moved it myself, down the hall, up the two stairs to the new part of the house, and into the space I’d prepared for it in the dining room.  Then I put the drawers back and went to continue cleaning.

This is what I found.

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What on earth?

This is a flash picture; there is no light in this corner, so I really couldn’t see very well, but that plastic container on the floor?  My first guess was that the dregs on the bottom was mouse poison.  And what was all that on the floor?

I moved the scale and that plaque beside it to the pile of stuff for storage.  The plaque?

It was a prayer.

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Okay.  Fine.  I can see something like that falling between the dresser and the wall and being forgotten about.  That black piece of plastic?  Probably put there to get it out of the way and forgotten about as well.

I very carefully moved the mirror next.  It was just leaning on the wall, on top of that piece of wood.  The far side of it is a broken edge.

Then I come back to clean up the rest.

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That plastic bowl?  Is a glass bowl.  The crud on the floor is ancient cat litter, complete with several desiccated turds.

And a piece of bread.

So, it looks like this area was used for both a cat litter box, and for… cat food? before.  I threw the bowl out, but I’m guessing it’s the remains of some sort of cat food on the bottom.

All of this means that someone took out the litter box, but left the mess behind.  Left the bowl and the bread and added a bathroom scale.

Then put the dresser on top of it all.

Then used the dresser to store extra towels on the bottom drawers.  Above the cat poop and drying food.

Oh, and as I was going back and forth to move things, I found a pile of something that had fallen out from under the dresser as I’d moved it up the two steps.  As I swept it up, I took a closer look.

I’m pretty sure it was a very old mouse nest.

Once clear, I mopped the area with disinfectant cleaner, including the walls, then used a scrub brush in the area (including on the other side, where I got the girls to take the stuff leaning there upstairs), then mopped it again.  The only thing in that corner that still needs to be moved is one last large mirror, which will require a screwdriver to remove.

I don’t have the energy for that anymore.

I also found a shoe tray that I scrubbed; it will go under our litter box when it gets moved.  For now, the entire area is being left to dry.  We will move our litter box in tomorrow.

This just blows me away.  It’s one thing to be in the practice of keeping things that might be useful, and just shoving them somewhere for storage, as is likely the case for most of the things we’ve found.  It’s quite another to deliberately put a dresser on top of cat litter, cat turds and cat food.

And a scale.

I just don’t understand.  Who did this?  I don’t know how long that dresser has been there, but I don’t think either of my parents were strong enough to move it.  Well; maybe my mother, depending no how long ago it was done, but she usually got other people to do that sort of manual labour for her.   So I have no idea.  And why?  Why was it done like this?  I can’t imagine any of my siblings doing this.

I’m at a complete loss.

I think I’m going to take a shower now.

The Re-Farmer

Two Steps Forward, One Step Back?

Before I get into the bureaucratic battle of the day, I will start with the pleasant things.

Critters.

Mama and the twins came out first, today, but at one point, we had all 5 deer hanging around.

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Then Mama and the twins chased off Hungry Girl and Barbecue, who hung out in the spruces for a while.  Barbecue tried to come back, but one of the twins chased him off.  Then Mama and the twins left, and Hungry Girl and Barbecue had a chance to eat.

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I had to include this one.  It looks like he’s shouting!

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Mama and the twins hadn’t gone far, though, and hung out in the garden area for a while.  When the twins started to come back, it was Hungry Girl’s turn to chase them off.  Back and forth it went, until they were done eating.  Then the birds got their turn!

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The grosbeaks really like the black oil seeds.  There aren’t as many in the deer feed, and we didn’t get one of the big sacks of just that type of birdseed this time around, so we’re seeing less of them, already.

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Quite the drama! :-D

That redpoll looks like it’s trying to figure out just what those crazy deer are doing!

In the middle of all this, I finally got a call back from Vital Statistics.  We’ve been playing telephone tag for a while.  The main question she had for me involved our address, of all things.  I included both our postal address and our physical address.  She went with just the PO Box. Then there was all the confirming of names and spellings; my husband’s name became the issue, because she wanted to put in his first name, as it is on his birth certificate, but that’s not the name he uses, nor is it what he would have put on the form when we got married, nor anywhere else.  Then there is the whole “birth name” and “name before marriage” part.  I told her about the problems I was having because of the names, so she ended up deciding to drop my husband’s first name completely.  That done, she said she would finish processing it today, and it’d be done!  Yay!

Then I got a phone call on my cell phone.  Yeah.  It was my old doctor’s office, once again calling the wrong number.  At least it rang, this time, though she couldn’t hear me and I had to call back on the land line.

Turns out that they can’t do debit Visa, after all.

They also don’t take electronic transfers.

So I’m going to have to find a check.  *sigh*

My younger daughter and I went into town again, to pick up some things we forgot yesterday.  We took the opportunity to play Pokemon Go, and it was actually warm enough that we walked over to a couple of gyms.  One of them is right along the lakeside that, in the summer, you can walk to rather easily, but in the winter, there is no path.  When we walked over, though, we would see a trampled path in the snow from the other players that have made their way to it, too.  With things half melted, it was a little rough and hard on the ankles, but we managed not to slip and twist anything. :-D

Among our errands, she picked up some birthday beer for her sister; a splurge on some Innis and Gunn.  Not sure how I ended up with daughters who like beer.  I could never acquire a taste for it, myself.  Same with wine.  Maybe it’s because I got traumatized by the cheap swill I drank back when I was a teen pretending to be cool at bush parties. LOL

When I got home, there was a message waiting for me.  From Vital Statistics.  She wanted me to call back.

Telephone tag it is, once again!

So the two things I thought were finally done…

Aren’t.

*sigh*

The Re-Farmer

 

 

Hello, March!

Ah, what a lovely spring day we are having today!  As I write this, our temperature is at +2C.  That’s right, I’ve had to add a + to the temperature!  We are above freezing temperatures right now, and it’s already evening.

Awesome.

Of course, we’re also getting storm warnings for Sunday – when we’re also supposed to be above freezing for temperatures, so it’s a heavy snowfall that would happen, if it does happen.  From talking to my dad over the years, these snowfalls tend to miss the farm, and hit farther south.  So we’ll see.

The melting snow has left the deer feeding area looking much bigger!  All the detritus of past feedings is being revealed, so the spots where I’ve been leaving little piles of seeds are now looking much bigger.  And blacker.

This morning, Hungry Girl and Barbecue came over before I’d gone out to freshen up the feed.  I tried to take photos, but the camera wouldn’t work.  Checking the display, I saw what looked like CHR.  Or maybe CHA.  Anyhow, I figured the battery needed to be charged.  So I took the one from the camera to charge and popped on the extra.

Which was also almost dead, even though I had fully charged it not long ago.  I still thought there was enough charge to take some photos, but not; I still got the same display.

So I missed getting photos of them while the batteries charged.

It turned out not to be the batteries.

Somehow, the memory card got locked.  The photos I took yesterday are still there.  I copied them, but I can’t remove them, nor can I take more photos on the card.

I have no idea how this happened, or even where.  It could have happened on the camera itself, or on the desktop.

I will have to investigate further.

I did, however, get a nice photo of a blue jay, at least.

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I got a call from my husband’s doctor this morning about a change in his medication.  (I appreciate that they will talk directly to me about it, so I don’t have to interrupt his lie-downs.)  The new medication is covered by insurance, so he gave me information and instructions about it, then sent the prescription to the pharmacy so I could pick it up today.  Rather nice having a prescription that we don’t have to physically pick up at the clinic and take to the pharmacy within a limited time period!

So my younger daughter and I headed into town to pick it up (and get some Pokemon Go in).

While there, I checked to see if my own file was successfully transferred from our previous pharmacy (it was) and if it had been filled (it was).  So I got both at the same time.

One of the pharmacists and a trainee spent some time with me, making sure I had the needed information about the updated medication, the dose, when to take it, etc.  They even opened the package to look at the paperwork to make sure the dose measurements on the injector pen matched the previous version of the medication.  It did, but the dose my husband is supposed to be on is quite high, so the box will only last a few days.  It was decided to leave it as is, for starters, then in the future we can get multiples of boxes, so I’ll have fewer trips into town.

Meanwhile I glanced at my own prescriptions and choked at the price tag.

The insurance coverage wasn’t used.

So I let them know and gave them my insurance card.  Once done with my husband’s prescription, they started fixing my file.

It’s a good thing I brought an insulated bag and asked for ice packs.

I think I spent at least half an hour waiting, as they first tried to get my insurance set up on my file in their system, which failed, and the pharmacist then called the insurance company directly.

Long story short.

They couldn’t get it to work.

At the insurance company’s end, the person was going to talk to someone else, but that someone else was on lunch, so she would call the pharmacy back later.

The pharmacist, meanwhile, felt that the problem was at their end, not the insurance company.  I could pay the full price and get reimbursed (nope; we may have just got paid, but reimbursement wouldn’t happen until it got fixed, and who knows how long that would take), or she was willing to transfer the prescription to the competing pharmacy across the street to be filled.

Yeah!  Really!

I decided to not get them for now (it’s a good thing they’re not a vital prescription!!).  She said she would call me if she got a call back from the insurance company.  I mentioned coming back tomorrow, but she suggested I call, first.

So what should have been a quick trip into town, with some leisurely Pokemon-ing ended up being much longer.  At least there is a Pokestop right next to the pharmacy, so my daughter was able to throw on a lure and played on both our phones while she waited for me.

Meanwhile, my phone let me know I had a voice mail.  Which was weird, because I got no phone call.  Turns out I did, but it just never rang.  It was my previous doctor’s office, wanting to talk to me about my file transfer.

So, once I got home, I had lots of phone calls to make.

I called the insurance company and explained what happened.  He could see nothing wrong with my file on the system, so he put me on hold to talk to someone else.

When he came back, I could hear the perplexity in his voice.  It turns out that in one area, my account was active, but in another, I was no longer active.  They don’t know why.  So he was going to contact the carrier my husband’s work is hooked up with to figure things out and get my file fully active again.

Hopefully, it will not take as long as it did to fix up the mess with my husband’s file.

Then I talked to my old clinic.  Turns out there is a $35 fee to transfer a file, and how did I want to pay that?  I don’t have a credit card, but I do have debit Visa, which they take, so we did that.

I also updated my address and phone number, so she wouldn’t call my cell phone, though my cell phone number is still there as a back up.

Then I worked on something else when I got a notification from my phone.

Another voice mail.

Yeah.  She called my cell phone.  And since I had zero signal at the time, it went straight to voice mail.

I called back and found out my card was declined.  Which made no sense.

So I called the bank’s 866 number on my card.

Which got answered with a cheerful recording saying I could help them out by taking a short survey.  As a reward, select customers could win a Caribbean cruise.

Uh huh.

So I went through the three question survey (there was no option not to take it), and at the end, the cheerful recording congratulated me, because I just won the cruise; it would only cost a $65 processing fee.  Did I want to accept the prize?

Uh huh.

So I selected yes.  A live person answered the phone, greeting me with an “are you excited about winning this cruise?”  To which I responded, “Actually, I’m trying to figure out how I got you guys, because I was trying to phone … ”

*click*beepbeepbeep*

She hung up on me.

I called the bank’s number again and got through to where I was supposed to.  After being on hold a while, I made sure to first tell the person who answered what happened.  She took notes to pass on to the back office to see if there was a security breach on their system.

Then I talked to her about my debit Visa being declined.  She checked, but there was nothing wrong with my card.  After getting more details, she put me on hold and went to talk to someone in the back office about it.  When she got back, she informed me that no transaction on my card was attempted, according to their system.

Which means that, somewhere between the clinic and the bank, something went wrong.

So, back on the phone with the clinic I went.  I told her what the bank told me, and she was surprised, because she had tried twice.  I told her the bank confirmed there is nothing wrong with my card, so she said she would try again later, then call me back if it was still a problem.

So far, no call back, but then if she tries to call my cell phone again, it might be a while before I find out.  I forgot to mention that she’d called the wrong number.

Ah, well.

So, more move related hassles to sort out.

Later on, I went and got the memory card from the camera, as well as the one that got locked.  I uploaded the photos I took…

And found pictures of Mama and the Twins.

I didn’t remember taking those.

I uploaded them all, then started trying to figure out what happened with the locked card, and if there was something I could find to unlock it on the desktop.

While I was doing that, my older daughter came by to let me know she’d taken some pictures of deer while we were gone.

I suddenly felt sane again. LOL

Here is one of the photos she took for me.

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With the melt, it looks like there is so much more feed out there than there really is!  I’d emptied the bag this morning, and picked up 3 more on the way home, so we should be good for the Month.

Now, I am looking forward to a quiet evening.  I’m not used to talking so much.  My throat is sore.  I have a friend I’m hoping to talk to soon, and I don’t want to have to cut conversation short because I’ve spent so much time talking on the phone!

The Re-Farmer

Warming Up

I must say, I’ve been really enjoying the warmer weather we’ve been having lately!

There is a down side to it, though.  Insects that would normally be hibernating right now, are coming out in droves.  Flies, I’m used to, but mostly it’s these guys.

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They are EVERYWHERE!  As I started this post, there was one crawling up the wall.  Every now and then, we hear the distinctive “tick” of one of them landing on the floor or some other hard surface.  They congregate on window sills and corners.  When washing up before bed, I find them crawling across the soap.  Every now and then, we’ll discover one that’s crushed on the floor, as we’ve inadvertently walked on them.  I’ve even found my beside touch lamp triggered by several of them, walking along the metal base. !!

Our daughters have been vacuuming them up several times a day, lately.  Unfortunately, that’s not really an option on the main floor.

These are not our local species of ladybug (coccinellidae).  I’m told that these are the imported Asian Lady Beetle (Harmonia axyridis) that we were told have been particularly bad this past summer.

Apparently, they bite, too.

Not much we can do about it but vacuum them up, really.  They’re still a beneficial bug, but can be a problem in greater quantities.

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Maybe we can take a lesson from our cat and just chill.

That’s her, with her chin draped over the plant stand, in front of my crochet corner.  She has a thing about draping her chin over things.  Or using objects as chin pillows.  Typically, not the object the rest of her body is on. :-D

In other news, I got a call back from the septic guy that has been coming to our farm for many, many years.  I’d left a message for him over the weekend, mentioning that the tank hasn’t been done in at least two years.  We are concerned that the tank might back up into the basement, as has happened in the past, now that there’s suddenly 4 people using the system.  He remembered the farm and the ejector system we have.  While he was willing to come out and do the tank, he recommended against it, while the ground was still frozen.  He was confident that we’d actually be okay until the fall.  To get it done now, while the ground is still frozen, introduced a potential risk.  It would take a while for the tank to fill again with water, triggering the ejector to send it out to the field, far from the house.  Normally, any water in the pipes after it was emptied would drain back into the tank, but with the ground shifting over the years, there would be pockets of water remaining that would freeze, or the septic field itself would freeze, over the days it would take before warm water was once again being ejected from the tank.  This would cause a major problem.  The only way to fix that would be to find the blockage, then dig a hole to the pipe to repair it.  In his opinion, emptying the thank now would put us at greater risk for that sort of scenario than for our tank having too much solids.

So I’m thinking that we will likely get it done in the late spring (the earliest he recommended), then go back to having it done every September.

Meanwhile, I got a response from another expert I’d asked advice for regarding our situation with the Co-op we left behind.  It was most helpful.  He made some of the same recommendations the lawyer did, but had other suggestions that the lawyer, not being as familiar with housing co-ops, would not have known to suggest.

Oh, how I wish I didn’t have to still deal with this crap.

Speaking of dealing with crap…

painMy husband had a medical appointment today, adding two more people to his team of caregivers; a joint meeting with a dietician and a diabetic nurse.  It was not pleasant.  He was having a very bad pain day.  Pain is a complicating factor, as pain causes high blood sugar reading.  So does things like lack of sleep, and numerous other things.  We’re basically treating a symptom.

Thankfully, on having it pointed out to them that he was in great pain at that moment, they were willing to cut through the usual stuff (which he’d heard before, anyhow) and go straight to options.  The best one of them being that, in the future, they could have these appointments over the phone, instead of him coming in.

Meanwhile, I took advantage of the appointment and got the process started to move my own medical files over – then ran into an old friend in the waiting room!  It was good to see her again.  I look forward to our being able to get together to catch up.

Slowly but surely, little by little, we’ll get all this medical stuff switched over to our new home.

The Re-Farmer

 

 

 

 

 

Horror Movie Set!

Oh, my poor, brave, brave daughter!

I got a response from my brother, after I told him about the drip in the bathroom ceiling.  Among the things he told me was to check in the crawl space above the bathroom.

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This picture is from when the girls had started cleaning the upstairs in preparation for painting.  Look at the top left.

See that triangular bit that’s brown?

That’s where the access panel is.

The wall is at an angle under the roof, and there’s a section about 2-3 feet high that’s walled off to hide the ducts and pipes and wires.

I honestly thought it was closed off, but it turns out that panel just pops right off.

That’s where the pipes and ducts for the bathroom are.

My younger daughter is the only one who could possibly fit in there, and still be able to move around.

At least, in theory.

Because it was painted, the panel needed to be pried off.

There’s stuff in there.

Not right at the front.  No.  Further in, and all the way to the back, past the pipes and ducting.

Also, lots of old mouse droppings.

I had grabbed a hook I’d found when cleaning my mother’s old bedroom, made from a straightened wire hanger, and my daughter poked around a bit.

Which is when she found a live spider.

She is arachnophobic.

That was it.  She was willing to crawl into the horror movie death hole with dusty books and jars, cobwebs and mouse droppings, right up until live spiders came into play.

The poor thing managed to hold it together, but she just couldn’t do it.

So I figured I’d give it a try.

20180224horror.tunnel

Why is that stuff there?  How is that stuff there?

My knees are shot, so I borrowed my other daughter’s knee pads (she has a bum knee, too), and set up the vacuum cleaner.   I vacuumed the mouse droppings and dust from the front, used the hook to drag some stuff out, vacuumed again, hooked out some more stuff, vacuumed again, hooked out some more stuff, vacuumed again…

And that was as far as I could reach.

The photo is from after I’d vacuumed and taken out the stuff closest to the opening.  You can see all the crud that got dragged with it, that I needed to vacuum again.  I’m not sure if you can tell, but there is what appears to be fabric – an old coat? sweater? – way in the back, past the duct and pipes.

After clearing things out as much as I could, it was time to try and crawl in.

I couldn’t even get into the opening.

To get in, you have to bend around a corner.  My shoulders got jammed between the slanted portion of the wall and the edge of the opening.

Theoretically, I could have squirmed down on my belly and squirmed my way forward.  Maybe.  Not likely.  But even if i could, once I reached the stuff I couldn’t clear out, that would have been it.

At this point, my brave, brave daughter was willing to try again.

She donned the knee pads, gloves and mask, grabbed the flashlight, and started to squirm her way in.

She couldn’t get all the way in the opening.

Because of the angle, the only way she could have fit would have been to combat crawl her way along the bottom.  And while she does not share my generous proportions, it was still too tight to move much as at all.  Then she would have reached the stuff I couldn’t put out, which would have blocked her way, and would have had to somehow pass it back to me, then continue on.  Because of where the drip was happening, she would have had to go at least as far as those pipes.

It wasn’t going to happen.

She could, however, see more from her vantage point.

There are obvious signs of old moisture damage, but nothing looks recent.

Wherever the water was getting in from, it doesn’t look like it was coming through this space.

But without going all the way in, we really can’t say that for sure.

I’d responded to my brother, mentioning that I hadn’t thought the crawl space was accessible, and he’d written back.  Oh, yes, he tells me.  It’s quite accessible.  Then he described having to go in there to put in the wiring for the new electric furnace, dragging himself along a few inches as a time, while pulling the wire.

Now, my brother is a thin man, but he’s not tiny.  With the angle of the roof on one side, it would have been like a giant sausage casing.

This is like a scene straight out of a horror movie.

Speaking of which…

20180224stuff.from.horror.tunnel

This is the stuff I was able to get out of the horror tunnel.

First aid books.  An old Polish prayer book.  A jug from pickling vinegar.  An empty binder.  A book on car repair.  Maps.  And… other things.

I didn’t want to look too closely.

Why did the stuff get put in there?  HOW did the stuff get put in there?  When?  I mean, if my brother crawled around in there, was it already there and he just crawled over it all?  If it got put in after, how did stuff get so far to the back?  Or has it been there since the area got walled off, after we got running water and the bathroom was installed?

I’m just… amazed.

Just think.  If we hadn’t had that drip, we wouldn’t have had a reason to open the space up and wouldn’t have known there was stuff in there.

I could have lived without that knowledge.

The Re-Farmer