funny

Sunday Adventures in Vehicles and Bugs

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We are still on the lookout for a church in the next town, so this morning I headed out to visit a new one I’d never been to before.  I almost didn’t make it, having been up until 3 am this morning (actually 2am, but then daylight savings time happened), but it worked out.

This time I went to an evangelical “free” church.  In all my years growing up here, I had no idea it even existed, as it’s in a residential part of town I’d never gone to before.  The only reason I knew where it was was because my daughter and I had found it while playing Pokemon Go a month or so ago, and all churches are Pokestops.

I honestly don’t know what to think of it.  The church itself has no online presence, but I was able to look up what an evangelical church is, and it’s a solidly grounded non-denominational church.  Like most churches in the area, there was a small core of regular congregants.  This being a resort town, the population basically doubles in the summer, and all the churches get fuller.  People were friendly in welcoming.  They have a pastoral couple, rather than just a pastor, which was not something I’ve encountered before, though I was aware of such things.  The sermon was good, though there were a few things about the service that I found a bit strange; little throwaway comments that were intended to be humorous, but were inadvertently sexist.

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Strange Fruits!

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Looking out the master bedroom window this morning, we discovered a strange fruit in the trees!

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It is a Rolando Moon fruit!

Our own cats were very, very interested in this strange fruit, and desperately wanted to jump up to the window.

This is the one window that did not get replaced last summer.  Though it, like the other windows in the log portion of the house, has a deep ledge, there are plexiglass panels installed on the inside, to keep the cold out.

DaBoy’s leap was an ignominious failure.

His mother was only slightly more successful.

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Well, not really…

Then another fruit appeared…

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A Beep Beep fruit!

They made for a good laugh this morning. :-D

The Re-Farmer

Animal Happenings

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I wanted to start by sharing this photo of the cats this morning.

When I go out to feed them, there are several cats that are now used to me enough that they have become a tripping hazard.

Then there are the others…

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If you look way in the back, you can see Squishum, sitting and waiting for me to leave.

That dark patch in the snow beside him?

That’s The Hand.  Sitting in a boot print, peering above the snow.

I swear, The Hand is getting more nervous around people, instead of less!  It used to be that I could at least walk past the feeding area, and he’d just stop eating to watch me, or back off into the dog house.  Now, I can’t even do that.  I come anywhere near the feeding area, he just takes off.

Sadness.  Woe.

Hopefully, in the summer when we can spend more time outside, we will be able to get him comfortable with us.

When putting out the deer feed, I made sure to put some under Eunice, the scary snowman, again.

Eunice has almost completely lost her face in the warmer temperatures.

It wasn’t long after I’d come back in that I saw Mama and the twins at the feed – with Mama going straight to Eunice!  Not bad, considering she wouldn’t go near it, yesterday.

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After taking some photos, I sat down with my morning tea in my crochet corner, next to the tripod.  After a few minutes, I looked up to see a big, white furry deer butt!

Now, with white tail deer, when they become alarmed, they flash their tails.  The white fur under their tails bristles.  Think of a cat’s tail when it tries to look threatening.

This deer was facing the spruces, with its tail up and the white fur bristling like it was hit with electricity.  Something was there that was really spooking them.  Not enough to leave, but enough to run off towards the garden.

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Next was several minutes of them looking over to that spot in the spruces, stomping their hooves, looking around, staring hard at that spot in the spruces, edging closer, backing off, looking hard at… something.

What was that something?

I had a hunch, and it turned out to be right.

Creeping through the spruces was…

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The Mothman, making another rare appearance!

The deer kept stomping and edging closer, and stomping some more.

The Mothman?

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Mothman gives no f###s.  Not the least bit intimidated by flashing hooves and stomping feet.  She just sauntered through the piles of feed, even as Mama got brave enough to come over and start eating again.

Eventually, the twins joined her.

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They continued to look over at where the Mothman had gone as they ate, and eventually left completely.

A few minutes later – presumably after having visited that cats’ feeding area – the Mothman returned.

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After gracing me with a pose for the camera, she slunk away into the spruces again.

Vanished, until her next appearance.

What a gorgeous cat.

The Re-Farmer

Morning Mystery!

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As expected, as the snow melted, I found the cats’ missing food bowl.

…

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Now I’m wondering, how on earth did it get there?  It’s not like it got shoveled up there by accident.  It’s under the newest snowfall, and a bowl full of frozen water woud have fallen right off the size of the shovel I was using, not to mention I would have felt the weight of it.

Weird!

I figured the cats would be happy, though.  I already filled two bowls with water, so I knocked the ice out of this one and filled it and the remaining bowl with food.

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They rejected it.

Silly kitties.

They did actually eat out of it a bit, going back and forth between the two, before all of them went to the one bowl, even though it meant one of the cats ended up being pushed into a bowl of water.

Silly kitties.

The Re-Farmer

The deer showed up, too!

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One last post for today!

This morning, I was quite surprised to see Hungry Girl show up on her own.  This was early enough that the feed wasn’t quite covered by the snow, yet.

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She was very skittish coming in.  I wouldn’t be surprised that all that snow would have made everything sound very different to a deer.

Gosh, she still looks pretty rough, doesn’t she?

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Though the feed was still visible, she nuzzled pretty deep into the snow as she was feeding.

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I just couldn’t resist posting this goofy photo of her!

Later on, well after the snow had covered the feed, Barbecue came by, too.

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He had to dig his nose down pretty far to get at the feed by then, but he had no problem finding exactly where the food was!

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He gets a more dignified profile picture. :-D

I saw Hungry Girl come along shortly after, but they were both very nervous and ran off before she got to the food again.  They did come back, but not for long.

They at least got some food, though.  I’m hoping that Mama and the twins come by at some point, too, for a bit of a snack.

The snow has stopped falling now.  My brother who lives nearby was kind enough to come and clear our driveway out.  He’d fired up the tractor to do his own driveway and just popped over to do ours as well.  I’d seen the snow plows going by the main road earlier, so I’m hoping they’d already gone through the road past our place before he came over.  The last time the snowplows went by, they left a windrow across our driveway.  Not enough of one to be more than a bump, but having another one on top of that now would be much more than just a bump!

After doing the driveway, he came in for a bit of a chat.  During the conversation, he mentioned last winter being one of the coldest in many decades!  He feeds deer with hay at his place, and he said he was feeding 39 of them!  I just can’t imagine that many deer crowded around by his place.  He trained his dog to leave them alone.  He said that they were pretty mean to each other, too, attacking each other with their hooves.  One young orphan deer was small enough to jump up into the round hay bale and get some food while avoiding attacks from the other deer.  After a while, he broke up the bale to spread it out, so they could feed farther apart and not be attacking each other so much.  Sadly, one night, a pack of coyotes killed a young deer, right there next to his house!  They had heard their dog barking like crazy, but by the time they saw why, it was too late.

Coyotes can be a real problem.  Especially when the population is high enough for them to start forming packs.  That’s one of the reasons I want us to get our firearms acquisition certificate as quickly as we can, and get at least a .22 rifle.  Being on the farm without a gun feels very wrong.  It’s a vital tool.  Especially if we do start getting farm animals over the next few years.

This has been a pretty mild winter, though, so there is less chance of a hungry coyote showing up and attacking anything in our yard.

It’s supposed to be just below freezing over the next few days, then creep above freezing again.

Time to keep a close eye out on the roof, and for any more leaks that might show up!  Hopefully, once the roof is shoveled off, that won’t be an issue.  We shall see.

The Re-Farmer

Having some fun

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As I mentioned in my previous post, today’s snowfall was perfect snowman snow!

My daughters agreed.

They called me upstairs without telling me why, to see if I would notice their new friend.

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His name is Nail.

Rusty Nail.

For some reason, there was a rusty nail on the roof, so they incorporated it into their little snow dude.

Yes, they made a snowman on the roof, outside their window.

Then used ink to make a face.

As we were talking about it and how the snow is perfect for making snowmen, they started commenting on how they should make a big one in the yard.

Then they promptly headed out to do exactly that.

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Here is my older daughter, adding the final touches.

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Meet Eunice.

I wonder how the deer will handle seeing it there?  It’s right near the feeding station.

When they were done, my older daughter came in, but my younger daughter stayed out to pet the outside cats.

Then she made this, facing my office window.

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I’m told it’s not finished yet, so it doesn’t have a name.

Apparently, it needs abs.

I love my daughters.

The Re-Farmer

In the snow

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The predicted snow finally arrived last night. While other parts of the province is storming, we have had a gentle snowfall.

The feed I left out this morning has been buried, but that is not stopping the critters from finding it. Like this squirrel.

Also, our satellite internet is having troubles due to the weather. My husband has been able to get enough signal for a wifi hotspot. Let’s see how long before I can upload and post this video! It’s already failed to upload twice as I’ve tapped this out on my phone.

The Re-Farmer

A Musical Problem

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I have discovered a problem with the postcard records.

I can only listen to a track and a half, or so.

These are fascinating, by the way. I would love to hear all the songs in completion. I’ve lost much of my Polish, so the words are just on the edge of my understanding, but I have identified love sings, drinking songs and humorous songs.

Sometimes, all in one song.

I think.

The Re-Farmer

Today’s Critters

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Not a lot of photos today, as I made it in to church at the next town – the church of my childhood this time.

I don’t know that I’ll be going back.  I’m not surprised that things have changed after all these years, but some of it came off as rather creepy – and that was just with the announcements before service even started!  The weird birthday blessing with outreached hands is something I’ve never seen before, and the community greeting before service started, where everyone was expected to go around shaking hands, was another new one for me.  It was enough to make ME uncomfortable, and I’m the sort of person who will happily greet strangers I’m introduced to with a hug and a kiss on each cheek.

It didn’t help that I could understand the priest half the time.  I have an auditory processing disorder, which means that while my hearing is fine, the message gets sometimes gets scrambled.  Sometimes I, literally, hear gibberish.  Other times, I get gaps.  I know words were spoken; I know my ears heard the sound, but it just didn’t make it to my brain.  Most of the time, I hear enough that I can figure out what I missed, but if there are visual distractions, strong accents, or if a person doesn’t enunciate clearly, it can be a struggle.  This priest seems to have an aversion to moving his mouth when speaking.  Between that and how the responses have changed since I went here as a kid, it made it difficult to follow the service.

I’m really hoping we won’t have to go to the city for church!

At least I should be able to go there to get our Easter baskets blessed.

Anyhow.  Back to the critters!

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First up, we have another cheeky blue jay with a seed in its mouth.

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The red squirrels were certainly enjoying the fact that the deer are too skittish to hang around.  Doesn’t this one look like the most polite little gentleman? :-D

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The Beep Beep came by and plunked himself into a pile of seeds, and for a while, only the brave little chickadees and redpolls were willing to dive bomb the seeds around him.

Shortly after I took this, I noticed he’d moved to another pile of seeds.

Except… there was something odd about the way he was sitting there.

Something very… tense…

That’s when I realized he wasn’t sitting at all.

He was taking a dump.

In the seeds.

Which he then buried with snow.

What a jerk!

Later on, the girls called to me from upstairs, telling me to get the camera and look at the top of the dead spruce tree.

I got this next shot from the second floor.

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That’s either Nasty Crime Boy or Trüllbus the Crime Eater.  Just hanging out, enjoying the view! :-D

Unlike Butterscotch, he had no issues getting back down again!

Too funny!

The Re-Farmer