just talkin’

The things, and then more things

/ Re-Farmer / 6 Comments

I’m going to call this a mostly good, somewhat productive, somewhat frustrating day.

This afternoon, after checking the tracking information again to confirm I had five parcels to pick up at the post office, I headed out once it had reopened for the afternoon. A couple of them were in envelopes, but the others were in boxes. When the fifth one turned out to be the largest of them all, I left it to load the others into the truck, then came back for the last one. Just as I was picking it up, the postmaster quickly added a 6th parcel! There were 5 slips in my mail box, but she found one more! One that was expected to arrive tomorrow, it turns out. Thankfully, it was another bulky envelope, rather than a box.

So this was good. Especially since one of the packages that came in early was a heart monitor my husband got for himself. The kind you strap on while exercising. Our sulfur came in, so I was happy, too.

I was driving home when I heard a Messenger notification on my phone. I pulled into the yard to unload, but remembered to check the message before I went in.

I’m glad I did.

It was from my brother, who was at work. He’d gotten a call from the public housing department about my mother, since he is her Power of Attorney. He needed to talk to me, so I let him know I just got home, then got my daughters to unload and park the truck. I barely got to my office when the phone started ringing.

My poor brother.

The first thing that came up was that they had talked to my mother and asked for his number, since he’s PoA, but she told them she didn’t remember it. They got my brother’s number from me, but this was awhile ago! This is also not the first time my mother has done this. Which is strange, because she calls him herself, and has all our numbers written down in a list on her wall, along with postal addresses, birthdays and anniversaries.

The reason they were calling him, though, was about the bed bug situation. She got their notification that they’re coming in this Friday. My mother has been refusing to let them in for the last few times. This time, she called the number on the letter and talked to the exterminator, saying she didn’t want them coming in, and once again accusing them of theft. The guy would have had to tell the department about this, which leads us to the next issue.

They are coming in on Friday, and she has to have the place prepared – stuff moved away from the walls (difficult, given how tiny her place is), fabric items bagged up, etc. They will be coming in at around 9am, and she has to be gone all day (I believe they know she has respiratory issues, which means she needs to be out for at least 12 hours, instead of the usual 6 hours).

If she doesn’t do this, she will be evicted.

*sigh*

We’ve tried to warn her about this.

My poor brother was already having a stressful time at work, and now he had to deal with this on top of it!

One thing they will also do, though, is provide her with a special mattress cover that will kill off anything on her mattress that might have gotten missed, by denying oxygen.

We talked for a bit and, once he’s home from work, he’ll send a group email to the family. My suggestion was that I could go over on Thursday night to help with bagging things and moving furniture. The best thing would be for my mother to stay at my sister’s on Thursday night, since she has Fridays off, but I forgot that my sister works nights on Thursdays. I’ll be on my own for prepping her apartment. I’d be willing to drive my mother to my sister’s, but she would have to drive my mother back, since Friday will be our first city shopping day. Worse comes to worse, my mother could stay at the motel again, but she would have to check out by noon on Friday, unless she stays for 2 nights, and she would not be willing to do that.

She has no choice, though. She either goes along with this, or gets evicted.

One thing’s for sure. Since I’m the only one that will be able to go over to help her with her stuff on Thursday, I’ll be going straight to the shower, and my clothes to the wash, as soon as I get home!

My mother has zero understanding of just how much her behavior causes problems the rest of us have to fix, and now she’s putting her own housing at risk.

My brother couldn’t talk long, though, since he was already interrupting his work day, but we’ll connect again later today.

By the time I was off the phone, the girls had taken care of things and parked the truck, so I could get stuff together to go back outside and work on the carrot bed. It still had the plastic covered frame on it, so the first thing I did was add metal brackets to the corners before moving it. I most definitely could tell these brackets make a difference!

I was not intending to make another time lapse video of the progress, since I figured it would be pretty boring. I just took still shots of the progress, but I’ve since confirmed a frustration.

To make the photos I included in my previous post smaller, I cropped one, then reduced it to 50% original size. The two garden ones weren’t cropped, but I reduced those to 30%, plus I reduced the colours. Those two ended up being smaller file sizes than the 50% and cropped one. All the photos were uploaded to Google Photos, and inserted into my post from there. On my desktop, WP just tells me my storage is at 98% full, but the app gives decimal points, so when I had the chance, I checked on my phone to see if there was any change.

My storage went from 98.3% full to 98.5% full. Usually, I can upload many more than 3 photos before it goes up by even 0.1%, but for only 3 photos, greatly reduced in file size, to make it to up by 0.2%? Wth, WP?

Clearly, there is zero benefit to storing my images on Google Photo. I’ve tried embedding them, using the share link, etc., but instead of the images, the code shows instead.

So I guess I’ll make a vlog with the still shots, since it turned out to be a bigger job than I expected!

Very early on, though, I got an interruption. One of my daughters came out to let me know my mother had called; they were working in the kitchen and couldn’t get to the phone, but could hear my mother leave a message on the answering machine.

I considered calling her back later, but decided to do it right away.

*sigh*

When I got through to her, she was all chatty, asking how my cold was (I had started to feel one coming on, but that went away a while ago), before going on about how hers is no better (she sounds perfectly healthy), and it was so bad, she thought she was going to die, because of her breathing. At that point, I told her flat out, she says this every time, and it’s getting to the point where I don’t know whether to believe her or not. So she dropped it and instead said she called my sister and asked her to come and take “stuff”. Stuff? What kind of stuff? My mother hemmed and hawed before saying that my sister sews, so… then changed the subject. I guess she was trying to say fabric items? But I’ve helped pack her stuff into bags for previous bed bug spraying, so I don’t know what she’s talking about. With the way she hemmed and hawed before answering, then changing the subject, I suspect she’s trying to hide something from me, and intends to give my sister things that my only my brother, as her PoA, should be seeing.

Then she started asking if I knew about a distant relative that passed away, and I did, because my sister does genealogy stuff and shared the obituary online. My mother wanted me to go to the funeral on the weekend. I don’t know these people at all. I suggested my sister might go, since she’s the one who keeps track of all these relatives, but apparently she already said no, because the funeral is on the Sabbath. ??? I managed to preemptively cut off the possibility of my brother going, since he’s so incredibly busy already, and probably doesn’t even remember them anymore, giving how many decades it’s been since we’ve had any contact. Why my mother suddenly thought it was important for some member of the family to be there, I don’t know. We’ve had other distant relatives pass, and she was never like this before – though she did mention our vandal would probably be there, because apparently he’s friends with them, etc., etc. Okay. So then he should be there. Not me!

I finally got a chance to ask about her grocery status and it turns out that was why she was calling. Her fridge is empty, and she has only 1 bun left. Then she started telling me about the various things she was about to start cooking…

So did she want me to come over tomorrow?

Well, she’s making her list right now, and this and that and….

She would not commit to asking me to come over tomorrow, though when I asked if she wanted me to come over today, she said no. I kept trying to get more information out of her, like if she needed to go to the pharmacy or the bank or anywhere else, and she said now, but with much hesitation. So I finally just said, I’ll come over tomorrow, at the usual time. The usual time? Will I be bringing lunch? I told her that the last time I was at her grocery store, I saw they had the hot meals again, so I could pick up a couple and we’ll have them for lunch. She got downright excited about that!

As we were talking, I kept asking her, is there anything else you need? Anything else you want to tell me? Anything else that’s new?

Nothing came up about the exterminator notification letter or about Friday.

So I let it be. I’ll wait until my brother has had a chance to talk to her.

Which he has tried to do, while I was writing this, but there’s been no answer.

*sigh*

So that was quite the thing.

I’d told her from the start that I’d been working outside, so I finally brought the call to a close so I could get back to it. I think my mother was bored again. I do wish she wouldn’t wait until she’s running out of food, because calling me to help her with groceries! She refuses to do otherwise, though, telling me that if there’s food in the house, that means she has to eat it…

…

…

I never quite know how to take that. It’s not like she’s a glutton who sits around over eating all day, but she makes it sound like the mere act of eating food is a bad thing.

Anyhow.

I’ll be going there tomorrow, and we’ll see if she’s up to climbing into the truck to do her own shopping this time. With only one place to go, I think she might be up to it.

That done, it was back to working on the garden bed, which also involved pulling in the bowed out sides. I’ll do a vlog about that later. For now, I will say, I am really, really starting to hate those @#$@!% Chinese elms!!! Good grief!

I got it done, though, and even added sulfur to the soil at the end. It took way longer than it should have, but it’s done. Tonight, I’ll see if I can put together a vlog using my still shots, instead of posting any pictures. I suppose I could upload them to Instagram, but it seems not everyone can see them when I embed from Instagram, and I wouldn’t be able to explain what’s going on, anyhow.

I’d like to get more stuff done outside while the weather is good, but now I’m going to have to be at my mother’s at least 2 days this week, then on Friday I’m in the city.

This seems to be a constant pattern, pretty much since we’ve moved here. The more work we need to get on top of around here, the more external responsibilities end up taking priority. It seems to be getting worse, instead of better, to the point that we are falling behind rather than getting ahead. Such is life, but when it comes to things like my mother deliberately disrupting things and hurting people the way she does, it’s getting much harder not to get angry at her – and it takes a LOT to make me truly angry!

Thank God my brother is our “landlord” now. Otherwise, I know we would have moved out by now. Even the short time we were here and she still owned the property, we reached a point where we were seriously considering it. We would have put up with the financial hardship but, if we had, it would have caused more hardship for my brother than my mother, and none of us would have wanted that. He and his wife are the shining light of awesomeness that makes it all worthwhile!

Well, it’s getting late in the day. If I’m going to my mother’s tomorrow, and put a video together, I’d better get to it.

The Re-Farmer

Our day so far

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Morning rounds are so much more enjoyable, now that it’s warmed up, and I don’t have to slog through snow, slush or mud. 😂

First, the cuteness!

Broccoli let me pet her today.

She is so very round.

I counted 32 yard cats today, including 5 that were following around one of the white and greys that was obviously in heat.

*sigh*

Of all of them, the least feral one was Shop Towel!

I tended to the raised bed that was planted in yesterday.

In the first photo, you can see that the stove pellet mulch has absorbed moisture and broken apart into sawdust. The second photo is after I gently spread it around. I like using stove pellets as mulch when direct sowing because even things with small seedlings, like the spinach, can easily push their way through the light and fluffy sawdust.

I also managed to get a picture of an emerging snow crocus!

We’re not seeing many, yet, and the few we do see tend to be too far from the path for me to get a decent photo. Looking at the forecast, I was happy to see rain, but a closer look at the hourly forecast shows that we have an only 4% chance of rain, so… none. At best, we’ve got a 25% chance of rain some time tonight.

After finishing my rounds, I headed to the post office to pick up a couple of parcels. One was a courier delivery, so timing wasn’t an issue, but the other was to our postal box, and I wanted to pick it up before the post office closed at 11:30.

There was nothing there.

Strange, but okay.

My husband was surprised, as he got email notifications for 4 different parcels, instead of just the 2 I was expecting. When I had the chance, I went online to check the tracking, which has timestamps on it.

Two showed “attempted delivery” times that were shortly after I left. Two others had time stamps that were after the post office was closed. A fifth (!!) simply said “delivered today”, which would have been a courier.

One of the packages that came in has our sulfur in it; last I checked the tracking information, that one was supposed to come in on Thursday, so it’s three days early!

The post office opens up again at 2, so I’ll head out again this afternoon.

Then it’s back to work in the garden beds! Woohoo!!

The Re-Farmer

Various things

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It’s another chilly and wet day, so no progress outside.

The rain continued through the night, and this area where I’d scattered all those seeds is now full of water again. That will either benefit the seeds, or drown them!

Speaking of seeds, the first Wild Bunch Mix winter squash seed has a root emerging already! At least, it was 1 this morning, though when I check it again later today, I’m sure there will be more. I could just see them, starting to show through the snips in the outer shells I’d made.

I had some errands to run, so I headed out early enough to get to the post office before it closed until the afternoon. Then it was off to town, where I made a quick stop at the grocery store for a few things, then went to one of the hardware stores. I will be running out of seed starting mix soon, with all the seeds in the Wild Bunch Mix I have pre-germinating, so I wanted to get more of that. Then, after looking around, then finally asking someone, I found it!

I found vermiculite!

I couldn’t find it when I checked while in the city, yet there it was, locally. Quite a few bags in stock, too. I missed them at first, because the packaging is almost identical to one of the brand’s potting soils. I’m hoping this will help keep the moss and mold in some of our pots at bay.

My daughter had finally fixed some problems with her bank’s updated app, and was able to treat us today, so the last stop before heading home was for some take out from a Greek restaurant in town. A “Greek” restaurant, but with the most massive menu I’ve seen anywhere!

While I was out, I got a message from my husband telling me a package I was expecting tomorrow was in. I’d already been to the post office and it wasn’t there – or so I thought – so I stopped in again on the way. I figured it had to have been a non-post office delivery, but nope. As I was going in and out of the store, the rain turned to snow, then back to rain, then back to snow, then back to rain…

We’ll be getting that until at least midnight. Tomorrow is expected to be chillier than today, then things should finally start warming up again, the day after. Winter just doesn’t want to let go! This freeze/thaw cycle, though, is just tearing apart the gravel roads.

Once at home and looking at the packages I picked up, it turned out that what I thought was something else was the package my husband told me was in. Which is nice on the one hand, since it was something he ordered for me, but not so nice on the other, since it means his replacement CPAP hose and nose pieces aren’t in yet. He’s leaking air. He needs a new mask/headpiece (a hose arrangement the nose piece attaches to), too, but they were out of inventory.

On a completely different note, I got a call from my mother. She got another letter under her door from the public housing department that owns her building. It was a notice for beg bug spraying. She has been refusing to allow them in, as she believes one of the guys stole some stuff from her – stuff that she considered valuable, but are only valuable to her. She phoned the number on the letter and told the guy, she’s not afraid of bed bugs, but she is afraid of people coming in and stealing her stuff (the time she thinks this happened was more than a year ago). The guy said she must have misplaced them. This wouldn’t be the first time she’s believed someone has stolen from her. She had an envelope of money go missing and she all but directly accused one of her neighbours of going into her apartment while she was in the lounge. A couple of months later, she found the envelope.

So what my mother wants me to do is go through her stuff for her. The stuff in question, however, would be of interest to my sister for her genealogy records, so I suggested she call her. We could possibly do it together.

My daughter, however, pointed out something to me.

Personally, I don’t think my mother has bedbugs, so I haven’t been worried about it. However, if she *does* have bed bugs, and I start going through all the stuff in her bedroom, I’d be bringing them home – and with this house, we’d never be able to get rid of them. We’d have to move out and empty the house.

I’m going to have to call my mom back and tell her this. It’s one thing to go to her place and help her with her groceries. I’m basically just in her kitchen and little dining table, all near the door. It’s quite another to be in her bedroom, digging through her closest and shelves, going through stacks and stack of papers she’s got tucked in them.

*sigh*

She was going to call my sister then get back to me, but I’d better call her back now and get that over with.

She’s not going to be happy, but then, she’s been refusing to allow her place to be treated. Actions have consequences.

*sigh*

The Re-Farmer

Nothing to complain about!

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Wow. I thought we had high winds here!

I just heard back from the Cat Lady. She was more than happy to change when we would be connecting.

Part of their roof just blew off!

Their new house has a metal roof and one of the panels went flying. Turns out the winds are higher in the city than where we are!

Thankfully, no one was hurt, and the damage was minimal, all things considered.

When it comes to our own winds, I’ve got nothing to complain about!!

The Re-Farmer

Moody morning, and testing them out

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We’ve got a foggy, moody day today!

I took this several hours ago and, while it’s not as dense now, it’s still foggy out there.

We’re just barely above freezing right now, but even earlier things were starting to melt again.

I got to test out the new rubber boots!

This is part of the path crosses the moat that surrounds our garage every spring. I was more than happy to break up the ice and walk in water, because it was incredibly slippery in all the paths! The boots don’t have much grip.

They did allow me to check the lake that’s forming in front of the outhouse, and finally get to the sign cam to switch memory cards. I cut through the spruce grove to avoid the deepest snow, then went around the edges of the tree and fence lines. The snow in the open isn’t excessively deep, but why fight through it, if I can avoid it?

I did remember to change the clocks on the trail cams, though – just a little bit late! I actually forgot about daylight savings time almost entirely. We have only two clocks that need to be manually changed, and one of those is on the oven. I suppose we could do the microwave, too, but after getting a series of power outages a while back, we just didn’t bother setting the time on it again, at all. I find myself at least a day late in switching the trail cams, every daylight savings.

As for today, I’m looking forward to a quiet day of indoor tasks, and no driving around with errands. Especially with so much melting on top of ice out there! We’re only supposed to hit a high of 2C/36F today. Right now, we’re at 0C/32F, with a “feels like” of 3C/37F. So we’ll see what we really get. Oh! I just checked one of my weather apps, and the forecast has changed again. Now they’re saying we’re supposed to reach 4C/39F today.

One thing we do have with this weather is far fewer cats running around! I think I counted about a dozen or so this morning and, every now and then, I’ll see one come running from somewhere in the outer yard. They are most definitely exploring further afield, possibly to neighboring farms.

They also haven’t been eating as much kibble as things get warmer, which is going to be nicer on the budget, but all the containers were empty this morning. I think we got visited by racoons again. I’m pretty sure I heard some screeching outside my window last night, but I didn’t see any in the sun room when I checked the critter cam. I imagine we’re going to start seeing the skunks again in the near future.

The inside cats, meanwhile, are being driven insane by the occasional lady bug or fly that has come out of dormancy and started bouncing off the ceiling or windows.

Ladybugs are remarkably loud when they do that!

So is the crashing and banging when the cats launch themselves after them, sending anything in their paths flying! *sigh*

Speaking of cats, I’ve been keeping in touch with the Cat Lady. The “problem cat” she took in at the request of a shelter is not doing well. Hissing and spitting and terrifying the other cats in the room. It’s only been a couple of days, though. About the only positive thing she could tell me is that the shelter didn’t have to remove all the cat’s teeth. She’s still a gummy cat, but there are a few teeth left. The poor thing must be so traumatized – and that’s on top of having been removed from an abusive home in the first place.

Needless to say, I’m not going to be pushing about the Cat Lady taking our three. Especially since I think they would be staying with her for a short while, first. Thankfully, she does have an entire separate, heated building on their new property for some of the rescues, but others have to be in the house for special care.

She and her family are so amazing. They put up with so much – and she puts up with the two calicos from our place that are still nasty to her, even though they are great with everyone else! In all her years working with rescues, she’s never encountered anything quite like that before!

Hopefully, the new addition will learn to feel safe and trust again, but it’s likely going to be a hard road after having gone through so much.

I just can’t understand people who abuse animals.

The Re-Farmer

Orders in!

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We’re back from town and picking up the packages in the mail. One of my daughters came along to do her own shopping, so I had both company, and help bringing things to the house!

Here’s one of the packages that came in; we finally replaced the outside heated water bowl that stopped working.

It’s the same size as the one that’s in the sun room. I had intended to buy another large one at the local hardware store again, as the price was better than ordering the same larger size online, but my husband went ahead and ordered this one before I got around to it.

I like the pretty colour. 😁

I was happy to see our order of lysine came in a couple days earlier than the tracking information said it would.

Then there were these.

I decided to get a new USB extension and adapters, instead of using the old ones we’ve got. The ones we’ve got would be from before we moved out here, so probably close to 10 years old. I figured some newer, more up to date items would be better! The adapters came in a three pack, so we have extras for anything else we might need them for. So many things come powered by USB these days!

Of course, I had to test it out on the lights that came with the seed starting kit. We can easily fit 4 of them on one shelf of the mini-greenhouse at the window. Then, since we don’t need to start seeds for a while yet, I decided to set three of them up. I’ve got the tray with the eggplants and hot peppers on the second level right now, and two trays of onions at the top level. Since whatever is on the second shelf wouldn’t be getting as much light, I would alternate them every few days. Of course, they would also need to be rotated regularly. What I did was place three of the LED grow lights from the kits on the top shelf, over the side of the seedling tray that gets the least amount of light.

It should be interesting to see if it makes any noticeable difference.

Meanwhile, I’ve been looking up the bulbs for one of my aquarium greenhouse lights. We have one burnt out bulb, and the other is starting to look dim. I got them from the same fish supply store my daughters bought the aquarium set at (hugely discounted for Boxing Day, or we could never have afforded it!), and never really looked into the type of bulbs. I just knew it was the right kind for our tank.

Well, it turns out these bulbs are general grow lights, not just aquarium bulbs. Which, unfortunately, makes them a bit more expensive. I found them on Amazon, but I don’t want to buy them there. I’m going to check out some hardware stores, first. At least that way, I can be sure any bulbs I get will make it home without breaking! Plus, I might be able to just buy one or two, instead of packages of 5, 10 or more! Not something I’ll have the budget for until next month, anyhow, but I can look.

As for our drive to town and back, our road is STILL not plowed, but at least the main road to the highway is. I am starting to think they’re not going to bother plowing side roads like ours until after tonight’s expected snowfall. I am SO thankful for our truck!! If we still had the van, we would have been dragging the undercarriage through the snow the whole way. My mother’s car wouldn’t have made it at all.

When I got home, there was a message from the salvage yard I’d contacted to see about getting rid of things like our collected aluminum, and the 13+ large batteries we found while cleaning out the basement and parts of the garage, plus a few other things we could get rid of, like the broken appliances. Other stuff, I would want my brother to be there to say what can stay and what can go. I called the guy back. He told me they’d be in our area in the next while, however we can’t get to the barn right now! So I suggested we wait at least a couple of weeks. When I told him about how some things would need my brother’s okay to clear out, and we’d have to book it in such a way that he could arrange a day off to come out here, he suggested we wait until we can do that. By doing one trip for everything, they only have to bring the equipment out once, and can give me a better price. This company actually weighs the scrap metal on location, rather than hauling it away first, then weighing it. That way, the customer can see exactly what the weight is, right then and there.

So that will wait until spring, or at least until enough snow is gone that we can get to areas like the car graveyard well beyond the outer yard.

I will be really happy to finally get a lot of that junk cleaned up. And I’m sure the renter will be happy to see it gone, too. That way his cows won’t be getting into stuff and possibly hurting themselves!

Little by little, it’ll get done!

The Re-Farmer

A day of rest, and possible adoption news

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I try to keep Sundays as my day of rest, but that doesn’t always work out. Today, I finally did, though not from much choice! 😄

I was awakened early by hungry cats, so I went ahead and did my morning rounds early, too.

The outside cats get rather confused when I come out that early! The sun was barely up. I got a head count of 28 or 29, though.

Also, I can tell when the racoons have gotten in. Now only is the garbage can typically knocked over, but they leave the water bowl absolutely filthy! Ew.

As I was heading back in, these four posed beautifully for me. When I moved to pet them, after taking this picture, the tuxedo with his back to me took off. Syndol, of course, wanted aaaaalllll the pets and pushed the orange and white away to get them. 😄 I tried to pet the tuxedo with more white on its chest. He wouldn’t let me, but he didn’t run away, either. As I pet Syndol, he sniffed my hand – then started giving me kisses!! It was so sweet!

Once back inside, I uploaded and went through the trail cam files. No computer troubles! Yay! I did have a surprise, though. The gate cam is set to take one still image, then a 10 second video. I was going through the stills when I saw a great big racoon near the gate, but the next image… what the heck was that? Something looked to be jumping through the bottom bars of the gate, but I could not tell what it was.

Then I checked the video.

It was a fox!

We know we have foxes around, but very rarely see them. I think we saw a fox crossing the outer yard once, our first summer here? I only vaguely remember.

So… now I’m wondering if we’re feeding foxes in the kibble house, too!

One of these days, I’d love to set up a critter cam facing into the cat shelter area, just to see what visitors we get! Any camera there would have its motion sensor constantly triggered, so I’d be looking for something NOT on batteries.

Maybe some day.

Anyhow.

After going through the files, I tried to get other stuff done on the computer, but was falling asleep at my keyboard, so I finally gave up and tried for a nap. After fighting the cats for space on my bed, they converged on me as soon as I was lying down. Potato Beetle was really cuddly! He kept shoving his face into my hands, and ended up sleeping curled up around the top of my head, with his face snuggled up against my forehead. It was so sweet!

I’m happy to say that, at some point, PBC joined the pile and napped with me, too! She’s getting quite socialized. She still gets a bit standoffish, but likes pets, purrs lots, and cuddles with the other cats.

Speaking of cats.

I heard from the Cat Lady last night. She has someone that’s looking to adopt. It’s an older person who is healthy and living on her own, but is lonely. So she’s looking for a calm and affectionate cat. Given her age, her family has already said that they will take care of the cat when she passes, but that’s unlikely to happen soon. The Cat Lady told her about Ginger, but asked if we had others that might fit the bill. So we sent her pictures and told her about several others, including Cheddar and Potato Beetle. Ginger would still be top of the list. She asked about PBC, but while she’d be great to adopt out, I don’t think she’d be appropriate for someone that’s elderly.

So that information has been passed on. It would be good for Ginger to be away from so many cats, and to have his very own human. Things like his needing help to clean his ears, since he can’t do the ear on the side of his missing leg – something Toni manages to not have a problem with! – have been mentioned. If he gets picked, he will first stay with the Cat Lady as he gets vet checked and shots, etc. first. With our history with cats, that makes me nervous. The vets always seem to find some hidden but major health problem! Okay, so it hasn’t been all of them, but enough to be rather alarming. Not that Ginger has shown any signs of health problems, but then, neither did some others that got adopted out.

Gosh, I feel teary just thinking about giving up Ginger! He’s so sweet. It’s better for him, though.

I just have to keep telling myself that.

So we’ll see how that goes. For all I know, the Cat Lady might have other cats that would be a better fit with this potential adoptee. Whatever happens, happens!

The Re-Farmer

Good grief!

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I had a much interrupted night, so I asked the girls to feed the outside cats.  I’m supposed to be trying to get sleep right now, but the interruptions continue! 

While a daughter was outside, feeding cats, I checked the weather.  Good grief!

Twenty below zero, with a windchill of -27C!!!

And my daughter hadn’t bothered to put on a coat!

She informed me that she was able to pet the super fluffy little tabby.

Today, our high is supposed to be -10C.  Tomorrow, we’re supposed to reach 5C! 

The critters outside must be so confused.

Speaking of critters, the raccoons are showing up in the sun room at night, more often.  I chased at least 4 out last night!

Anyhow.

I don’t think I’ll be getting that sleep I need.  The interruptions just aren’t slowing down!  I’m going to be a useless wreck, today. 🙁

The Re-Farmer

Shifting plans

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This morning, my husband had if first eye appointment in many years.

He also took an appointment time just 15 minutes after they opened. I normally book for the afternoons, because of travel time and… well… I’m just not a morning person!

We left early, in case road conditions were still slippery. They were not, so we got there half an hour before they opened. Which neither of us minded. It was a painful drive for my husband, so sitting in comfortable seat while it wasn’t moving was a good thing for him! He also decided to leave the walker at home, since he only intended to walk from truck to door and back again. We were planning to swing by a grocery store afterwards, but he was intending to stay in the truck while I picked things up.

He ended up getting the dilation test as well, which meant spending some time in the waiting area while the drops did their work, then back to finish the testing. By the time he had everything done, and they processed the direct billing on his insurance, with our provincial health care covering any diabetic testing 100%, the final bill was a whole $5! Which was less than my first tests! They also said he could come back in a year, instead of 6 months, with me. It seems I have more damage to my eyes to monitor than he does.

He did not get glasses, though.

He talked to the eye doctor about various options, including contact lenses, which he’s interested in trying again. Personally, I’m not a fan of using something you have to buy over and over, anywhere from every few weeks to every 6 months. Not when a pair of glasses can last many years. To get glasses, though, is going to be a large initial outlay. Aside from needing things like prisms, he needs some of the more extreme concave prescription lenses. The super thick ones would be cheaper, but heavier. They can do thinner ones, but that jumps the cost significantly. The woman helping us (she also helped my mother, and was fabulous with her) has extreme lenses in the opposite direction – hers are convex rather than concave. She also gets the thinnest possible lenses to reduce the weight, plus photo-sensitivity and so on. Her lenses alone cost her $1100. When lenses are that extreme, the types of frames that will hold them becomes more limited, and at that level, start at around $200-$300.

Which we don’t have.

Since he needs to talk to them some more about his options, we’ll come back another time to talk about contact lens options. They can then order some testers for him, and he can see how that goes.

When we were done, he wanted to grab something to eat, but nothing was open yet. We ended up driving to my mother’s town, but the place we wanted to go to, there, wasn’t open yet, either! It was finally past 11am, though, so there was one fried chicken place I knew for sure was open.

It wasn’t until we were driving to the highway to do that, when my husband remembered we were supposed to hit the grocery store. I wasn’t about to turn around, though. Instead, I decided that, after we ate, I’d drop my husband off at home, then go to the town nearest us. One of the things on my list was a pharmacy item, anyhow, and if I was going to the pharmacy there, I could get prescription refills, too.

Once settled in the restaurant, I wasn’t sure what I wanted to order. I have given up sugar and simply carbs again for Lent, and the meals all included carb heavy sides. I asked and found that I could order just chicken or just shrimp, with no sides. They still had a bread crumb coating, but for the amount on them, it was not really an issue. So I ordered a some fried shrimp while my husband got fries and chicken – it was the fries he was really craving!

During all this time, of course, his eyes were quite uncomfortable, and he was wearing his sunglasses over his regular glasses – we have several pairs of sunglasses designed to fit over regular glasses! When he asked me to check his eyes, I just had to take a picture, so he could see for himself!

This is about an hour after getting the drops! 😂 He was quite happy to put the sunglasses back on while he ate!

Also, my husband has the most gorgeous eyes. *melt*

That done, we headed home, I dropped him off then left immediately for town. After getting a few groceries – a bit more than intended, as there were some really good sales on – I went to the pharmacy. We actually had his bubble packs delivered yesterday, but he forgot to call them back to add on his insulin. While getting that done, I asked what the status of his Ozempic was, more because they have had such a hard time getting it in the dose he needs, since it became so popular as a weight loss drug. I’m glad I asked about it, as it turned out his prescription renewal had run out. So the pharmacy sent a fax to his new doctor and, once they get the new prescription, they’ll have his refill delivered next week. Then there was my one prescription. I still have almost half a month at home, but since I was there, I figured I’d take care of it, too. I was able to refill it, but that was the last of my refills on file, so they sent a fax to my interim doctor, who is also now my mother’s new doctor. So in the end, it’s a good thing we forgot to go to the grocery store after the eye appointment!

By the time all the running around was done, it was far later than I expected to be home! In fact, in a few minutes, I’ll get heading out to feed the yard cats so they can finish eating before it gets dark and the raccoons come out.

I am really appreciating the longer days, that’s for sure.

I’ve made sure to tell my husband, though; the next time he makes an appointment, book it for the afternoon, if at all possible! 😂🤣

The Re-Farmer

Wow

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I’m in the city right now. I decided to get an oil change before heading into Costco, so I’m just waiting on that right now. I decided to check the weather conditions back home.

Wow!!

The highest temperature I saw in the forecasts was 6C, but we are at 8C now – and it’s not even the hottest part of the day, yet!

The is going to make the temperature drop tomorrow feel even colder. 😆

The city is usually a couple degrees warmer, but right now, it’s a couple degrees cooler where I am.

What a gorgeous day!

The Re-Farmer