The freezing rain we got yesterday didn’t last long – at least not here. I was expecting the heaviest part of the system to be pushed to the south of us, but instead it was to the north of us, and they got quite a bit more rain and ice pellets.
We were clear for a while, then it started snowing during the night. All night, apparently. It was a lot deeper than I expected, when I came out this morning!
This handsome fella gives it a bit of perspective. I had mostly cleared the cat house roof of snow previously. You can see the warm spot over the ceramic heat bulb! There’s kibble buried under there, and it looks like cats were digging for it. Considering that there was still kibble in most of the food trays, I think maybe they wanted not-frozen kibble? When I shoveled most of the snow off again, I uncovered some of the kibble, and one of the cats was immediately up there, eating kibble out of the snow/slush by the warm spot.
Another perspective shot. This is accumulated snow on the kibble house roof, not just one night. It’s deeper than the height of my kibble container.
Those popcorn containers are the handiest things. The plastic is food safe and super strong.
I had to dig out around the cat shelters before I could finish putting out the kibble and topping up the heated water bowls. The snow seemed to drift right in space in the middle, and even in front of the entry to the cat house, which is probably the most sheltered space, with two overhanging roofs to protect it.
After that, I had to dig my way out of the yard, and a path to the garage. I am so thankful for our neighbour clearing our driveway yesterday! It’s still quite passable, even with the new snow. Of course, snow blown off the garage roof drifted right in front of all the doors, so I cleared a path in front of those. We can now access the side where little Spewie is stored.
We were supposed to reach a high of -6C/21F today, but apparently we’ve already passed it. We’re supposed to cool down slowly through the night, then get a high of -14C/7F tomorrow. After that, we’ll be warming up again. Very mild and pleasant for this time of year. Previous predictions of snow over several days have changed, and now there is no new snow expected for some time. Looks like we got what was expected to fall over several days, all in one night, instead.
We never heard back about the financing for the replacement vehicle yesterday. I will wait until about noon before I try calling the garage to see of they got the answer. I suspect not getting a call means we got turned down for financing. That would be disappointing, but not surprising. The shift to long term disability and losing 40% of my husband’s income ended up messing with his credit score quite a bit – and since neither of us have credit cards, nor any debt other than dipping into my overdraft now and then, we’re not building our credit scores back up again, either.
Well, we shall see.
It sure would be nice to have a reliable vehicle again!
I was hoping that I’d be able to post some good news about the replacement vehicle situation today, but there isn’t any news at all, yet.
Yesterday, we got a call from the financing company with questions for my husband (since our only income is his disability payments, the application is in his name). We were told we would have an answer today.
I waited as long as I felt I could for the call, but finally headed out to do a shop. How big of a shop depended on the road conditions. A system is blowing in and we’re supposed to have snow. Not a lot, but it’s supposed to continue for several days.
Then we started to get the freezing rain warnings.
So I headed out. If the roads didn’t look good, I’d go to the nearest town and do a small shop, but if they looked good, I intended to go to the smaller, nearer city and do a medium shop. A trip to the big city was not going to happen, and won’t until after the new year.
When I got to the highway, it looked good, so I headed towards the town my mother lives in, where I typically get some gas first, then continue on to either city I’m shooting for. As I got closer, though, I drove right into the freezing rain. My windshield was freezing over faster than the heat vent could clear it. I had to switch between trying to see through an ever shrinking clear spot in the ice and using the washer fluid to clear the ice, which would immediately frost over the entire windshield for a brief moment before melting clear.
Not fun.
So I did a small shop at my mother’s town. I got a couple of their largest bags of cat kibble – the last two on the shelf, of the cheaper brand – as well as a few things for ourselves. The kibble was the most needed item. The two bags should last us until after New Year’s, when we will hopefully be able to do a monthly stock up shop in the city – with a replacement vehicle! The price difference on the kibble alone is more than enough to cover the cost of gas for the trip, even at our current high prices.
That done, I headed straight home again. By then, the system had reached our place, and was more ice pellets than rain. Thankfully, I was no longer driving straight into it, so my windshield stayed clear.
So now we continue to wait on the call that will let us know if we can get that replacement vehicle.
Meanwhile…
Things continue to go well with socializing the bitties. Butterscotch and Bobby nap together regularly now, though her patience is limited. Most importantly, Sprite – who is very difficult to photograph! – has gotten better at letting us pet him, and last night, I woke to find him sleeping across my ankle! Mostly, though, he prefers my younger daughter. He is still more nervous around me, but I was able to pet him and handle him more than usual this morning – almost enough to be able to confirm he is male. I’m about 95% sure, but I could only go by feel, since it’s really hard to visually confirm on a mostly black cat, when I’ve got just a split second to do it. These are tiny kitties with tiny bits, so there isn’t much to feel, either! He and Bobby have been extremely playful this morning, which is making Marlee very stressed, unfortunately. Ah, well. It’s only for a few more days!
Still no luck with catching their mama. She will avoid the sun room entirely when I do their food and water. Crud.
Anyhow. Hopefully, I will have good news about the financing to post about soon!
I’m glad to be home and done with it, though. Looking at the life security camera feed, I’m seeing a lot of whiteouts from blowing snow!
So… First the sort of bad, sort of good news.
I dropped the van off early and talked to the mechanic in detail about what was going on, including that the warning light had turned on again when I drove in, then went for lunch. Normally, I would have walked around town to run as many errands as I could, on the way to where I usually go for lunch, but the winds were too brutal today. Instead, I basically crossed the parking lot to a hotel across the way, and went to another Chinese restaurant. Just that short walk was more than enough to convince me to stick close!
The van was done by the time I got back. He’d done the oil change it was booked for. As for the rest…
*sigh*
When he hooked up his reader, about 40 codes came up. He cleared them, but two wouldn’t stay cleared. There is a bearing in each of two tires that is starting to go. This was a known problem, and not extremely urgent, but they do need to be replaced. The problem is, replacing them will cost at least $1000 – more than the van is worth. Getting the rest fixed as well would bring the cost to over $4000.
So… I paid for the oil change.
The bearings will last a bit longer, so we can use the van, but it’s on its last legs. I’d already talked to him about replacing it, and to be on the lookout for a truck or van for us for January or February, but it looks like we can’t wait.
He has used vehicles for sale that I walked past, and I noticed a 2008 SUV, among several others. My husband’s walker should be able to fit in the back of an SUV all right, plus it would be something he could climb up into, like a van or truck, rather than down into, like most cars, which is incredibly painful for him. We hadn’t considered an SUV because we wouldn’t be able to do things like haul the gas powered snow blower to be serviced in it, but we don’t have the luxury of choice right now.
I asked him about it, but the 2008 was already sold. Of the others he had, and discussing our needs, he suggested a 2013 Ford Explorer. It was actually a lower price than the other, older ones, but it has 260,000 km on it, which brought the price down – and he lowered it even more, for us, if we’re interested. And yes, he will take the van as a trade in, though it’ll only get us about $300 towards it. This particular vehicle is all wheel drive, and has a number of amenities that would be quite useful. It also happened to be owned by a family member of his – just one owner – and he’s been the one that serviced it the entire time she had it. He told me about some of the work he’d done on it.
In the end, I got information about it from him, along with a form to apply for financing. We’ve already talked it over as a family and have decided to go for it. We just can’t be without a reliable vehicle, and with my mother’s car – which doubles as our back up vehicle – sometimes not starting on us, that means we have two unreliable vehicles right now! What choice to we really have? I’d much rather have another van, but beggars can’t be choosers. Plus, the price is really good for a 2013 vehicle!
So we’ll have to start that process. It’ll be a moot point, if we don’t qualify for financing, anyhow.
Once I had the van back, I contacted the lady about the eggs, then went to the grocery store. I also updated the family and asked my husband to send our regrets to his brother; we’d been invited to do Christmas Day at their place, but we will be driving as little as possible until the van is replaced.
We traditionally do our main celebratory meal on Christmas Eve, as part of Polish tradition, and already have a turkey thawing out. I got more for the meal, plus a few things to make sure we won’t be running out of things until after New Year’s.
This is what $264 and change looks like. Though I got a lot of things on sale, it’s still about $50-$60 or more higher than if I’d been able to get to the city to buy it. Especially when including the cat kibble.
My husband requested some Caesar Salad mixes, plus I got a couple of kit salads for our Christmas and Christmas Eve dinners. Potatoes in 10kg bags were on a very good sale – less than $5 a bag – so I got one of Russets, one of red. There’s sweet potatoes, broccoli, rye bread and wraps, Mandarin oranges, Caesar Salad dressing, cheddar cheese, mozza cheese, some chicken “fries” as an appetizer for Christmas, and a cake for dessert. There’s bacon to drape over the turkey when we roast it (we plan to spatchcock the turkey), and some pork chops that were a good price. Oh, and a big bag of potato and cheddar pierogi. Last of all, an energy drink for the ride home!
I think I remembered everything.
That done, it was off to pick up the eggs!
Two flats of farm fresh eggs, for $25.
That done, I stopped for some gas on the way home – I considered getting a car wash, to get rid of any ice and snow built up under the van, but it was closed due to the cold temperatures. Their convenience store had a lot of stuff for Christmas, including a big box of Stroopwafels, which is a rare treat for us, so I had to get that!
And yes. I bought lotto tickets, too!
One last stop on the way home was the general store and post office. I got some drinks and alcoholic eggnog for Christmas and picked up the mail. I knew there was one package waiting for me, but there turned out to be three. I was very excited when I opened them, with one of them being an incredible surprise, but those will get their own posts!
After that, I finally headed home. One of my daughters got the wagon to the garage for me, since we can’t pull into the yard to unload right now, so that got loaded up. By then, it was late enough to give the outside cats a feeding and top up the sun room water bowl.
Shortly after I got home, I started getting messages from the cat lady. The vet that does the spay clinics just set a date for another one, and did we have any females to do? She also wanted to take the bitties.
Long story short, I now have one white and grey kitten that’s female in the baby jail. My daughter was able to catch the grey and white bitty tabby, but not the bitty tuxedo. We don’t know if the bitties are male or female.
Oh, dear.
The bitty is so small, it has already managed to get out of baby jail, but the white and grey just squeezed out, too!
Marlee does not like the kittens, and has been snarling any time she sees them!
Ah, well. I will let them explore until it’s time to do the evening wet cat food feeding. Hopefully, I can get them into the baby jail to eat in peace. After that, I suppose I’ll have to watch my feet during the night!
The date for the spay clinic is Jan 2 and, after I explained about our van issues, the cat lady said she will come out, likely Dec. 31, to pick them up. We should be able to catch the bitty tuxedo by then, and maybe another outside female, but we’ll also get Tissue done – the last inside cat to get fixed. This will give us time to socialize any we can bring inside, too. The bitties will stay with the Cat Lady and she will adopt them out, but the others will come back to us. The vet does ferals, so if we can catch any of the unsocialized females, they can be added to the list, too!
The bitty tabby is hiding somewhere, but the white and grey is busily playing with the cat tree behind me. 😄
So… it’s been a much busier day than expected, that’s for sure!!!
The temperatures are pretty brutal out there right now, but we are very fortunate where we are. We aren’t getting any weather warnings, for starters. Western Canada is being absolutely blasted with extreme cold right now. Eastern Canada has their own weather warnings, though not as cold. Here, in the middle, we’re in a gap of almost mild temperatures.
Speaking of which…
Can you believe this?
I took this screen cap of the weather app that came with my computer, just a little while ago. We’re at -22C/-8F, with a wind chill of -30C/-22F I was definitely feeling that wind chill while doing my rounds, and actually skipped switching out the memory card on the sign came. Because my parents planted tall trees close to the house, rather than along the fence line, there is far less protection from the wind once I start crossing the old garden area. The lilac hedge and few trees that are there do help, but not that much.
I made sure to start the van and let it run for a while, while doing the rest of my rounds, though.
What’s unbelievable, though, is the forecast for around New Year’s. According to this app, not only are we going to warm up, but actually reach highs of 1C/34F!
I actually don’t believe it. My phone’s AccuWeather app says we’re going to reach -7C/19F around New Year’s. I think that will be more likely!
Still, that’s really incredible and, according to the AccuWeather website, which has extremely long range forecasts, what we’re getting now is almost the coldest we’ll get for the rest of the winter. There’s a few days they’re predicting will hit -22C/8F again, but not cold snaps that last days, like we’re in right now.
When I was looking at the Farmer’s Almanac forecast for this winter, they were predicting some areas getting brutal cold, while others having a mild winter. From their map, we were in a sort of in between area that could go either way. It’s starting to look like the Farmer’s Almanac was pretty spot on, and that we lucked out by getting the milder temperatures this year.
After the last couple of winters, I consider that a huge blessing!
It’s still pretty fekkin’ cold, though.
The large heated water bowl gets a thick ring of frost around the top edge, but the smaller one actually gets a sheet of ice that hangs like a shelf above the warmer water!
I’ve completely stopped trying to knock the ice out of the metal bowls and refilling them. The cats are mostly using the sun room for shelter now, so I’m putting more food out in there, and topping up the broken heated water bowl. It freezes over night, but from the level the ice is at when I pour in the warm water, they are getting plenty to drink before they have to go outside.
Both bitties have moved into the sun room, for the most part. I sometimes see the tuxedo outside. There’s no litter box in there (it’s in the cat house), and they seem to be going outside to do their business. At least, so far, I’m not seeing any messes in the sun room.
After breakfast, they all go back to their favourite spots!
I just had to get a picture of these two.
Pointy Baby (in front) and his older cousin are such a matched set! The older one is so fluffy! They both seem to have that mix if white and black fur on their sides that make them look like they’re going grey!
Pointy Baby is extremely friendly and can’t get enough attention, but we’ve had no success in socializing his cousin.
In other things, today we bring the van to the garage. I am really, really hoping it’s just some minor thing that he can fix right away. If it’s major… well, we’ll have to make some decisions.
If all goes well, after the van is done, I’ll finally pick up those eggs I was supposed to pick up earlier, then do at bit of grocery shopping to last us until after New Year’s. There is no way I’m going into the city for the big shop I was hoping to do, this close to Christmas, and I figure it won’t be much better after Christmas, either.
I am so nervous about what the van’s diagnosis will be!
Marlee has discovered a new, favourite space to loaf in.
As I was going to bed last night, she was wandering around and I started to pet her. Bending over hurts after a while, so I lifted her onto the bed to sit with her. She does NOT like to be picked up, and likes being carried even less, but once she was on the bed and I started petting her, she turned into a purr monster. Rolling around, grabbing my hand, insisting I pet her face, doing cozy toes against my hand, and generally ensuring I was not going to bed any time soon! At one point, I think she saw a cat moving out of the corner of her eye and started to hiss and purr at the same time!
She is such a sweet cat!
In other things…
While doing my rounds this morning, I tried starting my mother’s car.
It didn’t start smoothly, but it did start. It may have been plugged in, but it was still -25C/-13F at the time, so it’s going to complain. I left it to run for a bit, and it was fine.
At this point, I find myself thinking that her car not starting when it was time to leave was God’s way of telling me I should use the van. It was only while driving the van that I realized the car would never have made it through the snow in the driveway at the time.
Of course, I started my rounds with feeding the outside kitties. The kittens spend most of their time on the swing bench now. The thermometer in there was reading -12C/10F. It’s right against an exterior wall, so it likely reading colder than the ambient temperature.
Some of the kitties run off when I come in with the food, while others crowd in front of the door, giving me no room to step down, and try to get into the old kitchen! It would be a lot easier if I could keep the kibble bin in the sun room, but that would just attract racoons.
While I was bending over to set out kibble, I looked up to find one last kitten on the swing bench, looking right into my face.
It was the grey and white bitty tabby! This is the first time I’ve seen it in the sun room, though I did figure it had found its way in by now. I dropped some kibble in front of it and it ran off, but I did see it eating with other cats on the floor, soon after.
The bitty tuxedo was outside, and went after the kibble I put in one of the openings to under the cat house. When it was still there after I topped up the water, I reached over to pet it. It hissed at me and ran the rest of the way under, but at least I got to touch it!
When I was finishing my rounds and going inside, I spotted the bitty tuxedo on the swing bench.
I just love that teeny, tiny white mustache!
Later, my husband got this photo from the bathroom window.
The bitty tabby is at the front. It looks like it’s nursing on its mama – along with one of the grey and whites! Broccoli seems just find with nursing whatever kitten wants to!
They crowd so close together on the swing bench, it’s hard to count them. While looking through the bathroom window, before my husband got the above picture, I counted at least 11 cats on the bend, three more above the heat bulb, and three more on the floor, eating. I couldn’t tell if there were any in the cat bed under the bench.
That cat lady is working to make space for the bitties. She’d like to take them within the next couple of weeks. I don’t know if that will work. They are still too skittish. I’m glad they’re going into the sun room, though, and taking advantage of the huge pile of body heat on the swing bench!
Today is going to be a quiet day of staying indoors and warm as much as possible! Tomorrow, I take the van in to the garage. I’ll be getting an oil change, as well has getting it checked to find out what’s going on with the brakes warning we’re getting. It could be as simple as the brake fluid is low (or too cold). Hopefully, it’s not something major. If it is, we’ll have to decide whether it’s worth fixing, or if we’re trading up sooner rather than later!
What a day this turned out to be – and it’s still the afternoon, as I write this!
Here’s a bitty, so start things out on a positive note!
I eventually saw both bitties, then I saw the tuxedo eating in the sun room. As I finished my rounds, I spotted him in the cuddle pile on the swing bench!
At least the morning started off well.
My mother had called yesterday, and we arranged for me to come over to help her run errands. With that in mind, while doing my rounds, I started her car and let it run for a while. Everything seemed fine, so I shut it off and plugged it back in before going inside.
The woman I’ve been getting our cardboard for the garden from has been selling eggs. I decided to get 2 flats of eggs from her, instead of Costco, and we made arrangements for me to get them while on my way to the city, tomorrow. She’ll be away, though, so her mother has the eggs, in the town nearest to us – but not the town I normally go through on the way to the city. I got her contact information, and was going to just make a side trip to get them on the way out, but since I was going to be running around today, and picking up cash for the eggs in the process, I figured why not make the side trip to get the eggs today, on my way home, instead of tomorrow, on the way to the city?
So that was arranged before I headed out to my mother’s. I was planning on going to the bank then pick up lunch, first, so I headed out very early. I even remembered to grab the empty water jugs to refill.
It’s a good thing I headed out as early as I did!
First, my mother’s car wouldn’t start.
I turned the ignition, and there was nothing. No sound. The fan and the radio turned on, but that was it.
After trying several times without success, I plugged it back in, then headed inside to switch keys. I asked my husband to call my mom and let her know I’d be coming with the van and why, then headed to the garage again.
The van started fine, and I backed out. My daughter had cleared in front of the garage, but had not been able to get back out again since then. I ended up backing into the ridge of snow, so I went back and forth a bit to be in the clear, before pausing to send a message to my brother about my mother’s car, since he likes to keep on top of that. I had to get the van out of the garage to send the message, because there’s no wifi signal in the garage.
I had just finished that and started to move the van, when an alarm sounded and a warning light turned on. The onboard computer displayed the message “check brake system”.
WTH???
I decided to try plugging in the OBDII reader to see if it could tell me something useful.
It wouldn’t connect.
The app just kept scanning for a device to connect with, and never found anything.
After following the instructions to connect, several times over, I gave up. To use the scanner, the vehicle ignition is supposed to be in the “on” position, but without the engine running. I was going to drive it back into the garage and cancel with my mother, but when I started it, there was no more warning.
Did I dare go to my mother’s?
I decided to give it a go.
And promptly got stuck.
The snow on the driveway was deeper than I thought.
Thankfully, I was able to easily back into the cleared area again, reposition the van, and go for it.
I barely made it to the road, but I did get through.
My mother’s car would not have made it, so… silver lining!
I drove until I reached the highway, when I could finally pull over to message my family, asking if the driveway could be done while I was gone. Then I continued to my mother’s town.
It wasn’t until I was pulling into the parking space at the bank that the warning light turned on again. I went to get some cash, started the engine, and it was still there. I drove to the Chinese take out place and parked, but when I started it again to go to my mother’s, the warning was gone.
In the middle of all this, I was contacted by the egg lady’s mother, with an address to pick up the eggs, and had to cancel that, though I offered to pay for delivery, if that were possible.
My mother and I had lunch and visited for a while. I updated the family, and my brother, about the situation, and my husband was able to book the van into the garage to get checked – and for an oil change – the day after tomorrow. I was just starting to message the egg lady’s mother, when she responded to my question about delivery, saying she didn’t drive. Thankfully, I was able to tell her I’d be in town on Thursday with the van, and should be able to get the eggs, then.
Needless to say, I was rather on edge while doing errands with my mother! The warning light did turn on again, in between errands, but then it turned off.
We did groceries last, and I stayed long enough to put away the refrigerator stuff before my mother kicked me out to go home. Usually, I stop to get gas (and buy a lotto ticket!) before going home, but I didn’t even do that. It was straight home – and the warning light stayed off the for the entire drive.
My younger daughter, meanwhile, had spent most of that time doing a marvelous job with little Spewie. It was a real struggle, but she’d managed to clear a lane just wide enough to drive through. I had to stop to let her know I’d arrived, and move the extension cord, because she couldn’t hear me over the snow blower. Still startled the heck out of her!
Did I mention she’d cleared a path just wide enough to drive through? 😄 Getting in and out of the van was a bit of a challenge!
With how hard of a time the little snow blower was having, clearing such densely packed snow, once I was parked and we could see she didn’t need to clear much more by the garage, she went and cleared a path to the gate cam, and enough space to be able to close the gates. I’ll have to open them again tomorrow, for the pharmacy delivery driver, but at least it’s an option, now!
As for us, we are going nowhere tomorrow.
We’re supposed to stay pretty cold over the next four days or so, before things start becoming relatively mild. We’re getting extreme cold warnings, but that’s a relative thing. Some friends in the city we were living in before moving here have been posting screenshots of their weather apps. They’re getting -33C/-27F with wind chills of -45C/-49F today. We’re not supposed to get anywhere near that cold. I’ll be just find with highs of -22C/-8F we’re expected to get a few times in the next week. Even right now, we’re at -21C/-6F, with a wind chill of -30C/-22F, and nowhere near as cold as they are!
Still, this cold is doing a number on both our van and my mother’s car. We’ll be taking the van in, but there is nothing we can do about her car until probably February.
Unless it just starts working again. I’ll try starting it again tomorrow morning, while doing my rounds.
Both vehicles really need to be replaced, but the priority is on replacing our van right now. It’s the most needed vehicle.
Something to talk about while at the garage. Our mechanic now sells used cars, too, and I’ve already talked to him about what we need. Our van is so far gone, if we use it as a trade in, he’d just be sending it to the scrap yard for a few hundred bucks. He suggested we try selling it privately. Someone who can do the work themselves could do well by it, even as just a parts vehicle. But we can’t sell it without having something to replace it, immediately.
*sigh*
So, yeah… a lotto win would sure come in handy right now! I just gotta remember to buy a ticket! 😄
She may still snarl and growl at the other cats, but she’s doing really well. Last night, I put her on my bed and she actually stayed for a while, rolling around and streeeeettcching herself out. I sent a picture to the cat lady, who was shocked. She’d never shown them her belly!
The outside cats have been pretty excited about their wet cat food treats this morning, with a couple of them cleaning out the bowl for me. I’ve been mixing in some lysine before doling it out.
I spotted the tuxedo in his favourite spot under the cat house, so he got a big dollop. I later spotted the bitty tabby under the cat house in a different spot, but couldn’t get a picture. Pinky kept blocking my view!
I left quite early to take my mother’s car to the garage, and my daughters took turns supervising the cats in my room, and indulging Marlee. She has started to jump up onto the bed with them, and rolling around while being petted. She still snarls and growls at most of the other cats, but she was okay with lying on my bed next to Cheddar, which is awesome.
Cheddar is really good with other cats!
Big Rig has been a pain! She wants out of the room, but when we did let her out, she immediately went after one of the other cats. She has only a tiny incision, but if she’s going to be picking fights with other cats, we’re going to have to keep her isolated longer, to give it more time to heal. The last thing we want is for her to open it up because she’s being a big B to the other cats! The problem is, even when being kept in my room, she’s been going after Butterscotch, too! I’m not impressed with her. 🤨
As I write this, she’s made her way onto my arms and is currently using one of my elbows as a pillow, while her body is sliding down and pushing my keyboard further and further away.
She makes it quite difficult to type!
While I was in town, I was early enough to fill my mother’s gas tank and get a car wash. I figured the mechanic deals with enough filthy vehicles. Especially with our current temperatures hovering around freezing, making for some very messy roads. When I dropped off the keys, I was still almost an hour early, so I went for lunch. He wasn’t very busy, and since I was just there for an oil change and coolant check, he got it in and finished before my official appointment, so it was ready and waiting when I got back. It has been so long since the oil was changed (thankfully, it doesn’t get used all that much), the tag from wherever it was done last was unreadable. Whoever did it last hadn’t done a good job, and it may have been leaking slightly all this time. The oil level was a bit low when I checked it, but not much, so it wasn’t too bad, at least. The filter was changed and the coolant topped up as well, and now my mother’s car is very happy! I could feel the difference as I drove home.
Gotta make sure it never gets that long between oil changes again!!!
By the time I got home, it was time to feed the outside cats again. This time, I saw Shop Towel coming a lot closer than usual – he was smelling that wet cat food and I could see he was wanting some! I don’t know of there was any left, by the time he showed up. My focus is on making sure the bitties get their fill.
Shop Towel (aka: Sad Face) was not looking good today!
He has clearly been in fights recently. You can even see blood in his fur on his side. We haven’t been hearing any cat fights, so this likely happened at one of the other farms in his territory.
I want to snuggle that sad faced boy so badly!
I ended up sending a picture to the cat lady. I told her, this isn’t one of our cats, but he’s been coming around for a few years. Because he’s so aggressive with our male cats, we haven’t been encouraging him to stick around, aside from filling his belly. We’re not exactly chasing him off, either. We’d love to actually befriend him, but not with the way he behaves with the other cats. I suggested that, if we could ever trap him, he’d be a good candidate for a TNR.
Much to my surprise, the cat lady said that she knows of a farm with no other cats where he could be released! That would be ideal for him – and there would be a better chance of him being at least somewhat socialized, if he’s not fighting for territory with other males.
Of course, the idea of a farm that doesn’t have cats is just… so foreign to me! 😄 Usually, they just show up.
Now that the car is taken care of and the cats brought home, we actually have some quiet time over the next while. No trips to the city, no errands, no more waiting for the roofers… I can actually stay home for the next few days! About the only thing I expect to need to do is help my mother with her shopping, now that her car is done.
I look forward to tucking my head into my shell and being a hermit for a while!
I left really early to take my mother’s car to the garage. It was a pleasant enough day that I didn’t mind having to find something to do for a few hours, and with the history of my mother’s car, I would not have been at all surprised if the tire blew out on the way.
There’s a reason I’m paranoid about tires.
As I headed out, I paused to look around for the bitty baby that had been under the cats’ house earlier. As I looked around the entry, I startled Junk Pile, who was in the cat bed inside, next to the window. She jumped out of the cat bed, and I could see she had been nursing two of her white and grey kittens.
And a bitty baby looked up at me, smacking its lips.
She was nursing him, too!
We may not know who the mama is, but it’s good to see that a lactating mama with an older litter is willing to take care of another cat’s baby!
The trip into town was uneventful. The tire held its air and didn’t blow out on me. 😄 After dropping off the key, I headed up into the “downtown” area. Since it was about lunch time, I was thinking of going to a particular restaurant, only to find it was partially boarded up and closed! From the damage to the door and frame, clearly someone had broken in. Such a shame! I hope they will be able to reopen. Most of the restaurants along that strip are only open in the summer, for tourist season. This one is normally open all year. They only have five or six tables. Most of their business is take out.
So I decided to have lunch at the Chinese restaurant I used to go to when I was driving my younger daughter to her previous job at the pharmacy for a Sunday shift. They were only open for 4 hours, so it wasn’t worth driving home and back, so I was stay in town, and usually had Chinese buffet for lunch. I was thrilled to see their buffet was open again. This place is also where we will sometimes get a special occasion take out. When we do that, we order enough to last the four of us a few days, so it’s a pretty big order! The owner actually remembered me when I came in, commenting that it’s been quite a while. Yes it has! I didn’t realize how much I missed them until today. It’s not like we ever go out to eat often in the first place! I haven’t had an actual sit down meal here in about three years.
While I was there, I took advantage of having good signal coverage and messaged the cat lady to let her know that I saw the bitty baby being nursed by the one lactating mom that’s still hanging around. She was very happy to hear it. 😊
On my way back towards the garage, I was able to stop at several places for errands. One of them was the pharmacy. We’ve been getting our prescriptions delivered, but have skipped for the last few weeks. One of my husband’s medications, a weekly injection, which I am now also on for a different reason, has only limited coverage with his private insurance. It covers 90% of the cost, but only up to a certain “reasonable dose” amount. At 90%, we were still paying about $70 for one injection pen, which means the retail cost per pen is almost $700. Each pen comes with 6 needles, which gives an idea of what doses are typical, but my doctor had me building up to a dose that is basically the entire amount in the pen. Double what my husband was on! So for my husband, he’d need a new pen every two weeks, while I would go through a pen a week at maximum dose. Even with insurance, my prescription alone would have taken up almost our entire prescription budget for the month – and we already had to increase it because of rising costs! I was on the maximum dose only once when we found out it was no longer covered by our private insurance.
Now, this province has its own public coverage for prescription medications, though it’s something that has to be applied for. After a deductible is paid, the province’s health care system covers the cost. For those prescriptions that are covered by both the provincial and our private insurance coverage, the private insurance covers the 90% cost until the annual deductible with the provincial system is reached. Then it switches to the provincial insurance, which covers the costs 100%. These injections are not normally covered, but when our doctor found out we were having problems, he applied for special coverage. When I went to the post office to pick up the replacement phone, my husband and I both had letters letting us know it was approved.
So I stopped at the pharmacy and got it double checked. Their system showed it was good to go – and they had the prescription in stock, so I was able to get both our prescriptions. I’ve been off it for so long, though, I’ll probably have to build up from a low dose again. Which I don’t mind doing, since it means one pen will last a month, instead of a week. Also, when I last spoke to my doctor about it, he reduced my dose to what the insurance company will cover, so now I’m on the same dose as my husband.
What I’m not looking forward to are the side effects I had from it. It took me a while to figure out that this prescription was the cause of my… volatile intestinal distress, shall we say. The doctor wants to try me on this medication for a year, but if these problems come back, I’m going to ask him to put me back on the old medication. Not only is it cheaper, but I didn’t have any side effects from it.
It took a while for that to get cleared up, and my husband also had his bubble packs ready, so I was able to get our prescriptions done. While waiting for the injection prescriptions to be filled, I used the time to look for some lecithin powder for the outside cats. I did find some, in capsules, but only one brand of supplements. It was also soy based, which is NOT recommended for cats. When the prescriptions were ready, I asked about it, and that was all they had available.
I’ll have to ask the cat lady where she gets hers, because she said she got it as a human supplement (rather then from a vet) for really cheap – and the capsules I found were not very cheap! So many of the kittens have gooby eyes, but there’s no way we can get them to a vet or treat them. The ones with the worst of it are too feral.
So, that will have to wait.
One of my other errands was to get my driver’s license renewed, which required a new photo this year. The vehicle insurance and registration for both our van, and my mother’s car, needed to be renewed as well. So that is now all taken care of, well before our deadline.
By the time I made it back to the garage, they had my mother’s car in, and the tire off, early. My timing was just right; they were in the process of examining the rim.
The tire had nothing wrong with it. It was the rim that was leaking air. With the type of rims my mother’s car has, the chrome starts to peel after a while, and that compromises the seal. It just needed to be cleaned up and smoothed out. After they explained it to me, I was able to drop my bags off in the car, then head across the street for one last errand; a quick stop at the grocery store across the street. By the time I was done, so was my mother’s car.
It cost less than $35 to get it fixed! I don’t think I’ve ever had such a low car repair bill! 😄😄
Before I left, I messaged the family to let them know, and ask someone to leave the wagon by the garage so I wouldn’t have to back up to the house to unload. When I got home, my older daughter was sitting on the front step, absolutely enveloped with kittens running around and climbing her, as she tried to pet them all at once! I think she had something like six kittens, all at once, when I came up with the loaded wagon!
She helped me bring things inside, then I stayed out to refill the kibble bin, then top up their kibble trays outside. I wanted to get all the kittens out of the sun room, so I could close it up for the night. I don’t want any more racoons getting in and eating all the kibble I’d just added to the bin!
I then stayed out to pet as many kittens as I could, do a head count (the number kept changing, but I counted anywhere from 21 to 26!), and look for the bitty baby.
I thought I spotted him, so I stuck my phone past the carpet strips covering the entry to the cats’ house and tried for a photo.
There he was!
After a while, I spotted him climbing the carpet strips again, and I was able to reach in and grab him.
Oh, he’s still a spitfire! That little one was really trying to fight back! I’m happy to say, though, that once I had him in my hands, he does look like he’s grown a bit. He did eventually calm down, and after a good little cuddle, I put him back inside the cats’ house.
I’m so happy he’s doing well and being taken care of!
I think I’ll have to ask one of the girls to take a flashlight, get down on the ground, and look under the cats’ house, though. I was hearing some noises from under there that didn’t sound very catlike to me. It didn’t sound skunk like, either. I did hear one of the cattens making a similar noise later, though, so maybe I’m off base, but if there’s a racoon or something that has made a den under there, I’d like to know about it! It seems unlikely, since when I put kibble on the ground where they go under the cats’ house, I usually end up seeing at least three, sometimes five, little kittens faces at the food. I don’t think they’d be under there, if there were something other than a cat under there, with them!
So today has been a good day. We have good news about the bitty kitty, good news about my mom’s car, good news about our prescription coverage, and even good news about getting my driver’s license and vehicle paperwork taken care of early.
And while I was working on this, the girls made supper, and the house smells delicious! Time to go eat. 😁
We’ve been allowing the kittens to stay in the sun room overnight, propping the doors so that they’re just barely open, since cleaning up the glass in the broken windows. The down side of that is, other critters get in, too. It used to always be skunks, but we hardly see the skunks anymore.
I think the racoons have chased them off.
After deciding to let the kittens use the sun room for the night, I put the extra kibble bags in the old kitchen, the used my husband’s walker, with the brakes on this time, to block the kibble bin into its shelf. This morning, my husband chased a racoon out of the sun room from the old kitchen, but he never actually went into the sun room. The walker looked like it was where it belonged and he didn’t think anything of it.
Well, they did get into things.
When I tried to open the door, I had to push away some things that had been knocked in front of it. The walker almost worked, but was half pushed aside.
The racoons had got at the bin from the side of the shelf, and did this to the lid, managing to get the bin partly off the shelf in the process.
*sigh*
At least the bin was already mostly empty. I’m glad I didn’t refill it instead of putting the bags away.
As for the kitties, they were more than happy to see me with the kibble container! We top up their kibble in the late afternoon, but not too late, because we want to feed the cats, not the racoons and skunks. This time of year, the other critters will clean out every crumb by morning.
I tried to do a heat count and I got to 28! I might have counted some twice. It took a while, but I did see the bitty baby. It was under the kibble house again. I’m concerned the racoons might have scared it – and all the other cats! – out of the cat shelter. I could just see it, but couldn’t catch it. It just exploded with spitting noises at me, and went further under the cat shelter.
While doing the rest of my rounds, I took the time to pump the tire on my mother’s car. After 4 or 5 days, it was completely flat again, but it should handle the trip into town this afternoon, though I plan to leave quite early, just in case I end up on the side of the road or something.
The good thing is, we finally got my new phone set up and activated. Last night, I’d been able to get pretty much everything I needed going, but the one thing I couldn’t get working on the phone was… the phone. The instructions were simple enough. Go online, find the mobility options and activate the new phone. Simple enough.
Except the option wasn’t there.
Now, we are on a family plan, and it’s under my husband’s name. I can log in, but it’s his account, so I don’t like to mess around with it. That’s why, after I’d settled on a couple of possible replacement phone choices, I left it to him to actually go through the final details, then order the phone.
On top of that, my phone number is technically his. When he replaced his old phone, he took that opportunity to get a new, local number and was able to find one that was almost identical to my childhood phone number. So when his new phone came in, we traded sim cards. I got the new phone number, he got the new phone. That was a couple of years ago. Then we ended up trading phones – and sim cards – more recently because of the Bluetooth problem my older phone was having that was not an issue for him.
Odd that it would be the newest phone in the household that would develop a swelling battery and need to be replaced!
Unable to activate the replacement phone, I finally turned it over to my husband so I could work on other things. It took a while, but he finally found the activation option.
Under our daughter’s phone number.
Somehow, when he went through the upgrade process to purchase the new phone, he ended up doing it under her number in the group plan, instead of what the account sees as his number.
Once he got the new device activated, I got the sim card from the phone that was being replaced, my daughter got the new sim card, and her old sim card is now in the phone that’s been replaced. So we all have the same phone numbers, but I have a new phone with an old sim card, while my daughter has a new sim card with an old phone.
The main thing, though, is that we now all have working phones!
Because the new phone can’t support an external memory card, I wasn’t able to transfer everything over from the old phone. So last night, I started transferring everything on the micro-SD card onto my external hard drive. I expected it to take a long time, but it stalled at 16% and stayed there for hours. It ended up locking up my desktop, and I had to do a hard shut down. Even after restarting it, there were issues. After much fighting, I got everything unlocked, then started going through individual folders on the card and transferring them. I knew where the problem was – my photos! I simply have too many of them on there. When I’d set it to transfer everything, it got to the photos folder, and just froze. I have them organized into folders by year, then in sub folders by month, and I’m now having to transfer each month over, individually. Even then, it still takes a while, but at least it’s not freezing my computer!
So that’s something I’m going to have to slowly work on tonight, when I can be around to monitor it. Then, once that’s backed up, I’ll do the same thing with files that did get transferred to the new phone, and see how much storage space I can free up. It’s not an issue right now, but with how many photos I take, it’ll fill up fast. Especially if I’m also taking video.
For now, however, I have a few things to get done before I have to head into town and get my mother’s car in the garage. Thankfully, we’ll be having a nice warm day today, so I will be able to walk around town and do some errands while it’s being worked on.
I’ll be so glad to have that tire fixed, and not have to rely entirely on one vehicle again!
Well, the transfer is done! The bitty kitties were picked up late this morning… but not before they had a good nap.
On me.
After filling their bellies, and cover themselves in kitty formula!
The grey and white tabby is male. He is a show off, so that was pretty easy to determine. It took more effort to check the black and white, but I’m pretty sure it was female.
The cat lady, meanwhile, came baring gifts! A big bag of dry kibble, a cat bed, some small cat blankets, a baggie of cat treats and…
… a toy for the outside cats!
We talked a bit about all the cats running around, with several of them coming right up to her. She noted quite a lot of them look old enough to be fixed, so after she gets the three we have in mind right now done (they will stay with her for a week after surgery, then come back, unless she finds adoptees for them), she will start looking into booking visits for more outdoor cats, and hopefully adopt some of them out, too.
We didn’t stay long after she left with the bitties, heading out to pick up my mother soon after. It was supposed to be a warm day today, but there was a chill wind, and my mother wasn’t too happy about that. We picked up some fried chicken and wedges for a picnic lunch, though, and she was very happy about that! After we ate, the girls took the short hiking path around the marsh, while my mother and I made our way into the interpretive centre. She wanted to visit the gift shop. I ended up buying a cookbook of recipes submitted by volunteers. We left soon after the girls caught up with us again. My mother is noticeably having a harder time walking. It’s a shame we couldn’t load her little power chair into the van for her. The ramps we have are fine for loading snow blowers and riding mowers. Not so great for something more delicate! Mind you, just getting in and out of our van was really pushing it for her, too. My mother was more than happy to go home and get some rest.
The girls and I took advantage of the outing and went to a different town. They wanted to hit the grocery store. Our mechanic’s garage is across the street, so while they did that, I went in to talk to him.
After booking an appointment for my mother’s car, to get the leaking tire looked at (I expect it will only need to be patched), I talked to him about our van. He sells vehicles, too, now, and I was suggesting maybe using it as a trade in – he’s done enough work on it to know it very well – and talked about what we might get. It would have to be another older vehicle, because we can’t afford much, but once the quarter beef and the branch chipping are paid off, we can use that money towards a slightly newer vehicle.
He actually recommended we try selling our van privately. At best, he’d be able to give us $300 for the van, and it would be sent for scrap. On a private sale, we might be able to get about $500. (Or, he suggested, we can just keep it as a back up vehicle.) For someone who has the tools and knowledge to do most of their own repairs, it could still do well by them. The problem is all those little things that go wrong on an older vehicle – it’s a 2005 – that is the issue. There are just too many little things that should be fixed, before they become big things, but taking it in to get them all fixed at a garage is still more than we can afford.
We talked about what sort of vehicle we are looking for; the Grand Caravan we had before did well by us, and this Uplander is doing remarkably well, considering how abused it turned out to have been before we bought it. The Uplander hasn’t been made and sold in Canada since 2010, though. He still finds some decent Caravans, though. The other possibilities we are looking at are an older F150 or Ram1500 – both vehicles that are highly rated for winter driving, and that my husband would be able to get in and out of all right. He happened to have an F150 in one of his bays that was for sale that he could use as an example. It was a 2010 and well out of our budget, but my goodness, it was in fine shape!
Because he’d mentioned scrap dealers, I brought up that – now that our vandal can no longer try to claim the junk here on the farm – we can actually have it sold as scrap. He said to wait. This past spring, the prices where the highest he’s seen, but right now, the prices are down again. They go up again in the spring.
So we will wait.
I think we’ll be waiting with replacing the van until spring, too. Whatever we get, I’d want to be able to have it paid off within a year, and that might not be easy.
Ah, well. We do what we can!
The funny thing is, after the girls and I were back at the van and were about to leave, someone came knocking at my daughter’s window, wondering if he could ask us about how we liked our Uplander. I recognized him as an employee from one of the local hardware stores, so I just got out and went to talk to him. It turns out he needs to replace his wife’s car, and was thinking of getting an Uplander, but had been hearing conflicting reports on how good they are. So we had plenty that we could share with him! I think he found it helpful.
We did get a laugh about his asking about the van, just as we were talking to someone about trading it in for something else!
We shall see how things work out. I’m glad I finally had the chance to talk to our mechanic about it.
Oh, and guess what?
He also hauls scrap. Which makes sense. With all the cars he works with, he’d have plenty to send to the scrap dealer. One of these days, I’ll have him come out to our place and look at what we’ve got and see what he says about it.
All in all, it’s been a very productive day, even though we were away from home for most of it!
The Re-Farmer 