I just got back from a much needed walk outside, to do at least part of my evening rounds. I would happily have stayed out longer, but the mosquitoes were out in their masses, and I didn’t want to cover myself with bug spray, this late in the day.
While out, I checked on a different sort of babies we’ve got growing right now.
Baby grapes!
Our first summer here, I had no idea my mother had grapes. They were completely engulfed in spirea. They did produce some bunches of grapes, though, which was really awesome. They were pretty small, but quite delicious. :-)
I did a lot of clean up around there, including cutting away the spirea from the grape vines (there turned out to be 2 of them) the next spring, and making a trellis for them. After a very harsh winter, I wasn’t sure they had survived, but I fastened what I could to the trellis and was diligent about watering them.
They did survive, but there wasn’t a single grape.
We had some harsh conditions this past winter, too, and for a while, I wasn’t sure they’d made it through, but they are finally leafing out, and there are quite a lot of little grape clusters showing! Now that they are no longer being strangled by the spirea, I am hoping we will have nice big bunches of grapes.
It was cheering to see them, after a rather frustrating and unproductive day. I had two time dependent things on my schedule; one was an afternoon telephone doctor’s appointment. Nothing urgent; just some follow up questions. Once that was done, I was going to pick up the rest of my husband’s prescriptions, which needed to be done before the pharmacy closed, but otherwise was just slated for “the afternoon”.
I got a call from the pharmacy late in the morning. They didn’t have enough of one of the meds to fill all the bubble packs, but they would have more tomorrow. Did I want to just get a week’s worth today, or wait until tomorrow?
Thankfully, my husband has enough to last him the rest of the week, so I said I would come in tomorrow.
With the timing of things, I was never able to get outside to do the transplanting I had intended to in the morning, and by afternoon, it would have been too hot for the job, anyhow. I figured, since I no longer had to go into town, I could do it after the phone call.
The time came and went, and there was no call.
After about 45 minutes, I finally called the clinic myself. Was there a problem? Was I the one who was supposed to call? No, I was still scheduled, and the doctor would still call me.
So I waited. It meant I couldn’t start anything that couldn’t be stopped instantly, so nothing particularly useful could be started while I waited.
And waited.
Eventually, it got late enough that the clinic would have been closed, but I still waited a bit longer, in case he stayed late.
Nothing.
I can’t fault the doctor. He was the on call doctor, so for all I know, he ended up in the emergency or something. It still left me feeling like my entire day was wasted.
Here’s hoping I can get at least the transplants done tomorrow!
It’s barely evening, but I think I’m done for the day! :-D
We had plans to go into the city so the girls could get some shopping done that we never quite get to when we do our monthly stock up. With that in mind, I started my morning routine early, starting with visiting the kittens.
Beep Beep dashed up the stairs when I opened the door to the basement, so I let her be and made sure no other cats came down. This way, the babies got to have the wet cat food, without having to fight over it with their mom! :-D
Except for Saffron, who was much more interested in me…
I think they did leave some behind for Beep Beep, when she finally came down. :-D
Doing my rounds outside is getting so gorgeous right now!
I noticed that the cherry tree by the house is blooming now.
Just the cherry trees by the house. The ones near the new garden plot are not blooming yet. Both areas get the same amount of light and rain. The only difference is the micro-climate created by the house itself.
I also found some surprise blooms.
When cleaning up along the south side of the spruce grove, I found a row of crab apple trees. While I still have much to do in cleaning up dead wood and thinning out the trees, what I managed to do so far, made a difference. Last summer would have been their first summer with more light and space. Like the row of crab apple trees I uncovered when cleaning up the maple grove, they had no flowers at all last year. This year, there is one tree, with one branch, that is blooming!
It should be interesting to see how things develop here over the years. I will be taking at some of these trees, and hopefully the remaining ones will have better conditions to grow and produce.
The lilacs are starting to open up, scenting the entire yard!
The chokecherries growing among them seem to be doing well this year.
I also checked the sunflowers, and even more of them are sprouting. These are the Early Russian sunflowers, which can grow 6-8 ft tall. The others are Giganteus, which can grow 10-12 ft tall. I hope to see Giganteus seedlings within a few days. The package info says it can be 10-14 days to germination.
When the girls and I headed out to the city, we had a wonderful surprise, just half a mile from home!
I pulled over and my daughter tried to zoom in on my phone as best she could, but zoom really sucks on my phone’s camera.
What you are seeing is a dozen sandhill cranes! They had been near the road when we startled them. These are really huge birds!! Seeing a dozen of them taking off at once was really something!
The drive to the city is about an hour, but along the way we made sure to stop at the medical clinic. The town our doctor is in is about 2/3rds of the way to the city. After not being able to get through yesterday, I wanted to ask about getting renewed prescriptions. Especially for my husband. Given he has the kind that requires a hand written, in triplicate, prescription that needs to be delivered to a pharmacy within 3 days of being written, I said I could come back for them after we were done in the city, rather than waiting until the doctor was off the phone with a patient.
Then it was off to the city, where we had several places to do to. Thankfully, they were not all that far apart, but not only has traffic increased substantially again, but so has construction. Most of the stores had no real restrictions or line ups. At least not the ones we needed to go to. We did drive past a few places that had long line ups outside. Even Walmart didn’t have any line ups for the cashiers, never mind outside.
I really feel for the people lining up outside in this heat we’re having right now!
Still, we got what we needed to do, done. There was some temptation to do more with “while we’re in the city anyway…”, but it was just too long, too hot and too draining! If it wasn’t necessary, we skipped it.
On the way home, we stopped at the clinic again. The doctor ended up asking me to come in to see him about the prescriptions.
It turned out that he had already faxed the refills to the pharmacy. Including my husband’s triplicate prescriptions. Because of the pandemic, they’ve waived the requirement for the pharmacy to have the physical prescriptions. Which no one told me about. They probably assumed I already knew.
My husband’s meds were ready for pick up on the 29th – a Friday – but he forgot to tell me about it until after the pharmacy was closed. So I picked them up on Saturday morning, after dropping my daughter off at work. When I picked them up, the pharmacist told me he could only fill so much, because of the need for renewals.
They must have faxed the clinic when my husband called his refills in, because the doctor faxed the renewed prescriptions …
… on the 29th.
Which means that, when the pharmacist gave me 1 week of bubble packs and told me he couldn’t do more (usually it’s 4 weeks) without a renewed prescription, they already had the renewed prescriptions come in, the day before.
:-/
Meanwhile, I’d been out of my own prescription for some time. When I went to get a refill and they couldn’t, they sent a fax to the clinic right away. I came back a couple of days later, and they still hadn’t received a returned fax.
That had gotten done on the 14th.
No one called me, so I assumed they never got a response. I’ve been without my meds for about 3 weeks. That was part of why I wanted to go in to the clinic in person, since we couldn’t get through by phone.
My doctor clarified all that for me, and even printed out copies of the prescriptions for my own records. Once we were done there, we headed to the town our pharmacy is in.
It turned out my prescription was filled and waiting in the drawer.
*sigh*
Thankfully, my prescription is nothing particularly urgent.
I did ask for my husband’s refills to be done, since he’ll be out in a few days. The bubble packs take more time, so I’ll be coming back tomorrow.
Meanwhile, I picked up something for myself.
After helping my brother patch the shed roof, I felt okay, but by the end of the day, my right wrist started to hurt. I have no idea what I did to injure, or even if it was any one thing that did it. I was able to manage well enough yesterday; mostly, I was reminded of it as a problem when I tried to do something like turn a door nob.
I am considered left handed, because I write with my left hand. With most things, I’m ambidextrous. Some things, I’m right handed.
Like when I open door knobs.
When driving around today, it was more of an issue. Just turning the ignition to start the vehicle was painful. Turning corners, hurt.
So I now have a brace to keep me from over taxing my wrist (though I had to take it off to type) and give it a chance to heal. It’s a bit on the small side, but I got the largest size available.
My and my big, manly hands! :-D
Thankfully, I have two strong daughters who can lug things around for me.
When we unloaded the van, we also brought the pieces of tree in, since it’s supposed to rain. Getting the big one was an issue; we did have to cut one of the branches off.
So far, it hasn’t rained here, but from the looks of the weather radar, we should get at least some, though a rather large rain system has already bypassed us entirely. Some rain would be wonderful. :-)
Meanwhile, it’s time for me to get that wrist brace back on!
Looks like the deer found something to snack on, as the top of our compost pile thaws out! There would be all sorts of vegetable and fruit peels there right now.
If there were deer at the compost, I figured there might be some at the feeding station…
There certainly were! Along with Pump Shack cat and Two Face. :-D
As I was watching, the two in the back of this photo wandered behind the house. Then they suddenly came running back into view, clearly startled by something.
There turned out to be a big pick up truck coming up the road. It was slowing right down as it neared the intersection – far more than usual – then continued to drive slowly after it turned, until well after it passed our driveway. By then, all the deer had been startled away. Going back to the window I first saw them at, I could still see them in the trees, with a couple already crossing the road. Not long after, I saw the truck returning and driving just as slowly. At that point, I figured the driver was watching out for any deer that might come running onto the road, rather than trying to watch them in our yard. :-)
It makes me so happy to see our furry visitors. :-)
On a completely different subject, we got the call I was wondering about this morning. The heart clinic phoned my husband.
There was a rather long and detailed interview, checking on his status. As far as his heart condition goes, he’s been doing awesome, but he did have to qualify some of his answers by explaining that he was dealing with the pain of his disability.
By the end of the call, after making sure he wasn’t in an urgent situation, his two appointments next week were cancelled. He was told they were looking to reschedule in June. He was also told they’re cancelling all their appointments, due to the Wuhan flu, to reschedule in June. They have no idea how they’ll re-book everyone for June, so it’ll more likely be July or August.
I can’t say I was expecting this, but I wasn’t not expecting it, either.
So that’s off the calendar.
My mother’s medical appointment is still on, though it’s already been rescheduled once. We shall see how that goes.
I did call my mother to check on her yesterday. I woke her from a nap! Oops! :-D
She assured me she had been able to get to the grocery store. It’s just a couple of blocks away, and she does the distance well enough with her walker. She’s been told to try and get exercise, so this is one of the ways she does it. The only downside is that the main doors of the building are now kept locked, so outsiders can’t get in without a resident letting them in, which makes is harder for her to get in and out with the walker. Those doors are the ones with the button to push to open automatically. She manages okay, though. As for her supplies, the grocery store delivers to her building regularly, so she has no problem buying as much as she needs and getting it home. Apparently, the only things they were out of stock on (that she noticed, anyhow) were bananas and garlic! :-D
She had also gotten a call from my sister the day before, and even the social worker had called to check if she needed anything. With all the social events now cancelled and people told to stay at home and not have visitors unless they absolutely have to, I think my mom is getting a bit bored! She does still go to the lobby just to sit for a while, for some “fresh air” and sit in at sunny window. The walk down the hall counts as her exercise, too. :-)
The main thing is that she’s doing okay and is not running out of any necessities.
As for her appointment, I’m not expecting a cancellation call, but again, it wouldn’t exactly be unexpected, either.
We continue to have frequent visits from deer in our yard. I got this photo out my window yesterday evening.
Of the 5 deer in the photo, 4 of them are a family group. One of them was part of a group of 3, two of which I could see through the trees near the old garden area, but they never came any closer to the house.
I don’t imagine there was much left at the feeding station, this late in the day, but they’re still coming by to snack on what they can find!
They are so pretty.
Speaking of pretty, check out this beautiful Potato.
Potato Beetle has gotten into the habit of dashing in front of our feet as we walk, slowing down, forcing us to step around him, dashing in front again, slowing down… then flinging himself onto the ground and rolling.
In other words, he’s trying to kill us by tripping over him. :-D
I was very late in doing my rounds this morning, and Potato Beetle was the only one around at first. That meant I got to pick him up and carry him – it was either that or constantly trying not to trip over him! – and he was very content to stay in my arms. Unlike Butterscotch, Beep Beep or Two-Face, who are in constant motion while being carried.
He so wants to come inside!!
There has been zero interest in our attempts to adopt the rest of the babies out, which is really frustrating. Two-Face is booked to be spayed later in April, which means we’re going to have to bring her inside, if only to make sure she doesn’t get pregnant, first.
But we already have 7 cats inside. It’s getting to be a problem. Part of the reason I did my rounds so late this morning is because of being kept up most of the night by cats.
Which reminds me. When topping up the outside cats’ food and water last night, we had an extra visitor in the sun room. Stinky is back! He stayed around, hidden behind the makeshift cat cave, while I was in there. Later, I could see him through the bathroom window, eating the cat kibble. When I looked again at about 2 am, he was still there and eating again! This might explain while, some mornings, all the food bowls have been completely empty, with barely a crumb left behind.
I was talking with one of my daughters this morning about the outside cats, and how we’re slowly getting them fixed as my other daughter has been able to afford it. We were talking about how the outside cats want in, but we just can’t do it.
Unless…
There is a possibility.
If we can clear and clean up the new part basement, then find a way to make a door over the entry to the old part basement, we could do it. We could move the litter boxes downstairs, and they would have a huge amount of extra space if we keep that basement door open. The old part basement has the pumps, including the sump pump reservoir, so we don’t want to let them in there.
I guess that’s incentive to get the basements done faster!
We shall see.
Meanwhile…
Today, being Sunday, is our day of rest. Normally, I’d be in town right now, while my younger daughter is at work for her short shift. The pharmacy she works at is closed on Sunday now, due to the Wuhan Flu, so we are all home today. For a moment I thought that, hey! I could go to church! But the churches are all closed to services right now, too.
Which leads me to another topic entirely. Normally, I try to stay away from stuff like this, but this blog is about our new life here at my old family farm, and this is one of those things that is affecting us. Even as relatively isolated as we are.
I am just so frustrated about all the panic over the Wuhan Flu. People are being so stupid about it. This morning, my husband caught an article about a couple in BC that walked into a grocery store and bought their entire inventory of meat.
I have two immediate thoughts about that. The first is, who has the money to buy that much meat? The second is, why did the store allow it? Retailers have the discretion to limit purchases. Why didn’t they?
Meanwhile, I just read the updated protocols for the hospital my husband has appointments with in the city at the end of the month. His appointments have not been cancelled, but the hospital is now allowing access at only 2 entrances. The main entrance and one to the cardiac clinic, which is also the emergency entrance and the one we will be using. Everyone who comes in will be checked for symptoms and asked about their travel history.
The thing that bothers me so much about all this is the panic – largely induced by the media. I’m certainly not against precautions, but so much bad information is out there right now and, as mentioned earlier, people are being stupid about it, and their behavior is affecting everyone else, in a negative way.
Another part of my frustration is this.
We’re nearing the tail end of the annual flu season right now. While there is non-stop hyperventilating about the Wu Flu around the world, in the US alone, between October 1, 2019 and March 14, 2020, there have been an estimated 38 – 54 MILLION flu illnesses. There have been an estimated 17 – 25 MILLION flu medical visits. There have been an estimated 390,000 – 710,000 flu hospitalizations, and between 23,000 – 59,000 deaths.
I’ve found the Canadian numbers. The Government of Canada website has weekly reports. The latest report, as of this writing, is March 8 – 14, or Week 11. From that last link:
Severe Outcomes Influenza Surveillance
Provincial/Territorial Influenza Hospitalizations and Deaths
To date this season, 2,232 influenza-associated hospitalizations were reported by participating provinces and territories Footnote 1.
68% of the cases were associated with influenza A.
Of the 978 cases for which subtype was reported, 55% were associated with influenza A(H3N2).
The highest cumulative hospitalization rates up to week 11 were among adults 65 years of age and older (71/100,000 population) and children under 5 years of age (69/100,000 population).
273 ICU admissions and 97 deaths have been reported.
68% of the ICU admissions and 71% of the deaths were associated with influenza A.
With so many people coming in to be checked for the Wuhan flu, more cases are being diagnosed for the annual flu. Many cases don’t get recorded, because people just don’t go to the doctor or hospital and get diagnosed. (Side note, the annual flu strains are listed as Influenza A and Influenza B, with A having several sub categories.)
Now, please understand that I’m not trying to say that the annual flu is somehow worse than the Wuhan Flu, or anything like that. There are significant differences. The fact that the Wuhan Flu is spreading at the same time as when the annual flu was in full swing is taxing health care systems to the max. Proper care should be taken.
Wash your hands with soap and water frequently.
Stay home if your sick, if you can. My husband used to work in IT, with government contracts, so he spent much of that stage of his career in various provincial government offices. Government employees are paid by salary, not by the hour, and tend to have generous sick leave and insurance policies. Yet so many people would show up at work, sick, hacking and coughing all over the place, acting like they were some sort of hero for being soooo dedicated to their jobs, that they came in even while sick. The next thing you knew, dozens of people are having to call in sick because of that one plague person spreading their colds. If you can stay home, do it! Not just from work, but going out in general.
Also, wash your hands with soap and water, frequently.
If you can’t stay home, take precautions. That’s where those masks come in handy. Masks aren’t there to prevent you from catching a virus. They’re there to keep you from spreading it to others if you’ve got it yourself.
Wash your hands with soap and water. Frequently.
Keep your distance from other people – stay out of each other’s “personal bubble”.
Wash your hands with soap and water. Frequently.
Sneeze into tissues. Cough into a tissue or your elbow.
Wash your hands with soap and water. Frequently.
Don’t lick your fingers before handling money, paper, etc. That is a MAJOR problem in retail. An astonishing number of customers slobber all over their fingers to better grip their cash or cards, then hand their germ riddled item to some poor part time cashier, who doesn’t have sick leave or insurance, and can’t afford to lose any hours due to illness. Keep your spit to yourself.
Oh, and…
Wash your hands with soap and water. Frequently.
Seriously. It doesn’t take much care to reduce the spread of germs. It’s not like they can get around on their own.
The frustrating thing is not that people are taking the Wuhan Flu seriously (panic behaviour being another issue entirely). It’s that we DON’T take the annual flu just as seriously.
Every year, before flu season, people are given the exact same information for precautions to prevent the spread of the flu.
Every public washroom in places like grocery stores, gas stations, restaurants and department stores have posts with instruction on hour to wash your hands properly. Seriously. People need to be told how to wash their hands.
And people don’t do it.
So many just use the bathroom and leave, without going near a sink.
It’s disgusting.
It gets people sick.
How many people would be protected, every year, if we kept up these basic hygiene practices, all the time? Especially at risk people, such as those with preexisting health conditions or the elderly.
How many productive hours would not be lost?
How many lives would be saved, every year?
Right now, we’ve got people panicking over the Wuhan Flu, with the media whipping it up to a frenzy. Emergencies are being declared. Economies are being shut down. Yet, we have the equivalent of the Wuhan Flu, if not worse, every year, around the world.
Again, this is not to make light of what’s going on right now. It’s just so frustrating that it took something like this for people do engage in simple behaviors we should be using all the time.
Of course you just know that, once this is over, many of the same people who went into a frenzy of toilet paper and hand sanitizer panic buying (all those survivalist and prepper sites are certainly being vindicated right now!), or doing things like buying up the entire inventory of meat in a grocery store, leaving nothing for those who actually need the food, will probably go back to business as usual; going to work sick, coughing all over their co-workers, and not washing their hands with soap and water throughout the day.
I’ve been told I should make sure to add warnings before I post certain things, so I’ll start with that. Towards the end of this post, there are pictures of a dead bird.
Aside from that, during my morning rounds, I did get photos of Two Face. Her wound is healing quite nicely. You can hardly tell where it is, if you’re not looking for it!
I want to thank those who reached out to me after my post about the various situations we’re having to deal with on the property. Your kind words and encouragement are greatly appreciated. Thank you.
The night I wrote about all that, one more thing got added to the list.
A couple of days ago, my husband and I had appointments with someone we hoped would be our new doctor, since our previous doctor had to suddenly move out of province.
The very morning of the appointment, my husband had to cancel out.
Today was my “day of rest”, during my daughter’s short shift. It was warm enough that I was able to do quite a bit of walking (playing Pokemon Go, of course. ;-) ), and was able to check out the conditions at the beach, too.
In the distance, you can see a ridge of ice on the lake. Beyond that is pretty much open water. At this time of year, and at these temperatures, the winds and waves are keeping the lake quite open, even in this comparatively narrow section of it; narrow enough that we can just see the opposite shore, though not in this photo. It will be some weeks, at least, before the ice is thick enough to drive on, and the ice fishing huts start getting set up.
The Re-Farmer 