Medical

So Many Feets!

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We got a light dusting of snow last night.  As I went out to take my mother to the hospital again, this was what I found on our walkway.

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So many kitty feet to make so many paw prints!

I love it!

Things went very quickly for my mother today; we barely waited 10 minutes in a busy waiting room before the nurse came for her.  Just the injection, a quick look at her eye, and we were done.  We’ll be back again tomorrow and likely the day after as well.

I left another 10 minutes earlier to pick up my mom, figuring I’d get her at home to put her knee brace on, only to find her already coming down the hallway, ready to go!  She refused to go back for her brace, but when I kept asking, she finally said “when we come back.”  So when we came back, I asked again!  I think she was hoping I had forgotten. :-D

So I finally got the brace on her.  Oh, what a lovely piece of engineering that thing is!  It’s beautiful!

Yeah, I’m a geek that way.

I told her to think of it like a prescription; just like she has to take her pills every day, she should wear her brace every day.  There are even people available where she lives that can help her put it on, if that’s a problem.

Of course, for all I know, she took it off as soon as I left, though she said she would wear it for the rest of the day.  I hope she will.

As for me, I think the next thing I will do is break out the handheld vacuum before I do anything else.  From where I am sitting as I write this, I can see 10 lady beetles crawling all over my window.  Well.  Not all of them are crawling.  I think several are actually quite dead.  :-o

The Re-Farmer

Critter Stress Relief

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Oh, what a long day it’s been!

Wait… what do you mean it’s not even 6pm yet?

:-D

Actually, it wasn’t that bad.  Just longer than expected.

Before heading out to drive my mom to the doctor, I was able to get a few quick pictures – though the camera wanted to focus on everything but the cat…

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This is the tree Butterscotch got stuck in a while back.  It’s almost like she’s going “I can do it… just watch me…” :-D

I left earlier so I could help my mom to put on her knee brace.  I got there and even pulled up to the exit nearest her apartment – only to have her calling me from the main doors.  Yup.  She was out early, ready and waiting.  I mentioned the brace, but no, it’s okay, she says, as she climbs into my van.

My mom is tiny.  My van is not.  It’s a bit of an effort for her!

The drive in was… illuminating… as my mother expressed her discomfort about being taken off the blood thinners for her heart.  I had to explain that the injections were another kind of blood thinner, but something that wouldn’t make her bleed.  But she was still uncomfortable with the change.  Ultimately, though, she did say it out loud; her discomfort was a matter of racism on her part – though phrased to show she believed the change in her medication was due to racism on the doctor’s part.

That didn’t go over well with me.

While certainly not the worst of conversations with my mother, it definitely had some moments.

At least this time, she didn’t basically accuse me of worshiping frogs.  I have decorations on my dash, including scrapbooking adhesive beads, sea turtles, tortoises, a rock fish – in my previous vehicle, I had a much more elaborate display, but the surface is different in this vehicle, and they don’t stick as well.  I also have 1 frog on the dash (I had more, but they fell off) and 1 toad, in my dash, next to the gauges.  I did this because I was spending so much time driving around and waiting in the van, I made it into my happy place.  At Christmas, I even had a tiny Christmas tree with battery operated lights.

My mom just saw the frog, and I guess to her, what I was doing was like when people put little religious statues on their dashes; so it meant that if I had it on the dash, it was because I worshiped it.

But not the turtles.  Just the frog.

She doesn’t like frogs.

After we got to the hospital, we found out where they told us to go was not where we needed to go.  It was all within feet of each other, at least, and the right people were informed that my mom was there for her injection.  We didn’t actually wait for long before a nurse came and took her into a consultation room, along with the blood pressure machine, took her vitals then prepped for the injection.  After some questioning of the nurse about the doctor and so on (my mother is pretty good at hiding her racist motives behind these questions), she had to be told again that the injection was another kind of blood thinner, so her heart was still being treated.  She asked about having the treatments transferred to the hospital closer to her, and the nurse said she would look into it, and directed us back to the waiting room.

If it hadn’t been for that, we would have been able to leave right away.  As it was, because the doctor was in clinic, seeing other people, it took a while.

My mother was remarkably patient, though, even when the not-quite-there lady came back wanting to watch her show, which wasn’t going to start for another 20 minutes, and kept asking us if we watched it, did we know what channel it was on, and where were we from?

When the show did start, she fell asleep.

Altogether, we waited for probably 1 1/2 hours.  Eventually, the noise of the TV was too much for my mother, so we moved to a table outside the waiting room that’s reserved for inpatients.  Which turned out to be a good thing, because the doctor happened by, recognized us, and came to check on my mom, right then and there.

Which also gave us the opportunity to clarify about the medications and the requested transfer.  The doctor wants my mom to keep coming back, rather than transfer to the closer hospital, so that the same people will keep monitoring her eye.

I’m good with driving her.

My mom was pretty tired by then, though, and glad to finally leave.  She’s not happy with the situation – especially after I told her that it’s likely she’ll need to come back until the end of the week, before her eye clears.  I don’t think she’s getting that this is just her first day of getting the injection instead of her pill, and it’s going to take a while.

I am so glad I have been able to come with her for these.  Before going home, she needed to get some prescription refills, and she completely misunderstood the doctor, thinking that ALL her prescriptions were being changed, not just the blood thinners, and so on.  Though I explained various things to her, she kept having to get them explained again by others.

It got very exhausting.  For both of us!

But I was able to help her get some grocery shopping, too, and carry them in for her.  By the time she got home, she looked more than ready for a nap!  I do hope she got one.

Tomorrow should, hopefully, just be a quick trip in for her injection, then home again.

And this time, I hope to get that brace on her leg!

It was good to get home.  My daughters were in the process of baking more bread, and taking care of the critters.  Even got some photos for me.

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Mama and the twins had come by, and were very active about it!

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While Nasty Crime Boy was very interested in something going on above Eunice, the Barely Upright Snowman.

As for me, it’s all I can do not to go for a nap right now. :-D

The Re-Farmer

 

In for a penny, in for a pound.

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This morning, I headed over to my mother’s place to drive her to the hospital to follow up on her blood filled eye.

Unfortunately, she continued to take the blood thinners, which she takes for her heart, that she was told to stop taking, because she said she felt really bad without them.

Once at the hospital, we got passed around from place to place; turns out that the hospital, clinic and lab are all in different areas of the same building.

Very long story short, the blood thinners are why her eye is the way it is; she may have scratched it herself, or just rubbed it really hard – she mentioned that the day before she’d gone into the hospital with my sister, her eye was really, really itchy, and she’d rubbed it hard because of that.  !!

The doctor that saw her decided to put her on a different heart medication that will involve injections, in place of the current blood thinner she is taking.  Thankfully, just before we was given the injection, I mentioned that she’d taken her regular meds this morning, and would that be a problem?

The nurse double checked, and yes, it would be!

So she will get her first injection tomorrow, and will continue to get them daily, until her eye clears.

Which means I’ll be driving her to the hospital every morning for probably the rest of the week.

In for a penny, in for a pound!  Taking on some of the driving of my mother to medical appointments was one of the things I intended to help with, after all!

Good thing my own schedule is clear.  And that I’ve got two handy daughters to help out their dad while I’m away.

Overall, the trip was good. My mother used a cane today, instead of her walker.  It doesn’t fold up, like my husband’s does, but I have plenty of room in the back of the van for it.  Ah, well.  At one point, I had gone ahead to open up the door for her, then watched her as she walked over.  This was the first time I’ve had a clear view of her leg that’s bothering her while she was walking for any distance.  Her knee is bent inwards quite severely!  She was largely walking on the inside of her foot.  I’ve offered to come earlier tomorrow morning to help her put on the brace she’s supposed to be wearing.  She agreed, which is a huge step forward.

Even with all the reroutes (including more blood work), we didn’t spent much time in the waiting rooms, and we were out in about 1 1/2 hours.  We had passed a restaurant on the way in, and she offered to take me to lunch there, but they weren’t open yet, so we ended up going back to her hometown and she took me out for lunch there, then I got her home.  She was pretty tired by then.

Tomorrow should be much shorter, at least.

Meanwhile, the girls did bread baking while I was away; they’ve been doing the basic sourdough recipe so regularly now, they don’t even need to bring out the cookbook anymore. :-D  They’re thinking of doing more tomorrow, except using The Rye of SourOn instead of Sir Sour Alot.

I showed them the pictures I was able to get of the deer I saw on the way home.  They told me Hungry Girl and Barbecue had come by while I was gone, both of which came back while I was uploading my phone pictures onto my Instagram.

I am thinking I might want to bring the DSLR with me tomorrow, just in case… :-D

I didn’t get a lot of pictures of Hungry Girl and Barbecue today, but here are a couple of Hungry Girl for you to enjoy.

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This one really stood out for me, when I saw that big, beautiful eye!

And then I saw this next one, and it made me laugh out loud.

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Oh, how I love the goofy face pictures! :-D

The Re-Farmer

 

 

 

 

A Day of Rest

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Today was a very quiet day; I’ve learned to really appreciate those!

I posted some photos of the outside cats on my new Instagram account when I went out to feed them this morning.  Butterscotch came out, and I tried to see how the wound on the back of her neck was doing.  The fur was no longer matted and damp looking, but quite clean, so some grooming obviously happened.  Though I could feel where the wound was, she wouldn’t stay still enough for me to see anything.  It’s clearly not bothering her, though, which is good.

I’ve yet to see any deer today.  My older daughter thinks it might be too wet.  I’m hoping they come by later on.  The squirrels and birds will eat only so much, and as damp as things are, the seeds might start germinating – or rotting, depending on the conditions.

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Nasty Crime Boy entertained us for a while.  At first, he seemed to be watching something up the tree, though nothing that we could see from our window.  Mostly, though, he was just starting at the tree trunk.  Perhaps a bug had caught his attention?  I was able to get his attention for a photo, though. :-)

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Trüllbus the Crime Eater took over Rolando Moon’s favourite spot.  He had joined me when I was putting their food out this morning, but he would not let me touch him, or even go too near him.

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The redpolls were out in full force, but they were so active, I didn’t even try for a photo of them.  Instead, I managed to quick shot of this little feathery golf ball of a chickadee!

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Only one blue jay visited today.  Looks like it was a day of rest for the critters, too.

It’ll be an early bed time for me tonight.  I’ve got my first turn taking my mother to a doctor tomorrow morning.  One of her eyes had suddenly turned blood red.  Thankfully, my sister was visiting that day and able to take her to see a doctor.  The local clinic was closed, however, so she had to go to a clinic in the next large enough community.  That’s where I need to bring her back to tomorrow morning.  It’ll be about 40 minutes drive, plus the time it’ll take to pick up my mother.  Who knows how long we’ll be in the waiting room; they only told her to come back in the morning.  No appointment made.

I think I’ll bring along a small crochet project.  And maybe some extra yarn and hooks for my mother. :-D

My daughter has already offered me the energy drink she had been saving for another day.  I’m going to need it! :-D

The Re-Farmer

Feeling like Spring!

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We’ve hit a whole +3C today!  Gosh, it feels so warm.

Of course, in a couple of months, the same temperature is going to feel cold, but hey, I’ll appreciate it while I can!

It was a great day to meet with family in town for a birthday brunch for my older daughter.  Unfortunately, my husband was in too much pain to join us. :-( We got to see my older brother and his wife, plus my nephew and his wife, whom I haven’t seen since I came out for my father’s funeral, almost 2 years ago.  My older daughter hadn’t seen them since my youngest brother’s funeral, about 8 years ago.  Yeah; the only time we’ve been seeing family has been for funeral related events.  We weren’t even making it to weddings.  We had lots to talk about!  Thankfully, the restaurant wasn’t busy, because we sat there for over an hour, lingering over coffees and talk.

In the end, it was probably a good thing my husband didn’t make it.  He would never had been able to stay so long.  No amount of medication can keep away that level of pain.

After, we spent some more time chatting in the parking lot about the car my nephew was driving; he’d salvaged it out of one of the car graveyards here at the farm and got it going again – he even left the moss growing in the Bondo cracks.  It seems one of the front tires was separating.  Did he have a spare?  Of course.  He had two full size spares. That’s my nephew!  :-D

So they were maybe going to go to where the boats were parked, where there was more room to change the tire, which I thought was great; that’s where we go to play Pokemon Go, so we’d meet them there if they did.  My daughters, meanwhile, walked to a Timmies to get more coffee, and they would meet me there, too.

When my nephew didn’t come to the parking lot, I thought they decided not to change the tire, but then a lure showed up on the Pokestop.  Looking around, I finally saw this familiar knit jacket that I had been admiring at the restaurant; my nephew’s wife had walked over to play Pokemon Go.  Which was perfect, because once my daughters joined us, we had enough people to do a raid. :-D

It turned out they had gone to another parking lot with boats in it.

Yeah, there’s more than one boat parking lot in town.

I completely forgot about the one by the marina.  It has a much more “private property” feel to it than the yacht club parking area we were at, which is next to a public park.  I don’t know that I’d call any of the boats there “yachts”, but there IS a sign… :-D

When we got home, my husband was lying down, so it was strange to find a business card tucked into the door.  Someone from a scrap metal company had come by while we were gone and left it.  Probably going to all the farms in the area.

We’re hanging on to that card!  Unlike my nephew, we are not in a position to start salvaging the many vehicles lying about.  We have neither the skills, nor the resources.  Nor the desire! :-D  Then there are the old fridges and freezers all sort of ancient metal things lying about…

Once things are clear of snow, I plan to do a walkabout with my brother so he can tell me the status of various things, including all the … stuff … lying around, so I know what I can get rid of.

Being away as long as we were, it meant we missed seeing the deer.  I’d put the cat food and deer feed out earlier than usual, and I did get a couple of cats come by.  Butterscotch even let me touch her.

Which is how I discovered a strange patch on the back of her neck.

Eventually, as she went from going to a food or water bowl, to winding herself between my legs, I was able to make out that it was a wound.  It looks like a bunch of fur has been torn out.  It looks raw, but it’s not bleeding, and when I had inadvertently skritched the area, she did not react in pain.  My older daughter had noticed something odd about the fur yesterday, so it’s been like that for at least that long.

Cat fight?

Most likely.  No way to know, though.

No deer pictures, but we did get some cat pictures…

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Eunice the Scary Snowman is starting to look like Eunice, the Sad, Tired Snowman!

Not that Beep Beep minds, while sitting on a warm spot.

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We weren’t able to get a photo of Beep Beep and The Hand, batting at each other while they were sitting like this.

They love that stone cross!  So do the squirrels.

I am so looking forward to the snow being gone.

The Re-Farmer

 

 

 

Critters – and ID progress

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We had a lot of deer activity out our window this morning!  All five of them, at one point. They were all energetic and dashing all over the place, which made getting photos a bit of a challenge!

My younger daughter was watching them and commented that the twins are starting to get less fuzzy and starting to look more sleek, like their mother.  I’ve noticed their faces are starting to get less round and also starting to get that more “adult” look.

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Except when they’re making silly faces! :-D

Despite our repeated vacuuming, the Asian lady beetles are still out in high numbers.

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In the morning, they really like our living room window.  They are upstairs in the highest numbers, but they also really like my office.

Yesterday, I made myself a giant cup of tea, then went into my office to work on the computer.  After a while, I took my empty cup and started to refill it, only to find a lady beetle had landed in my cup and was now swirling around in the tea.

Ew.

So now I’m paranoid about my tea.

This morning, one of my priorities was to look at the public insurance website about was needed to get a driver’s license updated after a move, because all this about needing my proof of address to include my physical address was getting beyond ridiculous.  The website very clearly states,

Rural customers must provide at least one document containing their physical address. If rural customers do not have two supporting documents containing their physical address, the second document can contain their mailing address.

Which is what I gave them.  In fact, both documents had the physical address, because the proof of identification form specifically has “no p.o. box” on it, as we’d considered adding it in, too.

So instead of driving to my bank branch in the town my mom lives in, I printed out copies of last month’s electricity and phone bills (this month’s aren’t up yet, which means they are likely not going to be available online until next week), as well as the puclic insurance company’s webpage.

When we got there, someone else was being served at the counter, so I waited.  Then a woman came out from the back – the one I’d been dealing with the last 3 times I’ve been there and has been trying to help me so much – and went right to helping me.  She knew why I was there!

We talked for a bit and I told her about my calls with the phone and electric companies, and how the electric company simply can’t include the physical address, because their system doesn’t allow for it.  She was able to tell me why the personal identification form was rejected.

It turns out the problem on the form wasn’t with me or my address.

It was the postmaster.

It seems that the identity unit (we have one???) couldn’t confirm her as a postmaster, based on some sort of criteria they had.

Which is weird, since she has a framed certificate up on the wall, identifying her as the postmaster, issued by Canada Post.

Totally bizarre.

In the end, she took my phone bill as proof of address, because the electric bill had a slightly different postal address – it included the term “station main” on there (which is what they normally do).  I mentioned that they had a copy of my marriage certificate, which has my address on it, but Vital Statistics isn’t among their list of acceptable sources.

Well, what I’ve given now had better be good enough.  If this isn’t, I don’t know what’s left!

After that, my daughter and I picked up some prescription refills for my husband.  Unfortunately, it was for painkillers that can’t be filled until the last refill is almost done.  My husband had phoned it in yesterday, but they wouldn’t be ready for pick up until today – and he ran out of the painkillers last night.

It was a rough day for him today.  It’s not like he can take them any time, either, but on a schedule.

After picking up the refills and doing  some other errands (one nice thing about it; almost all the stuff we needed to do was within a block of each other), my daughter and I went to play some Pokemon Go.  Which turned out to be really excellent hunting; we both caught new Pokemon for the Pokedex, and we actually caught a Blissy!  She hasn’t even seen a Chancy, yet (I’ve had much more opportunity to play that she has), so that was pretty exciting.

On the way home, we stopped at the post office.  The postmaster wasn’t there, but I talked to the person that was working the post office to pass on what happened with the form.  I figured she might like to know that the identity unit couldn’t verify her as the postmaster.  Mind you, it could be because this is such a tiny post office, inside a retail outlet, and not a stand-alone office, like in the next town.

After we got home, my daughter was a sweetheart and did some bread baking.

I ended up crashing with the cats for 3 hours.

I’m getting too old for this. :-D

The Re-Farmer

A Day Away

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An unusual day, today – I didn’t take a single photograph!  I was away most of the day, and don’t even know if the deer visited.

I had an appointment in another city; it’s still an hour’s drive away, but a much smaller city, so once there, it’s quicker to get places.  I left early, so that I could go to where I could print out photos for my mother, along with some 8x10s for ourselves to frame.  I chose a lot of images to show her when I visit – my daughter will be coming along with her laptop – but printed out “only” 14 of them for my mother.  Along with the deer she asked for, I included some birds and cats, and even one of my daughters with their completed snowman.

The staff member that helped me commented on the photos, so I told her a bit about our set up, and that they were all taken through our living room window.  I picked the 1 hour pick up option when I was done, thinking I would pay for them, go for lunch, then come back – glad that I’d left as early as I did.

Turns out that the 8x10s were done before I even finished paying for them, and the 4x6s for my mother were in process.  The other staff member at the counter that processed my payment brought over the 8x10s and commented on them – two deer close ups, and a redpoll on a twig.  There was another customer using one of their machines that heard me talking about the deer, and very excitedly asked if she could see my photos! :-D  Turns out she gets deer in her yard, too, but isn’t able to get photos of them.  So she was really excited to see them.

That done, I had lunch and hung out until it was time to find where my appointment was.  It was my first ever counseling session, to talk with someone about the stress issues I’ve been having, even after leaving the toxic environment that was causing it.  Thankfully, I’ve been able to consult with my lawyer and another expert, so I’ve got a plan of action, should things come to a head.  I told the counselor that I seriously considered cancelling the appointment because that, alone, made a huge difference in reducing the stress levels.  However, I told her I’ve also seen many people over the years dealing with stress and not going to someone for help with it and, over time, it ended up causing them more problems, whether it was not getting grief counseling after a tragic loss, or domestic situations, or for any number of things.  I didn’t want to be “that person”.   Despite the push in recent years to encourage people to view their mental health the same way as their physical health, there is still a huge resistance to actually seeing a professional about it, largely due to stigma.  Me, I’ve reached that stage in my life where I really don’t care what anyone thinks of me, and if they give me grief (or bully me in any other way), I am no longer the shrinking violet that backs off and slinks away, like I used to.  Now, I stand up and challenge people who do that, no matter who they are or what status or titles they might have.

Bullies really don’t like it when people stand up to them.  Unfortunately, it happens so rarely, they usually get away with it, and just move on to the next “victim.”

Or in other instances, try to exact their revenge though other means.  Which is basically the problem I’m having now.

I think it was a good session.  There really isn’t a lot she could do for me, but she was able to give me some resources, ask questions and listen to why I was there, and I am welcome to book another appointment any time I feel I need to.

I was done early enough that I could go and visit my sister at her farm.  I haven’t been there in years.  It was good to see her, and the changes they’ve made in their house since I was last there.

Female Redpoll

I showed my sister the photos I’d printed out and, since I had the USB stick, I brought that out for her to look at the rest on her computer.

She was surprised by a photo of a redpoll like the one pictured her.e

The surprise being the yellow/copper cap, rather than a red cap.

For some reason, my thought was that this was the difference between the males and females; the males have the red cap, the females being less bright, so they had the yellow cap.  I’d forgotten that the males have a red chest as well as the red cap, while the females have just the red cap.

So what is the one with the yellow cap?  It’s clearly the same bird.  There’s no other real difference.  I had a photo of one with a red cap, too, so we compared back and forth, and they’re the same, except for the colour of the cap.  We were seeing a lot of the ones with the yellow cap; it’s partly why I originally misidentified them as chipping sparrows, because in my own bird book, which doesn’t have redpolls at all, this was the one that looked the most like it.

She dug out her bird book, but it has illustrations only.  Male, female, juvenile.  The juvenile has no bright colours at all.

After talking about it, her conclusion was that they might be juveniles that are in a transition stage from having no bright cap at all, to their adult colours.  She is probably right.

If any birders are reading this and can fill me in, I’d love to hear from you!

I wasn’t able to stay at my sister’s for long, unfortunately.  My husband had called in some prescriptions. I wasn’t sure when the pharmacy closed, and it was nearly an hour’s drive away.  I wanted to get my own medical insurance coverage set up, too, now that we’ve been assured my coverage is all set.

It’s a good thing I left when I did.  I got there 15 minutes before they closed.

I still don’t have insurance coverage.

The first person tried to set it up on my file, but couldn’t get it to work.  So someone else came over to the computer to try other things.  She couldn’t get it to work, either.

So, it’s back to talking to my husband’s employer and their insurance carrier.

At least I was able to get his meds, though when it was rung in, the pharmacy was officially closed.

By the time I got home, I’d driven about 200 km in total, and had been gone for more than 7 hours.  About 2 1/2 hours of that was just driving.

Yeah, that’s a bit of a down side to living in the boonies. :-D

The Re-Farmer

 

Two Steps Forward, One Step Back?

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

Critters.

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

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

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

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

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

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Quite the drama! :-D

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

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

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

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

They also don’t take electronic transfers.

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

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

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

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

Telephone tag it is, once again!

So the two things I thought were finally done…

Aren’t.

*sigh*

The Re-Farmer

 

 

Hello, March!

/ Re-Farmer / Leave a comment

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

Awesome.

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

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

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

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

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

It turned out not to be the batteries.

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

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

I will have to investigate further.

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

2018-03-01.bluejay

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

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

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

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

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

The insurance coverage wasn’t used.

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

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

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

Long story short.

They couldn’t get it to work.

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

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

Yeah!  Really!

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Another voice mail.

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

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

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

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

Uh huh.

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

Uh huh.

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

*click*beepbeepbeep*

She hung up on me.

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

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

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

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

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

Ah, well.

So, more move related hassles to sort out.

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

And found pictures of Mama and the Twins.

I didn’t remember taking those.

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

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

I suddenly felt sane again. LOL

Here is one of the photos she took for me.

2018-03-01.whitetail.family

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

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

The Re-Farmer