my brother is the best!

Breakfast buddy, a great idea, and little garlic

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Today turned out to be a relatively productive day.

More than I expected it to be, considering I woke up in pain.

Which was odd considering I was up for a while between 2 and 3am, and had no pain, but when I woke again at about 6am, there it was.

I went out to feed the outside cats to see if moving around would improve things. I tried doing a head count this morning and saw “only” 14 cats.

I didn’t count the skunks.

This little guy was waiting with the cats in the sun room when I came out. It seems to prefer this particular tray just outside the sun room, and was eating kibble where when I came out with the cat soup. It did not want to stop eating when I came close! Hungry baby. It did finally move but came back as soon as I moved on to the next tray. I find it amusing that Sweetie – who still behaves as if terrified all the time – is buddies with the skunk!

After feeding the cats, I hoped to water the garden but, after walking around and checking the beds, I was just in too much pain – and I had taken pain killers before I headed out. So I went in to have breakfast and hoped the painkillers would finally kick in.

They didn’t.

In the end, after waiting long enough, I took some more and tried lying down. That finally did it.

One of the things on my to-do list today was a trip into town. My younger daughter had her own list, so she came along. While heading to the truck and getting things ready, I had a surprise. The shed my brother had bought was up! I never heard a thing!

What really caught my attention was this…

I had been wondering what could be done to create a base for the shed. After leveling the area, my brother salvaged an old steel door – for some reason, there are quite a lot of them scattered about! – to set under the shed. It is the perfect width.

I later found out that the shed is surprisingly light, so he wants to find a way to secure it to the steel door, so it doesn’t blow away in the wind.

I had a bag and a half of non-aluminum cans in that spot, and the cats were already starting to get into one of them. They are now in the shed. No more coming out to find cans scattered all over the place!

My daughter and I headed out soon after. I haven’t seen the renter’s cows for a while and I think they’ve been rotated out. We decided to leave the gate open and I made sure to send a message to let my brother and SIL know, so they knew it was us and left intentionally.

We had lunch first. While we were eating, I started getting a lot of notifications on my phone. It was the security camera at the gate. My SIL took advantage of the gate being open while she was mowing around the driveway. We had actually talked about that earlier and she wasn’t planning to mow, as we haven’t had rain lately and the grass wasn’t very long. The path to the barn that my brother uses a lot, however, was a fair bit taller, so she mowed that for them and just kept on going!

After lunch, we went to a nearby store to look for one of the things my daughter was after. She ended up finding a couple of things she needed, which was handy. Then it was off to the grocery store. I had a couple of the big water jugs to refill, plus a short list from my husband. Since we were there anyhow, I picked up some fresh fruit and a few other things that we would need soon that were on sale, and my daughter found a few things as well. I’m glad she was able to come along.

By the time we got home and everything was unpacked and put away, it wasn’t too much longer before it was time to feed the outside cats again, so I took care of that before doing the watering. This time, I also watered the trees and bushes in the food forest area. It’s been dry enough lately that they got extra watering.

After finishing watering the main garden area and the trees, I came around to do the south garden beds when I found my daughter going by with the wheel barrow. She had dug up the enameled bricks from around the fire pit and brought them closer to the house, where they are currently soaking in water to loosen the dirt before she scrubs them a bit. We were planning to take those bricks out and replace them with rocks that we’ve picked out of the garden, more of which needs to be brought over to the fire pit area. Knowing these were going to be taken out, she wanted to salvage them – to use in the basement! She is wanting to reorganize and do a keep clean in the living room. We’ve got that big fish tank we’d used as a greenhouse for seed starts in the past, and it’s in the way. We’d been talking about putting it in the basement, where I can use it as a greenhouse in the spring, but the concrete gets wet in the spring (parts of it are still wet now) because the weeping tile is probably full of silt and tree roots. Anything we set up has to be elevated, and we’d run out of bricks. Once she has these salvaged bricks cleaned up a bit, they will be used to set under the stand the fish tank rests on, so the wood won’t rot.

Getting all that out of the living room and down the stairs is not going to be easy. It will, however, free up a lot of space we need!

This was set up near the old kitchen garden so, once the bricks were soaking, that’s where I started the watering. While doing the wattle weave bed, I decided it was time to lift the garlic in there. These are from a bulb of garlic I’d found while preparing the rectangular bed nearby in the fall. This was well after I’d planted the garlic in the main garden area, and were clearly quite a bit smaller, even before I dug them up.

These are very young and small garlic, so we will be using them right away, rather than setting them with the other garlic to cure.

It’s a good thing I enjoy doing the deep watering, because it takes at least 2 hours – closer to 3, when the trees get watered, too. I was pretty tired, sore and hungry by the time I was done, and my daughters were sweeting enough to make me a supper when I came in.

Meanwhile, my brother has headed back to the city while my SIL stays here for a while longer. We never crossed paths in person today at all!

Anyhow.

Today has been a mixed bag, but I am happy with how much I was able to get done, in between dealing with pain. One of the things that came up while I was talking to my daughter about what I was feeling this morning was my doctor’s offer to start the process to get me a new pair of knees. I said no to that, as they aren’t that bad, really.

My left hip, however… that is something I should probably bring up, the next time I see my regular doctor!

Not anytime soon, though. One thing at a time, and there’s three of us waiting for various surgeries right now!

Ain’t life grand?

😄

The Re-Farmer

Catching up

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So the past couple of days have been SO much better, it just blows me away!

Yesterday, I was not only well enough to go into the city for the stock up shopping at Costco, but felt well enough to keep on going after everything was put away and we’d had supper. I headed outside for the usual evening cat feeding, then gave the garden a solid watering before heading back in.

A couple of nights ago, my brother and SIL quickly came by to drop off a box with a small raccoon proof shed they picked up. I had some bags with cans at various stages of sorting against the garage, and critters had gotten into them again, spreading them all over. So this is something we can store the aluminum cans in until it’s worth bringing them to the scrap yard. Most of the cans are cat food cans. Even though they are empty, the critters still smell food on them and sometimes tear the bags apart – even after ignoring them for months!

They also let me know that they were coming back the next day (yesterday) to take the trail loaded with metal items to the scrap yard. When they told me about the shed, I mentioned that we had more bags of cans in our basement that would fit in the truck. My SIL said that they could load the bags into their truck (which has a taller cap over the box) and take it in with the rest of the load.

I didn’t know what time they would be coming by with the shed, so I headed out with some fresh bags to at least re-bag the bag with aluminum only that had been torn up. As I was walking to the garage, however, I saw something that wasn’t there when I’d gone out to feed the cats and water the garden earlier.

That wasn’t there when I was out watering the garden beds! I sent the picture to our family chat and my daughters said they had heard something – maybe 40 minutes earlier – fall. It wasn’t even particularly windy at the time!

After re-bagging the aluminum cans at the garage, I came to see how bad the damage was under this tree top. Much to my surprise, the garden bed cover was not damaged. The netting was bent, but it doesn’t have hoops under it, to it can be easily pushed back into shape. All those branches sticking out in every direction actually kept the full weight of the tree top from landing on the cover and doghouse roof. I broke off some of the branches while one of my daughters came over, and she held the tree top up until I could get the garden bed cover out from under it, then pushed it aside, so it’s not over the old dog house anymore. We’ll have to come back with the chain saw to break it down, soon, but for now it waits.

We went in after that and my brother and SIL were in and out to drop off the shed in its box so quickly, if I hadn’t gotten security camera alerts, I’d never had known they were here!

With my SIL’s kind offer to take our aluminum in, that meant getting all the bags out of the basement. I didn’t know what time they would be coming buy, and knew I’d be going to the city, so I wanted to get the cans out before we left. Which had to be done in stages, since we can’t just leave doors open, or the inside cats would be getting into the basement, or outside.

I got it done, though. By the time I got them out near the junk pile, which has been cleared out significantly, thanks to my brother and SIL, I had 11 large clear bags, plus another 8 or so small blue bags. Including the two bags from beside the garage I’d rebagged the night before.

What I found out later was that they weren’t coming out until my brother was done at work (I had thought he might have arranged to leave early or something). So we were back from Costco well before they got here, in seperate vehicles.

I had actually gone back out to water the garden, but suddenly realized my brother had somehow arrived and parked by the barn without my ever hearing him! Then I heard my SIL arriving at the gate. So I postponed the watering and started tying the garlic off so I could hang them to cure.

Which didn’t work out as planned.

Normally, I make two long strings of garlic that I hang under the canopy tent to form a large X across the middle. The garlic, however, turned out to be too heavy. The first string of garlic kept snapping at different spots. In the end, I hung the remaining pieces, reinforcing the longest one with more jute twine. With the rest, I tied off strings of roughly a dozen garlic each and hung them around the sides of the canopy tent.

I was working on this when my brother and SIL drove their truck and trailer up to where the aluminum bags were. In the end, though, they didn’t take them yet. They didn’t have time. The scrap yard closed at 8, but it was at least a 45 minute drive to get there, and they needed to be there before closing time. Last call is usually about 15 minutes before closing.

So they left without the aluminum, with my brother driving the truck and trailer and my SIL following in the car my brother had come out in. They got there just in time and were able to get it done. Once the trailer was cleared, my brother took the car and drove home, since he had to go to work the next morning. My SIL drove the truck and trailer back here.

Meanwhile, I had finished stringing up the garlic.

There are two images in the above slide show. I don’t like that the garlic is around the edges, as they could be affected by the weather more. We’re not expecting rain for a while, though, so I hope they will be okay.

I was just finishing watering the garden when my SIL got back with the trailer. I helped her unhitch the trailer (something neither of us had done before, though at least my SIL has seen my brother doing it), then she drove the truck over to the bags of aluminum. We didn’t want them out overnight, as the raccoons would probably tear them apart.

It was getting dark, so I messaged my daughters and they were both able to come out and help load the truck. Much to my surprised, they all fit, with room to spare!

By then, it was pretty much full dark. My SIL parked the truck near their caravan and stayed the night.

This morning, I was up by about 6am, even though I hadn’t actually slept much last night. I headed out into the wonderfully cool morning to feed the cats and do a quick walkabout before going back inside.

While checking on the garden beds, I found this.

The last time I saw this Arikara squash, it was maybe 6 inches long!!

I set a brick under it, so it wouldn’t have direct contact to the ground. There are several more squash developing, but this one got huge, fast! One squash plant, and we might have as many as 5 squash off of it, if they all survive. This is how all our winter squash should be looking, but even the biggest of the other varieties do not look this vigorous and healthy!

I also spotted this – more wind damage!

This is a chokecherry tree, part of which has split.

Oh, I just realized. This is probably NOT wind damage. This might be deer damage. There are ripe chokecherries on this tree. If they were pulling on the berries like they do when going after the crab apples, they could easily have broken the tree like this.

My SIL and I were planning to head out around noon. That gave me time to go through the house for any remaining aluminum cans that were waiting to be bagged up, filling about half of a large, clear bag. Then I went to the garage, where a bag with crushed cans had been torn and spilling and picked that up. Then I crushed all the cans I could find in the crate and bin we us for recyclables. Last of all, I headed outside the garage with a magnet and sorted the last bag that’s been sitting there for months, pulling out the cans with steel. By the time I was done, I’d filled the large clear bag and about half of a small blue recycling bag. I carried them over to my brother’s truck and added them to what was in the back.

At this point, we have a couple of bags with just ferrous metal in them. We could have taken them with us, but it just wasn’t worth is for barely two bags. The price for steel is quite low.

I later found out my brother got 12¢ per pound for their load. The stuff didn’t weigh as much as my brother had estimated.

The cans sorted and bags and cleaned up, I headed back in to change out of my grubbies and into going out clothes. I double checked the hours I’d found for the place online, and they said they were closed today. !!!??? So I phoned.

They were very much open.

My SIL and I headed out soon after. We went to the salvage yard directly to the south of us that I was already familiar with, rather than the one they went to last night. There was enough in there that they brought out one of the bigger cages with a forklift, rather than the bin they’d brought out the last time we’d managed the trip, and we actually filled it. It turned out to be 252 pounds, and they paid out 70¢ per pound. a bit lower than the average going rate, but these were not “clean”; a lot of the cans had been outdoors for some time before we had to put the bags into the basement to keep the critters from getting at them, so they had literal dirt on them.

That got me just over $175 in cash. Not too bad!

I also remembered to ask for a new magnet keychain to replace the one that was stolen, I think by a raccoon. They had a whole basket full of them available to give out!

My SIL had suggested we go for lunch afterwards, and this allowed me to treat her, for a change!

I don’t know a lot of what’s available in this town, so when my sister suggested Chinese food, I was quite happy to try a place I’d never been to before. We had a lovely meal and a great time catching up with each other.

As we were finished, my SIL mentioned she wanted to go to the town north of us after we were done. I asked if she wanted company and went along, with just a side trip to the post office for something my husband was expecting.

The extra drive meant almost a lot more driving time to chat in. I really enjoy spending time with my SIL. She’s awesome.

The place she wanted to go to was the livestock supply store. She’d never been there before, but that’s one of the places I’d been getting 40 pound bags of cat food from, plus this place has all sorts of other farm supplies to ogle. I was able to give her directions to the store, which is actually away from the town itself. Since we were there anyhow, I picked up a couple of bags of cat food, as well as a very plain, inexpensive, folding knife. Something better than the utility knife I’ve been carrying around when doing yard stuff, with no fancy saw edges or do-dads. Just a plain knife. They had one left in bright orange, and I grabbed that. This way, if I drop it in the grass or dirt, it’ll be easy to see!

My SIL, meanwhile, picked up some stall liners. Something to put under the stairs to their caravan, or other places where they don’t want the grass to be taking over.

I have to admit, when I saw them being loaded into the truck, I started wanting one for our kitchen! These are designed to withstand cow hooves. The cats would not be able to scratch this up! They’re actually too big to fit on our kitchen floor, though, but gosh, that would be so nice. Pricey for what would essentially be considered a floor mat, but worth every penny.

That done, my SIL wanted to check out the hardware store. We both got a couple of little things, but mostly she wanted to look at their display sheds. They had quite a variety of designs on display, from basic wide open spaces, to ones with front porches, pretty windows and lofts.

Some of the price tags on these, though… there’s a reason I want to build a garden shed using the cordwood wall technique! The mortar needed for that, plus using wood from dead spruces we already have, would be a lot cheaper, even with having to buy roofing material.

With all the driving and checking things out, it was late enough that the girls took care of feeding the outside cats before I got home. We’re now good on dry cat food for both the inside and outside cats for probably the rest of the month, which was a nice bonus.

My brother has since made it out and they will be here for the weekend. Much of the focus is still going to be on cleaning up and hauling things away.

Which brings me to something the family is going to need to figure out.

My brother is going to retire in a couple of years. The deal is, he pays for the property tax and insurance, we pay the utilities and keep the place up – something that is getting harder for us to do with all of us being broken, one way or another. Something I hope will improve within the next 6 months or so, as my daughters and I each get the surgeries we need.

Once he retires, they won’t be able to keep up paying the expenses for this place. The money brought in by renting most of it out doesn’t even cover the cost of taxes.

We need to figure out what our options are, and we have only two years to do it in. Meanwhile, my husband’s disability income through is employer ends at age 65. That’s only 7 years away. It’s not like we can take over the property. With both our daughters having health issues, their options are limited, too.

We don’t have a lot of time to figure this out.

The Re-Farmer

A sad good by, a happy visit

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As expected, we lost little Batman last night. I kept an eye on him on the critter cam and knew he was gone when I used the camera to chase out the raccoons in a kibble tray nearby, and there was no movement.

He is now buried under where I plan to plant another tree in the outer yard.

We were never able to socialize him, but I’m still going to miss that little guy.

Today, the plan was to go into town and pick up some fruit for my mother, then visit her for a bit, in the afternoon. I figured, with the festival winding down, it wouldn’t be too bad. It did mean I would be out at a time when my pain levels tend to get bad, so I was pro-active about it. I was up by about 5am and outside by about six, first to feed the outside cats, then bury little Batman.

I spotted Sprout and her baby!

Then I did my usual rounds and checks, gathering a harvest from the garden. After I got back inside and had breakfast, I made a point of lying down for a couple of hours, at least. Not necessarily to nap, though I did doze a bit, but just to make sure my body rested before I headed out. It worked. I did not get hit with the pain later on, even when I was doing quite a bit of walking around.

As I was eating my breakfast, I got a call on my cell phone. That it even came through was the first surprise. The second was who we calling. A friend from high school. She was in town for a short while and was hoping we could get together. I told her I was going to be in town later, so we worked out that I would contact her before I went in to see my mother, and we would get together when the visit was done.

While getting ready to head out, I was surprised to see my brother out front with his truck and trailer, already partially loaded. He was getting the appliances and other metals on, to take to the scrap yard once he could get the time off work to take it in while they are open. As I headed to the truck, though, I spotted something loaded among the old freezers, furnaces, washers and driers I did not expect to be there.

The antique enameled sink that was leaning against the pump shack.

I was surprised as said, that doesn’t go! He said, yes, it goes. The junk goes. I told him I had planned to use it. We went back and forth about if for a while, as I told him where I’d planned to use it. He mentioned the stainless steel sinks in the sheds and garage (yes, we have a collection of those, too), but I said I don’t want a stainless steel sink. I want that one! In the end, though, it’s his sink. He can do whatever he wants with it, and I wasn’t going to argue. I was on my way to town, anyhow.

When I got to town, I was happy to see there was not a lot of traffic on the main road, though the temporary traffic lights were still set up. I headed to the grocery store and picked up apples, grapes and a few bananas, and decided to pick up some crackers, tiny cans of Ginger Ale and a container with a lid that she could use as a fruit bowl.

I also remembered to bring her old fan that she had asked for.

Thankfully, the nursing home has its own parking, and there was one open spot when I got there. The festival was winding down, but not finished yet, so public parking nearby was out of the question.

As I got to her floor and walked past the nursing station, I greeted the nurse, then turned around and came back to ask how my mother has been.

Not good, it turns out. She’s been yelling at them. Things like, when she didn’t get her tea fast enough, yelling “I want my tea”. Sadly, none of this is unusual or unexpected. She has always been one to be abusive towards those who are trying to help her. The nurse actually wished me luck when I continued on to my mother!

Thankfully, I had my friend as reason to leave earlier.

The visit actually turned out rather well.

She did try to do her usual digs and insults, but they didn’t get very far and I was able to distract her. She was happy with what I brought her. I washed the grapes right away and put them in the container I’d brought, and she started eating right away. Oddly, she was spitting out the skins. I asked her why, and she told me that she has to be careful with her digestion. Turns out, she has decided grape skins are hard on her stomach. ??? She decides all sorts of things are “bad” for her, but grape skins are a new one to me.

She tried to grill me on where my brother was and what he was doing. She had treated him so badly the last time he visited, and has zero understanding that this is a problem she is causing. Oddly, when I told her he was very busy, and only has a short length of time to get things done outside of work, she told me not to speak for my brother. I told her, then don’t ask about him. At which point, she started crossing herself. 😕

She complained about how they staff don’t “want” her to see a doctor, or a dietician. Which I know isn’t what’s going on, but she apparently told them that if they don’t want her to see the doctor, she’ll get us to take her to another doctor. Who that would be, I have no idea, but I told her, we can’t just take her to see another doctor. It doesn’t work that way. She’s under the care of a doctor already. She just doesn’t have the health problems other people living here have. I explained the nurses go through her file with the doctor regularly, along with all the other stuff (turns out she convinced them to put her on an inhaler again; only a doctor can write that prescription), but she refuses to accept that.

Then she got around to why she wants my brother to see her. She wants to talk to him about her health. Then she started repeating a story of how, back when she was about 25 years old (so… 70+ years ago) she had the same pain in her chest she has now (very unlikely) and the doctor gave her a prescription and she felt better. She wants us to find this medication and get it for her. All she remembers of it is that it had cherry and orange in it.

I tried to explain to her (again) that whatever she took 70 years ago probably doesn’t exist in that form anymore and, based on what she has described, it sounds like an early version of the “pink medicine” (Pepto) she takes now. The cherry and orange would be flavours, not the medicine.

She still wants to get my brother to find this mystery medication, because she’s convinced it is the only thing that will magically make her all better again.

She still complains about her breathing at night. I tried to suggest she try and take advantage of the hospital bed to sleep sitting upright, with her knees supported, but she stopped listening to me and started talking over me about something else entirely.

*sigh*

I had told her about my friend from high school being in town and asked if she remembered her. She didn’t, but when I gave her name, my mom just wanted to know her ethnicity. When she heard her married name, she wanted to know that ethnicity. When I told her I didn’t know she asked, what kind of friend can this be? I told her, a friend that doesn’t care about such things! Then she mocked her married name because it means “without clothes” in Polish.

I looked it up when I got home. The word in Polish is vaguely similar, but it is not her name at all. But “similar” is enough for my mother.

Much to my surprise, she didn’t give me a hard time about leaving fairly quickly to meet with my friend. Possibly because I mentions I see her only once every year or two. It was only as I was leaving that my mother thought to ask about my own health, since I’d told her I had been to the ER when she’d called me, wanting me to visit her that day. I told her I was going for surgery, party to find out what is actually going on, because so many tests are coming back normal. Something she would understand very well.

She did.

As I was heading out, I called up my friend and found out she was at a particular shop she visits every time she comes out here, trying on dresses! So I headed that way, though I had to park several blocks away. If the nursing home parking hadn’t been private parking that I could stay in, the walk would have been shorter! Which is fine, though I was glad I did that lie down this morning.

I caught up to her and, this time, I got to finally meet her husband! The building this shop is in used to be a butcher shop and grocery store. The owner had a secret recipe for steak spice that is the best ever. When they bought the building, they bought the recipe and regularly have it available, tucked into a corner of the store among completely unrelated items. So while my friend was in the fitting room, I popped over to see if they had any in stock. A customer was in front of the display so I started waiting, but as he and his son were talking about things, I could see they would be a while and just excused myself to grab a bag – then asked if he’d every tried it. It turned out he was local enough to remember the butcher shop and grocery store that was there before, and I told him the story behind the steak spice mix, and that it was the best we’ve ever had.

Then I grabbed a second bag, because I didn’t know when I’d be back.

I saw him walking out of the store later, carrying a bag of steak spice. I know he’s going to love it!

After my friend was done, we paid for our stuff, then worked out where we were going next. She wanted to go to the park where the main festival activities were still happening. We walked while her husband went to their car to try and find a closer parking spot. This gave us a chance to catch up on all sorts of things. She was having difficulty with an injured knee, so I just had to extoll the virtues of having a walker. She told me, she was trying to stay away from that. I told her that my husband had done that for a long time. When he finally got one, he wondered why he waited so long. It is such a huge improvement in quality of life. I don’t know that I convinced her, but I think she’s more open to it.

We took our time walking to the park, resting whenever we found a bench.

The park had the carnival rides still going, as well as a vendor village. All the little tents with the usual stuff you find at carnivals, but a few that were a little more unusual. One that caught my attention had a display of drinking horns and wooden steins that caught my attention. They had the style of drinking horn like we got for one of our daughters for her birthday a few years ago. The also had DnD items, “Viking” jewelry, and other interesting things. I saw grab bags for “hair weapons” that I just had to ask about. I was directed to a display of hair pins in the shape of medieval style weapons – swords, war aces, and the like. The grab bags were cheaper than the display ones, of course, so I grabbed one for each of the girls. We caught up with my friend’s husband and wandered around a bit more. After a while I spotted a donair food truck. We haven’t had real donairs since we left the city. The local restaurant has gyros, which are not quite the same thing. So I got four of them to take home.

Which did mean I had to leave right away, while the food was still hot. They ended up giving me a ride to where I parked my truck.

I found “graffiti” on my truck.

That is so adorable!

My daughter had actually done it a while ago, but this was the first time I saw this part of the truck in full daylight like this, instead of in the shadows of the garage.

My husband had messaged me for something, so I made a quick stop at the grocery store again before heading home. By then, my brother and SIL had left for home. My brother loaded so many washers and driers on that thing. Why were there so many washers and driers? I thought it was funny that we found 6 old toilets around (my brother found the 6th one, buried in the junk pile). There was the one washing machine we brought out to the junk pile when we replaced it. The rest were in the warehouse and storage sheds all over the place. Along with a couple of old furnaces, the remains of a wringer washer, and a couple of huge old chest freezers.

I also got a message that my brother had taken out the enameled cast iron sink and left it for me. That was so sweet of him! It’s a gorgeous sink; the kind with a built in drain area. Antique collectors and interior decorators would pay a pretty price for it. Especially in such good condition. Not that I’d ever sell it. That design is just too useful.

So today turned out to start off sad, but ended well. Even the visit with my mother was okay. I also didn’t get hit with pain after all that walking around, either.

Tomorrow, though, I’ll be walking around at Costco. Hopefully, my younger daughter will be able to come with me.

I’m not looking forward to it, but at least it’ll be on a Tuesday, not a holiday weekend!

The Re-Farmer

An actual productive day!

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This morning, my daughter and I headed out for errands. Too early, it turned out. I had a package waiting at the post office, but while the general store it’s in opens at 9, the post office itself turns out to open at 9:30. I could have sworn they opened earlier! My daughter had dashed in and did get the mail, but left the parcel card for on the way home.

When we got to town, my daughter was a sweetheart and took me out for breakfast (lunch, for her) before we hit the grocery store. This time, we were actually able to refill a couple of water bottles – last time we barely managed to fill one, as both dispensers had no pressure. We picked up a few things, including some things for my husband to make sure he’d have easy food available while my younger daughter and I are away all day tomorrow. My older daughter will be home to make sure he doesn’t have a repeat of last week and almost die on me again!!!

After that, we made a stop at the gas station that ended up taking an unexpectedly long time. On the way home, we just made it to the post office before they closed for a couple of hours over the lunch period, and my daughter was able to get my parcel.

Unfortunately, by the time we finished in town, my pain levels were kicking in again. By the time we got home, I was able to help bring things inside, but had to pain killer up and used some diclofenac cream, then lay down for a while. After a couple of hours, there was no relief in pain. It was long enough that I could take more T3s, and that eventually did it. I’m really hoping that new prescription does the job and this pain goes away, but I’d only had one dose so far. It’ll take at least a little while before I can tell if it’s working.

By the time I was able to get up again, I was eager to test out the contents of my parcel.

My eavestrogh pressure washer was finally in!

I was pleased to see it had a quick connect, but when I tried to attach it to the hose, I realized it had two male couplings. I had to remove the quick connect nozzle and attach the piece with the on-off switch (not visible in the photo) directly to the hose. Very odd.

I then spent the next hour or so, trying to clean a couple of the shortest eavestroughs.

I did not succeed.

I knew it would be difficult. The eavestroughs all have tiny forests of elm seeds growing in them. The debris was dense enough to break the brush head on the other cleaning tool I’d picked up – it came with two brush heads, and the first one broke the first time I tried to use it!

I was able to get some debris cleared out, but found myself with a different problem. The downspouts were getting clogged. After fighting it it for quite some time, I gave up and tried to clear the eavestrough on the other side of the old kitchen/sunroom. It was even worse. Finally, I have one last try at a corner of the living room, just trying to clear the opening to the downspout. Water could barely leak through at all!

I had to stop. There was no point in continuing. The eavestroughs were just too badly clogged.

I’d been updating my brother and SIL about all this, knowing they’d be coming out some time tonight. After failing to clear the eavestroughs, I got out the chain saw and a 100 foot extension cord, instead.

I FINALLY got that big piece of fallen maple branch cleared! It had broken up a bit when it hit the ground and I’d been able to drag off the narrow part of the branch, but the remaining piece was just too large and heavy to move – and it was taking up a significant portion of the lawn.

Not any more!

It took two wagon loads to clear away the logs and the scattered pieces of bark. Anything big enough to be a problem for the law mower. In the second image of the slide show above, you can see most of the logs (a couple of pieces are hidden behind the pile) set up and ready for the fire pit. Maple will make some good cooking fires, and this wood has been dead and dry for some time, so it can be used right away.

It was while I was finishing up putting the logs away and cleaning up as much bark out of the grass as I could, that I heard my brother and SIL arrive.

Since I had the chainsaw out anyhow, I moved on to the sections of maple I’d dragged under the hawthorn “fence”. This includes the pieces that had broken off another maple some time ago that I hadn’t got to, yet.

With these, I stacked the logs in between trees in the living “fence”. There are still some branches to do, but they were too thin to bother using a chain saw. I’ll come back with a hand saw.

I had considered cleaning up more fallen trees in the maple grove, right near the old branch pile and the fire pit logs. I decided against it. I was getting eaten alive by mosquitoes, and the chainsaw needs sharpening.

Part way through the cutting, I had to refill the oil in the chainsaw, so I went to the garage to get the jug. My brother was in lean to side where their mower is stored, looking for something. When he came out and saw me, chugging a water bottle I’d got from the truck, he told me he was going to go up on the roof to check where the leak is coming from. While he did that, I remembered to grab a broken old hose reel he’d dug out of the junk pile for me. I’d found it in the barn some time ago and we tried to use it for an actual hose, but it didn’t work and the hose ended up splitting and cracking. He had the idea that it could still be used to store the longer extension cords, and I was finally able to give it a try when it was time to put things away.

It worked beautifully.

By the time I was putting things away, my brother had done checking the roof over the second floor, and was clearing the eavestrough over the “new part” of the house. He mentioned he might need a hose, so I passed that up to him and he was able to grab it with the tool he was using the clear the eavestroughs. He was up there for quite a long time. The eavestroughs were horribly clogged. Thankfully, he was also able to clear the downspouts.

As for the roof that was leaking, he said the eavestrough over the 2nd floor windows were also clogged. Which is odd, because the girls told me that it never gets clogged. He concluded that this was why there was a leak at one of the windows.

I’ve since passed that on to my daughter and they disagree. This area was a problem before we moved out here. They’d patched the damaged wall, only for it to become damaged again in our first winter. It had stopped after the roof was replaced, until this past winter. They don’t see a connection between the state of the eavestroughs and the leaking.

Well, we’re supposed to get more storms in the next while, so I guess we’ll find out soon enough.

While trying to clear the eavestrough from the sun room, I almost refilled the rain barrel, so while my brother was using the hose to pressure wash the eavestroughs he had cleared of debris, I use the rain barrel to do some watering, even though we had rain this morning.

I was quite happy to see this.

I’m really hoping these were successfully pollinated. I’d hate for these lovely zucchini to whizzen away!

I was also really happy to confirm something that I wasn’t sure I was seeing right, over the past few days.

This is a luffa seedling! I direct sowed them because this variety needs only 55 days to maturity, which means it still has a chance to make it, and we might actually have luffa. I still have not been able to find my package with the remaining seeds, so it would be really awesome if it survives long enough that we can collect seeds.

After my brother was done on the roof, he brought over some tools and a reciprocating saw, with a blade that can cut metal, to work on the tire around the elm tree stump. He was able to cut through it in three places, then we used a pry bar and my chisel tip bar to try and work things loose.

There was progress, but my brother was so tired by then, we left it for the night.

After he left, I brought the hose over to rinse the dirt off my tools when I decided to use the highest pressure setting to try and wash away some of the soil inside the cut up tire.

That ball of dirt is so filled with swirling tree roots, almost no soil got washed away at all. !!!

Still, we’ll probably have it off by the end of the weekend, which means the tree guys will not have to figure out how to deal with it when they come back with their stump grinder. That tire has been sitting there for so long, the rubber is starting to disintegrate in places. It was still hard to cut through, though!

So that’s where we’re at now.

Tomorrow is going to be a very long day at the market, but I’m looking forward to it.

Now, to try and get some actual sleep, so I’m not drifting off at my table tomrorow!

The Re-Farmer

I admit, this terrified me

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So… it happened again, today, but this time at home.

First goal of the day was to make a dump run. As usual, I back the truck up to the house to load it up. My brother and SIL are out for the weekend and my SIL was using their beautiful zero turn mower, so I made sure parked the truck well out of her way.

My daughter and I loaded up the truck, then headed out. Finished up at the dump and head home. With the renter’s cattle now rotated onto this section, we made sure to close the gate when we left, so I stopped in the driveway as my daughter got out and opened the gate. As soon as she did, I went to put the truck back into Drive and…

Nothing.

The shifter just slide back and forth, no resistance.

The steering shifter linkage we’d just had installed as no longer working. Broken? Fallen off? We had no idea.

We just got the truck back. Aside from the drive home, this was the first time we’d driven it! They did test drive it a few times before I got it, but still… it should have lasted.

Damocles dropped his sword again.

Once we got over our disbelief, I left my daughter to take care of closing the gate back up, etc. while I headed in. I saw the barn door open, so I went to see if my brother was there. He was working on some of his equipment, so I told him what happened. He said he was busy, and I told him, I was just letting him know, since the truck was just sitting in the driveway, outside the gate, and told him I was going to go phone the garage – and see if I had any more tows left on my CAA!

I called the garage and left a message, then tried to log into CAA.

It didn’t recognize my password.

I double checked and confirmed I had the right password.

Still didn’t work.

Tried the app. I rarely use the app because I always have trouble with it.

It actually wanted my CAA number input first, but again, I couldn’t log in.

I tried to reset my password. A code would come in to my email account.

It never came in.

I hit resend.

It didn’t come in, and this time, there was no “resend” option.

By that time I got a message from my SIL, telling me my brother was looking at the truck, so I gave a phone handset to one of my daughters, in case the garage called back, and headed outside.

My brother couldn’t fit under the truck to see anything – the guy that had done it before, on the street, was incredibly tiny to fit under there! So he brought out a jack.

The next while was spent getting the truck raised up and secured, with blocks, a second hydraulic jack under the truck, and something I can’t remember the name of that can support up to 2 tons, set up to support the truck’s weight should the jacks fail.

It still terrified me, and it takes a LOT to scare me.

In the first picture, you can see what he found.

Those two pieces are supposed to be attached. The white plastic visible, fits over the metal nib above. It simply fell off.

In the second picture, you can see what terrified me, the entire time my brother was under there. All the safety precautions didn’t matter. The youngest of my brothers had been working under a car. He had taken precautions. It still fell, killing him instantly.

My brother got the linkage connected, but said it would just fall off again, so he looked around.

What he found was a hook, which holds the weight of the linkage cable. It was bent enough to be touching the transmission. Which meant the weight of the cable was actually pulling the linkage loose.

He thinks something had to have hit the hook. Who knows when or how. He straightened it out and then added some zip ties to hold the cable. Now, the weight of the cable actually pushes towards the linkage instead of away, helping hold it in place.

All the while, he explained things, took pictures and even some video. Some of which I was able to message to the garage.

When everything was done and the truck was back on the ground, I was able to drive it to the garage without any problems.

My brother is the best.

I never did hear back from CAA, so I still don’t know if I have any tows left. When I got inside, I phoned the garage and left another message to follow up. I suggested swinging by with the truck so they can take a look at it at some point. There is no way it should have fallen off so easily, even with the hook bent out of place. Even with what my brother did, it could still simply pop off.

Which meant we suddenly weren’t sure about our next trips.

We were planning to do a combination celebration for Father’s Day and a birthday today. My older daughter was going to treat us to Pizza Hut, which meant a trip to the nearer, smaller city. We would have combined the trip to hit a Walmart and a liquor store along the way.

None of us felt comfortable doing that, even though my brother assured me the linkage should hold now.

We decided we’d go to town, instead.

My younger daughter and I headed in so we would arrive as the pizza place we were going to was opening at 4pm, with my daughter messaging the family to let them know where we were, constantly. We ordered the pizzas, which would take a while to cook, giving us time to go to the grocery store. Along with the stuff we picked up for ourselves, I grabbed a small cake for my brother and SIL as a thank you and a Father’s day gift.

It took longer than expected at the grocery store, so when we were done, we went straight back to the pizza place to pick up our order. Then we made a stop at the liquor store for my daughter to run in and pick up a few things for herself and her sister. Then it was off to home.

Every stop we made, we were both on pins an needles. Would the truck move? Did the linkage hold?

It’s insane.

The truck ran just fine. Didn’t stop us from being constantly on edge!

Once at home, I pulled up to the house to unload, then quickly delivered the cake to my brother, staying just long enough to slip it through their door. They went out for supper themselves, not long after, but they will have desert waiting for them when they get back. 😊

Overall, it’s been a day of “rest” in that I didn’t work on any projects outdoors. While waiting in line at the grocery store, though, I couldn’t resist. I picked up a packet of Scarlet Nantes carrot seed tape. I’ll do another succession sowing of carrots. At this point, I’m basically just throwing as many things into the ground as I can, hoping something will make it. Deer got at the Spring Blush peas in the trellis bed. They’re survive, but a few plants are going to be set back. I really want more of the basics, like peas, carrots and beans. If I could, I’d be doing more potatoes and corn, too, but we won’t have ready space for those, even if we did have the time. There is a space down the middle of the trellis bed where I can plant the new carrots, though, next to the rainbow mix that’s already there. Sort of.

Being the 20th, with tomorrow being the first day of summer, I decided to do the garden tour videos today. I’ll see how the files turned out when I’m done here. Hopefully, I won’t have to do them over again, tomorrow.

So that’s where we are at now. Damocles dropped his sword again, but my amazing brother saved us again, while we had our hearts in our throats the whole time he was under that truck. We’ve all had our pizzas for today – my daughter got us enough to last us a couple of days – and we’re just relaxing until we’re ready for cake or pie and ice cream.

Then I think I’m going to try going to bed early. I feel absolutely wrung out.

Happy Father’s day to the dads out there! I hope you’re having a better time than we have been! 😄

The Re-Farmer

Seriously??? What now?

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Good grief.

This morning, I headed into town fairly early to pay for the repairs on the truck, and take the keys. I talked to the owner for a bit and told him the background on when this happened before, and the C clip fix that I’d meant to ask him to check before but kept forgetting.

He told me that, with Chevy/GM vehicles, this is the most common thing he’s seen break down. He’s replaced a thousand of these. They just keep breaking. EXCEPT the after market part. Those hold out just fine.

Then I headed into town to fill the tank on my brother’s car before heading home. I remembered to stop at the post office, and yes, our parcel was there. It didn’t have our box number on it, as some places won’t ship to box numbers. So it had the post office’s address on it. As soon as I came in, the postal worker saw me and got it right out!

After I got home, I had some time to get things ready before going to the funeral. To my surprise, my sister phoned. She asked if I were planning to go, and I said yes. She told me that our vandal had been adamant that he didn’t want me, my brother or my mother there. (You can read why we would want to go, anyway, here), but that his wife had said she would not turn anyone away. I told her, no one has said anything to us directly, I’ve only heard through her, but I assumed as much. She just wanted to make sure I knew, in case there were issues.

There were no issues.

My brother and SIL came out to get my mother. Their son and grandsons where there, so while my brother and mother had one vehicle, the rest went in my nephew’s truck. We had more or less worked out how we would switch vehicles.

After the funeral, we went to the cemetery for the interment. I went along with my brother and mother, leaving the car I borrowed from them, for the moment. My brother parked in such a way that my mother could stay in the car and watch, as she didn’t want to transfer to the wheelchair again. We left when they started handing out shot glasses; our vandal wanted everyone to have a shot of vodka at his graveside. *sigh*

My brother started taking our mother back to the nursing home while the rest of us crammed into my nephew’s truck to go back to where their car was parked. Then I drove my SIL to the garage, with a friend following behind, to switch vehicles.

They waited to make sure the truck started and I was on my way. I remote started it and it sounded fine, but when I got in, there was a warning light, and a message to service the 4 wheel drive.

???!!!

The garage was still open, though, so I quickly told my SIL what was happening, then went in to talk to the owner, who was working on another customer’s vehicle. When he heard what I described, he looked absolutely shocked. Obviously, this wasn’t there when the parked the truck in the lot after servicing it.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to check it today. His diagnostic computer was at his second location. I asked him, so what do I do? He suggested I drive it for a while and see if the light turns off on its own, which sometimes happens. It’s not blinking or anything, right? Nope. Not blinking.

So I tell my SIL and they leave, though she made sure I knew her phone was linked to her car, so I could phone her if necessary.

Then I tried to drive the truck.

As soon as I put it in drive (which felt really stiff with the new part) and as soon as I started moving, the alarm started to ding. There is a large open area I could turn the truck around in, so I did that. While in reverse, the dinging stopped. Once in drive, it started again.

I returned to the parking lot and backed into a spot again, then went in to talk to the owner and tell him what happened.

There was absolutely nothing he could do about it at the time, and I couldn’t drive it home like that. So I called my SIL.

*sigh*

I know they’re really wanting their car back. Their other one, that they’ve loaned me before, it still in the shop.

She had to get to where they were all meeting at a restaurant first, and then said she would come back. In the end, it was my brother that came for me. He called along the way, and it’s a good thing he did. He misheard when she told me where I was. The name of the garage is very similar to the name of the general store in our little hamlet, so he was on his way there! He had just passed the turn off to the industrial park our garage is now located in. He was on hands free and kept me on the line as he turned around and came back, telling me what he was seeing as he drove in. He didn’t have far to go.

When he reached me, I could tell he was very unhappy about the whole situation. I don’t think he quite understood why the owner couldn’t just manually check it. It didn’t occur to me until well after, that he didn’t know the owner was working on another vehicle and couldn’t really stop.

I was apologetic about the whole thing, but really, there’s nothing we could do. We had no other options. I’m just thankful that they could lend it to us at all. They used my brother’s newly acquired electric commuter car to drive my mother and plan to sell their two gas powered vehicles. Both of which needed a lot of work done on them, just to be safetied.

But, we have their car again. We drove back to the restaurant to drop him off, and I took their car home again.

This is getting so ridiculous. I can’t even drive the truck away from getting one repair job done, without something else going wrong!!

I don’t even know how we’re going to pay for it. Thankfully, the bill I paid this morning wasn’t large; about $275.

I did remember to text the owner and suggest he try driving the truck around, as I hadn’t had a chance to describe what I was feeling to him at the time. I barely drove it, and all I can say is that something felt… off.

Thankfully, he knows me will enough by now that when I can only tell him something vague like that, he takes me seriously. He might not always find the problem right away, but eventually, it happens.

I am so tired of this.

The Re-Farmer

A draining visit, a good visit and some spring clean up done

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Today, I was supposed to do a dump run, but I was just too tired and in pain. It’ll have to wait until they’re open again on Tuesday.

I had a rough pain night and didn’t get much sleep, so I was going to try lying down for a bit, then visit my mother in the afternoon. I wasn’t looking forward to that, after her last phone call, but it needed to be done. I wasn’t down for long when I got a message from my SIL. My brother was on his way to see our Mother, and would then come here to the farm.

So I decided to head out to my mother’s earlier and meet him there. When I got there, though, I found another message from my SIL, as well as from my husband. My brother had tried to call me, but he was calling the land line. He was going to the farm, first.

Which worked out. I got the messages just as I parked at the hospital and realized my mother would be getting her lunch tray, so I walked around for a bit to give her time to finish eating before I went in. I stopped at the nursing station to find out about the phone call I didn’t get on Tuesday, about arranging a family meeting with the doctor. The person at the desk wasn’t the one in the know, so she made a note for the nurse in charge to come see us while I was visiting her.

The first part of the visit was okay. My mother talked a lot about things she remembered from back in Poland. All stuff I’d heard before, but that’s okay. I took a chance and showed her pictures of the chicken coop. She asked me why I didn’t build a shed for them instead of something with so many “windows”. I told her, because we can’t do that right now, this is what we’ve got. She laughed at me for having a chicken coop but no chickens. I told her we were getting chicks at the end of the month. Just 10 for now. Only 10? So few?

…

I told her, the coop is only big enough for 10 chicks.

Then she started going on about how wonderful our vandal is, because he buys his eggs from the Hutterites, and he bought chickens for the freezer from them, too. Now, it’s entirely possible he did this once or twice, years ago, but in her mind this is something he always does. I told her, the Hutterites have a huge operation; we just need enough chickens for eggs for ourselves.

Oh, and my sister’s husband visited our vandal, who told him he doesn’t want me or my brother at his funeral. Which I figured. My mother told me, she wanted us to do what was the right “Christian” thing to do. *sigh*

Then the nurse came and things got… brutal, though in a relatively calm way, for my mother.

In a nutshell; the doctor will not see her or have any meetings about her, because he simply doesn’t have the time. She does not have any medical need for a doctor’s care. She went on about her hearing and her vision, but neither is something that requires him. My mother is undergoing the mineral oil treatment on her ears again – it will be for 5 days this time – before they try flushing it again, and my mother had all sorts of things to complain about with that. Meanwhile, my mother is adamant that they are not giving her her second eye vitamin pill of the day. She writes it all down, she counts all her pills, but they tell her different things about different pills – the nurse and I both realized that my mother was mixing a blue pill up with a green pill, thinking they were the same pill, so that’s why she was getting different answers. My mother is also now convinced that her hearing was “perfect” before she came there, and her hearing problems have something to do with not getting her pills. When I pointed out that she used to have her TV and radio incredibly loud when I’d come over to her apartment in the past, she switched to Polish and accused me of taking their side and of lying. She also wants a pill for her eyes. I had to go over how the eye vitamin is only helpful for her left eye and the dry macular degeneration. The only treatment for the wet macular degeneration in her right eye is the injections she would have to go to the city for. She has rejected that and demands another pill; going back to how she claims they have stopped giving her the second one of the day. Even her own notes show that she is getting two pills at 5pm, but now she says she only gets one.

Even after the nurse left, my mother kept insisting they were not giving her these eye vitamins, and all her health problems have now only started after she came to this TCU. Things she has been dealing with for a long time. I kept trying to explain things, but she just went back to the manipulation, saying I was taking their side, etc. etc. I finally said, it was time for me to go.

As I was getting ready to leave, my mother brother up her wheelchair. This is a folding wheelchair that had been my father’s.

She asked me if I recognized it. I saw it in the hallway and said I did. She asked me to bring it over, and began questioning me about recognizing it. The staff had clearly given it a really good cleaning; whatever they used on the heavy vinyl got it all nice and supple and looking brand new. They even oiled the squeaky food rest. However, it’s an old chair, and there are cracks in the wheels and spots of rust that I could say where there before.

My mother clearly didn’t believe me. She has decided it’s not the same chair anymore. The hospital switched it.

This is not a new thing. For as long as I can remember, she accused my father of “trading” cattle, vehicles, furniture, the TV, etc. and he was giving the “good” versions the second family she believed he had, and the “bad” versions for us. When she tried to convince me a particular cow had been traded because it looked different – it had matured and filled out, looking bigger, strong and healthier – I pointed out that if this cow had been “traded”, we now have a better cow, so how did her accusations make sense?

I had a very confusing childhood at times.

The visit done, I headed home, utterly drained. My brother was still here, so we sat in their mobile home and I filled him in. It was good to talk to him about it in person, and we had a great visit! He was dreading his visit with Mom, but I just heard from him. He ended up staying with Mom for a couple of hours and the visit went well. It seems my mother got her nasty out of her system before he got there. I’m very glad it worked out that way, because she has been incredibly cruel to him during most of his visits with her.

After filling in my brother, I headed inside and took a bit of a break before changing into my grubbies and going outside for some manual labour. That, more than anything else, really helps decompress after a visit with my mother.

My focus for today was getting the straw off the septic tank. I had just started when I began getting messages from the cat rescue.

They are trying to get ahold of special traps to borrow and bring here. Traps with motion sensors and operated by remote. We can set up the camera currently facing the isolation shelter to monitor the traps. When the motion sensor goes off, check the camera to see what critter is in it. This way, we can trigger the trap only if the specific cat we are after – Slick, for example – is in the trap. Skunks and raccoons can be ignored. 😄 That would be amazing!

My brother was getting ready to head out around then, and dropped off some lovely compost they’d made from their own kitchen scraps for me. He had time to check out the chicken coop and we talked about the septic area, and the emergency bypass set up I had set off to the side until the straw was gone. After he left, I continued and got it all clear. The surface straw was set aside in a pile, but the damp straw touching the ground, which was already starting to rot, got raked up and repurposed as mulch around the honeysuckle and white rose bushes in the old kitchen garden.

That clear, I set up all the parts and pieces for the emergency bypass against the old kitchen wall for their summer storage.

That done, I also set up a hose at the tap in the wall next to the pipe running out of the basement for the emergency bypass. The shut off valve in the basement can now be opened. I won’t set all the hoses up until things warm up more, but I can at least fill watering cans for the pre-sown beds, etc., for now.

My next garden priority is to start more seeds inside. That keeps getting pushed back, but most of what we have left to start indoors are for 3-4 weeks before last frost, so for those we still have a bit of breathing room. I have only a few things in the 4-6 week range that need to be started now.

So this has been… a day. I’m very happy I got to see my brother and that I got some work done outside. As for my visit with my mother, it is what it is.

It just left me feeling so incredibly drained! Getting the straw cleared off actually helped with that. Now I’m just physically tired, not both physically and mentally tired! 😄

The Re-Farmer

I made it – and got garden stuff

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Well, I did it.

I had no choice.

I borrowed my brother’s truck for a trip to the post office and general store.

But first, I had to do some digging. *sigh*

We have a prescription delivery today, so I went ahead to open the gate, to be left open until after the delivery. Walking down the driveway, I was seeing a very odd shadow. It turned out to be a steeply angled drift that stretched from under one side of the gate, diagonally across the driveway for about 30 feet.

Also, the plow went by. There wasn’t much of a plow ridge, but enough that it was making the end of the driveway too narrow.

Messed up arm or not, it needed to be cleared before I could go anywhere, and before the delivery arrived.

Thankfully, the snow wasn’t too hard packed and I could mostly to it by just pushing the shovel with one hand, but it did take a lot longer for it.

My right arm is so messed up right now.

That done, I got my brother’s truck unplugged (he’s got both a block heater and a trickle charger, so I’m leaving it plugged in even though it’s warmer) and started.

First of all, I have to say, it is a good, solid truck. It has done amazing for my brother, made many trips hauling trailers and RVs, and we got an amazing amount of my mother’s furniture into it when we emptied her apartment – though the battery did die, because of the extreme cold we’d just gone through. Thankfully, my brother has a portable charger/booster for times like that.

I hope never to have to drive that truck again! 😄😄

It’s the largest vehicle I’ve ever driven and handles completely different than any other vehicle I’ve ever driven. Everything about it feels and sounds “wrong”! Even the sound of gravel getting kicked up against the undercarriage sounded wildly different. It’s an older vehicle – I don’t know the year, but I think it’s late 70’s. Maybe early 80’s. Which means the entire frame makes noises that newer vehicles just don’t, anymore. Creaks and groans, rattles, pops and snaps. Of course, it also handled very differently, too.

Still, it got me to where I was going, and I am thankful for it. I’m sure, over time, I would get used to it and it would be fine.

I don’t want to have to get used to it. 😂

I did remember to bring a couple of our hard sided grocery bags when I got to the general store. I had a bit of a shock when I pulled in. Their gas price was $1.169! The average gas price in our province right now is $1.614

I just looked it up and Costco gas prices today are $1.099 right now, while the average price for the city is $1.629

Both gas tanks on my brother’s truck were full, though.

Anyhow.

I went in and got the mail, including the two parcels I was expecting. Then I did a bit of shopping. Just a few items for us, but mostly I was looking at their kibble. We’re running low on kibble for the outside cats.

They only had small 1.5kg (about 5 pounds) bags of cat kibble, and the cheaper brand was just under $10 a bag. Lots of big bags of dog kibble, but none for cats. The store does carry feed, so I asked if their supplier carried the 40 pound bags of cat kibble. She looked it up and they do, but it’s a brand I was unfamiliar with. Still, if it’s something we could get here instead of driving to feed stores in towns to the north and south of us, that would be helpful. I didn’t think of it at the time, but I should request a bag and see if the cats will actually eat it.

I got only three of the little bags for now. The kibble bin for the inside cats was mostly full, so that went to the outside cats, and the small bags for the inside cats. We have lots of canned cat food, thanks to the very generous donation, so we can use more of that for a while.

Before heading home, I messaged and asked if someone could meet me at the garage to help me bring things in. I couldn’t carry anything with my right arm. Even with taking my bags to the truck, I couldn’t open the doors my right arm. I had to put the bag down, use my left arm, hold the door with my foot and grab the bag again. I had to make three trips to bring them to the truck, when I normally would have been able to carry all three bags at once!

When I got home, my younger daughter was waiting for me in the garage – and she was hobbling with a cane! I was glad she was there, though, as she could guide me into the garage. My brother had set a large board across as a stop so the truck wouldn’t go too far in and have the cap hit the top of the door frame, but with her there, she could let me know when to stop before I hit the board.

Then my poor daughter struggled to grab two bags with one arm, to take into the house for me! I offered to find a way to do it, but she managed. I stayed long enough to make sure the truck was plugged in and locked up (my brother is worried about our vandal) before following her.

Once settled in, I texted the garage. I let them know that the third brake light I’d ordered was in, to replace the one I stupidly broke by forgetting the garage door was not fully open before I backed out. It’s an easy fix, but requires climbing into the box, and that’s something that is increasingly difficult and dangerous for me to do. I then asked, if the truck won’t be ready by the weekend, was it possible to get a courtesy vehicle? It’s one thing to drive my brother’s truck to the post office. It’s quite another to drive it to, say, Walmart, in one of the cities, or even just to one of the other towns to go to the feed stores. The part not being in yet is not something they can control, but it has already been a ridiculously long time to be without a vehicle as we wait!

I don’t know how often they check their texts in between jobs. I figure I’ll hear from them just before they close, again.

Then I had my other parcel to open, and this one is for the garden.

One thing that I ordered was 6mm thick greenhouse plastic at 10′ x 26′ (about 3m x 8m) That is long enough to cover an entire 4′ x 18′ bed in the main garden area, with a fairly decent height. I’ve been using painters drop cloth plastic, and it’s just too thin and tears too easily. I haven’t been able to find anything thicker, anywhere, other than vinyl table protectors, which are all too small. Unless I go for clear tarps, which I might still do for other things, but those can be very expensive. I not going to open that package until spring.

Then there is the hoop kit. I’ve been making do with things like Pex pipe, which works well enough, but for the price of the pipe, I wasn’t saving anything compared to this kit. The “60 piece set” includes 50 connectors, 27 garden clips, wire, gloves and 60 fiberglass 17″ hoop rods. The second picture in the slide show above shows the instruction side of the card.

The gloves are the one thing I would consider as probably useless in the kit. They wouldn’t fit my simian hands. They might fit my younger daughter, though. Maybe.

If this works out, I might go ahead and order more of these kits in the future.

Over time, as we slowly frame all the garden beds with logs, we plan to build more 3′ x 9′ covers. The beds are 4′ wide on the outside, so with the thickness of the logs, the actual growing area is closer to 3′ wide. We have three 3′ x 9′ garden beds made with scrap lumber I found in one of the sheds, and that’s the dimensions I was able to make with them, so it’s become sort of the default when it comes to making covers that are interchangeable. In the main garden area’s 18′ beds, we’d be able to fit two covers over one bed. The plan is to be able to use greenhouse plastic or netting interchangeably over the covers, as needed. Until then, we’ll use a hoop system, like this.

Then, there is the portable greenhouse.

Which has its own challenges.

High winds and cats, mostly.

It’s currently covered with a huge tarp, black on one side, grey on the other, that was generously sent to us. It’s a heavy duty tarp, but you can actually see in the photo that there are lots of tiny little holes in it already! I can see light through them, on the inside.

*sigh*

I just came back from getting the prescription delivery, and there was another cat sitting in that same spot. I’ve seen others perched on the peak, as well.

So anything we try to use to cover the frame, so we can still use it, has to be cat proof.

I’ve been sent links as inspiration to use repurposed clear plastic bottles to make a greenhouse. Aside from the 1 gallon size distilled water jugs we get for my husband’s CPAP humidifier that I use in the garden, we don’t use a lot of clear plastic bottles. We haven’t even bought cases of bottled water from Costco in ages. However, it’s something we could make a point of collecting. Theoretically, we could do something like that to create walls that the cats can’t climb. If we were to instead cover it with, say, a clear tarp or 6mm plastic, we would have to put something under it to prevent any sort of sagging, like chicken wire (we have a roll with enough left on it to do that).

Something to figure out. Honestly, though, the bigger priority this year is to create something like a polytunnel in the main garden area this summer, as we would need to use it to overwinter the chickens we are getting this spring. That coop I got is fine for three seasons, but not enough to handle our prairie winters! Still, it would be nice to be able to use that portable greenhouse for our seed starts again. We only got one spring out of it before the cover was destroyed!

Meanwhile, I’m glad I was able to pick up the hoop kit and 6mm plastic. We’ll test it out once things melt enough. The prices were good enough that, if they work, it would be worthwhile to get more. It’ll be much easier to protect the beds from cats with netting, and these rods should even fit in the channels of the dollar store netting kits we got last year. Those were good, except the wire supports couldn’t handle the weight of kittens jumping on the netting.

Lots of work to do. I am looking forward to the warmer weather to get started on it!

Now, if my body would only cooperate and stop breaking down on me.

The Re-Farmer

A day of digging

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I ended up outside for about four hours, digging paths in the snow – and I’m not done!

The priority was to get the fire pit area cleared. That has been drifted over for at least a couple of months now. I got the easy paths done first, though, like the path to the litter compost area. On that side, there was one path that got drifted over that I hadn’t gotten to previously, and I needed to use the ice scraper tool to break up the packed snow to get it clear. The rest of the most used paths only needed minor clearing.

The first section of the path to the fire pit area was brutal. I didn’t even try to re-dig the original path from before. That’s where, in the video, you can see a dark trail from dirty little cat feet. Normally, I’d clear the cat path to where they get under the storage house, with a branch off towards the fire pit. That cat path was too hard packed, so I cleared a new path next to it, until I reached where the old path branched off.

Even working off to one side, the snow was so hard packed, even the blade from the ice scraper had difficulty cutting through. I probably spent as much time on that one short section as I did the rest of the path to the fire pit area. If I had tried to use little Spewie to try and clear it, it would have broken. I’m pretty sure even my brother’s gas powered snow blower would have broken, trying to get through there!

Speaking of which, my brother came out today. Along with stuff he needed to do in their storage, he got his own truck set up. He used the snow blower in the outer yard and driveway as well, and moved his truck to our garage, where it can partially fit through the door. The cap on the box of his truck is too high to drive all the way in. He made sure it was all prepared so we can use it, if we have to.

He is convinced something is going to happen to prevent our truck from being ready in a few days, or it’s going to break down again, and we’re going to need to use his truck.

I really don’t want to use his truck! I appreciate the offer, for sure, but it’s a bigger truck, a rear wheel drive and basically a one wheel drive. It’s done very well for them, and I am incredibly grateful the option is there, but I really, really would rather not have to use it!

While I was digging one of the last sections of path, my brother came over to get me and show me the truck. He had it part way in the garage, and had set up a large board across the floor, in front of the tires, to make sure it didn’t go past that point. Otherwise, the top of the box cap would hit the top of the garage door frame! He had me start it and back it out, and walked me through various things on it. This truck as two gas tanks; something we’ve never had. As old as it is, it has lower mileage than our truck! He had some things he wanted to take out of the back, so after going over it with me, he took care of that, then drove it back in position party way into the garage while I went back to shoveling.

I was near finished shoveling when he came over again. He wanted to take pictures of section of the drain pipe from the kitchen, across to the bathroom. Under the bathroom, with the maze of pipe joins, the main drain changes size twice before the final length of 3″ pipe that runs to the septic tank. He is thinking of replacing the pipe from under the kitchen to under the bathtub with 3″ pipe, so that it can handle the volume of water from when the washing machine drains. The washing machine’s pump drains it faster than the water can go through the 1 1/4″ pipe. The problem is, there not a lot of room to put a 3″ pipe through!

I told him about how I’d run the drain auger through three times, after the plumber last got it unblocked for us. Not even the commercial drain auger can get the inside of the pipes completely clear from decades of grease and grime from the kitchen sink, and the sink that used to be set up where the washing machine is now.

I’ve picked up a brush set that’s designed to clean pellet stove pipes or dryer vents. It has two brush sizes, one of which will fit inside this pipe, and it can reach up to 30 feet. It’s about 20 feet to the corner under the bathroom. I think that if I can scrub out the inside of the pipe, that would solve the problem, and we can have the washing machine drain to the septic tank instead of out the window in the main door! I haven’t done it yet because it would be a very messy job that I would need to prepare for. Just running the auger through was messy and disgusting enough! Until it’s done, though, we don’t even dare try testing it again. The last time we did, even after the blockage was cleared by the plumber, we ended up flooding the entryway again. The water just couldn’t drain through the pipe fast enough.

That done, it was back outside. My brother had a few last things to do before leaving, and I did a bit more clean up around the paths before starting to put things away. I dug out fire wood that had been partially buried in snow, and left it out in the sun to melt a bit before having a cookout tomorrow. March is a birthday month and we always celebrate on a weekend near the birth date, usually with a special take out meal (going to a restaurant is no longer an option). Obviously, we can’t do that this month, but I still want to do something special, so we’ll be having a cookout, instead!

Before putting everything away, I finally took the snow off the cat shelter roofs. I’d been leaving the snow as an extra layer of insulation, but we don’t really need that anymore. Now, I want the sun to actually warm up the shingles and metal roof panels and melt away any remaining build up of ice and snow.

By the time I got in, I was pretty wasted. My daughters have basically taken over the other jobs I normally would have done, and made sure I got fed! 😄

Tonight, I’m thinking to prep some things in advance for the cookout before heading to bed. I’m still deciding on what that might be.

Meanwhile, I still need to dig out one more path. With the cookout planned for tomorrow, I might leave that for Monday. We’ll see. I definitely want to get it done before the first day of spring, though, as I plan to do my first “garden tour” video of the year. 😄 It won’t be the first time I did one with everything covered in snow!

Little by little, it’s getting done!

The Re-Farmer

Better than expected!

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First, the cuteness!

I wasn’t fast enough in getting the picture I wanted. Ghosty and Tin Whistle were snuggled cheek to cheek and looking so absolutely adorable.

They still look adorable, of course.

This morning, I got a pleasant offer from my brother. He was planning to visit our mother today, and wanted to know if I wanted to go along. Since our truck is in the shop again, that meant extra driving to pick me up, then drop me off later. Of course, I accepted, since I have no way of knowing when we’ll get the truck back and I can visit her again.

It was a bonus for him, too. He got here earlier than he’s been able to in ages, which meant he had daylight to check on a few of their things and get some stuff done before we headed out. It was so warm today, I headed out early so I could scrap the sidewalk clear and get a few other things done outside. We hit 3C/37F, and I was absolutely overheating!

An unexpected extra reason for a joint visit popped up. I had talked to my brother about the check my mother gave me, to help with truck repairs. I wanted to be sure she would be okay before I tried to deposit it. He told me that it was fine and to deposit it as soon as possible. So I went to do a mobile deposit.

It didn’t work.

It turned out that when my mother tore the check out off the check book at the perforated line, a tiny piece of the check tore off. It had a bit of the account information on it. Not even a number, but part of the lines and bars around the numbers. So I was going to return it to her, voided, and – if she were still willing – we would help her write a new one.

My brother goes over my mother’s finances with her, regularly, and he was prepared to do that with her today, but he also had her new phone.

Yes, my 94 year old mother now has her own cell phone!

He chose one of the ones we were looking at on Amazon, and it arrived about a week ago. He also ordered a SIM card, but that never showed up. He ended up going to the phone company and, thanks to a deal he could get through his employer, he was also able to get a Senior’s plan for her, at a discount. The batteries were charged, with numbers pre-programmed, and it was ready to go. While we were driving, he had me get it out to test it by calling his cell phone. Which only worked once, because we kept losing signal. There are several cell phone dead zones just like we have at our place, all along this highway, even much closer to the city. Frustrating!

When we got to the TCU, my mother was in the common room with the same guy she’d introduced me to before, working on a jigsaw puzzle again. My mother introduced my brother and I to him and he volunteered to leave for a while, so we could have some privacy. Which was very kind of him.

Once settled in, my brother asked if she remembered about getting her her own phone. She did, so the next while was spent showing her the phone, the charging port, and showing her how to use it. The phone can actually do quite a lot, but all we could focus on was for her to be able to make and receive calls. Because of her vision declining, he made sure the phone he got did things like voice the numbers as she dialed them. The buttons are large enough that she had only minor issues in hitting the right ones. He showed her how to use the contacts list and got her to call my cell phone, then to manually dial to call our landline at the farm – I made sure to message the family that they were about to get a test call! Then, as a way to give our sister my mother’s new phone number, we got her to manually call my sister, too. I thought we might not get her, as she would normally have been at work, but it turned out she had called in sick and was able to answer. My mother could barely recognize her voice, with the cold she had!

There was a fair bit of confusion for my mother, but we managed to keep it low key so that she did not get completely overwhelmed. After a while, we went back to her room so the charging cradle could be set up next to her bed. We talked about how she should keep the phone with her, then set it on the cradle at night, or if she’s napping. I suggested I could make her a phone pouch so she could wear it around her neck. My brother, the excellent planner that he is, had already picked up a lanyard long enough, so now my mother can always have her phone on her.

My mother did start to worry about “what if’s”, and being able to call out on her own. We told her that even if she has issues, we can now phone her directly, and not have to go through the nursing station and get transferred to a cordless phone. That made her very happy. Then she was worried about knowing her own phone number. My brother had it hand written down for her, on the large print instructions he’d printed out for her so she could read it more easily. She had trouble reading the number, but not because of her vision. It was because it wasn’t written out the way it was “supposed” to be. Mostly with the 7’s. Sevens must have a line across them. Without that, she couldn’t tell the difference between a 7 and a 1, she said. Which didn’t make much sense under the circumstances, but it was a simple matter to just add the marks she insisted the numbers had to have! In the end, she was quite happy with the phone, which was a huge relief.

Next, my brother went over her finances with her. That is it’s own challenge, as she has trouble understanding some things, and kept asking about things he just didn’t get a chance to get to, yet. He kept having to back her up to go over things he needed to show her first. Some of it involved having to explain why her “rent” is so high – it includes her meals, medications, etc. Everything they do for her. The check she wrote to our vandal was in the list on his printouts for her, and he took the time to explain to her that she had to be very careful writing large checks like that, or she won’t have enough to pay her accommodation charges.

Which was a good time to return her check to me, for the truck repairs. We explained what happened, and made sure to void it out in front of her, and my brother kept it for her files. After seeing her numbers, I was much more comfortable accepting the money. Once she understood what the problem was, she was quick to send me to get her purse for a replacement check. I wrote it out for her, she signed it, then my brother stopped her from tearing the check out, so he could very carefully do it for her – after clearing the remaining bit of the first check she wrote to me, still attached to the checkbook!

There were a few other things we needed to talk to her about. One of them, my brother had brought up during the drive out. He had needed her photo ID in order to do some things on her behalf, and he told me she only had her citizenship card. Which made no sense to me at all! I knew that, when she turned in her driver’s license, years ago, she immediately went through the process of getting a photo ID instead. The photo IDs look almost identical to the driver’s licenses. I’ve seen it. I knew she had it. But when my brother asked for her ID to use for some of things he was doing for her, she showed him the citizenship card.

So we asked her about that, and she brought out her citizenship card again. It’s a modern, laminated plastic card, but her photo on it is many decades old! My mother made a big deal about how important this card was, but didn’t understand that it was pretty much useless as an ID, if only because her picture on it is so old.

Her photo ID, it turned out, was hidden behind the citizenship card. I got it out and my brother took pictures of it, as the bank was going to need it. It took a while before I could put it back, because my mother had the holder and kept going on about her citizenship card and how important it was, looking at it, taking it out, putting it back in. Eventually, we were able to get the photo ID back in the holder, making sure that it was visible.

Which is when a thought struck me, and I took a closer look.

It expired three years ago. She needs a new one!

This would be beyond my mother right now, but my brother is going to see what he can do to get her a new one. It’s got the wrong address on it, anyhow, but what could we use as an address now? She’s not going to be living here permanently!

My brother said he would figure it out. The main thing is, he got pictures of it and can use it for what’s needed, now.

The necessary things done with, we got to just plain visit for a while. My mother had asked me to bring a cross for her, which I did, and it’s now hanging on the wall where she can see it from her bed. There were hooks already there that I could use. Her room mate had company, one of whom brought two big, very chill, very well behaved dogs. My mother wasn’t happy about that, but she hates having dogs and cats indoors at the best of times. It wasn’t an issue, though, since we were going back to the common room. Before her guests arrived, though, my mother’s room mate was walking back and forth with her walker in the hallway. My mother was absolutely convinced that she was doing it to listen in on our conversation.

Overall, the entire visit went way better than expected. My brother was really worried Mom would lose it over the phone. That’s her typical response when he gets things for her, no matter how much she actually needs it. The last time I saw her, she would go on about how we needed to get her out of there and would start crying off and on. This time, she still had some complaints, but actually seemed to be in a good mood. She was happy that her friend from church had come to give her Communion, like he used to while she was still in her apartment. At my mother’s request, he will arrange with the priest to come and hear her confession before Easter, so she was happy about that, too.

We were able to stay for quite a while, but my brother checked the weather and realized we needed to head out. There was a storm on the way, and he still had to drive me home, first. The storm won’t hit us, though we’re expecting to get snow overnight, but it’s supposed to pass right over where my brother lives.

He messaged me to let me know when he got safely home, just as the snow was kicking in. Good timing!

As he dropped me off at the gate, he mentioned that we need a people gate. I told him, we were planning to make one, and I told him about my plans to make an arbor to make it look pretty, to have plants growing on it, and about where I was intending to set it up. It turned out we are very much on the same page about this, and he suggested it’s a project we can work on this summer.

Now that they no longer have their own acreage, and all his equipment is out here, we will finally be able to get some things done! He’s planning to set up an office in their mobile home, so he can stay out here, work from home, then work on things out here in the evenings.

Knowing him, I expect to have to struggle to keep up! I also expect we will learn a lot from him, and I really look forward to finally being able to get things done. There was so much we expected to be able to do when we moved out here, and had this whole 5 year plan. So much of it went out the window. We knew it would be a lot, but none of us realized just how bad things had gotten, and how many of the tools and equipment our vandal had taken.

This summer is going to be very, very different, that’s for sure!

Right now, though, I’m just focused on getting through this winter, and hopefully having reliable transportation soon!

Meanwhile, we were both really happy with our visit with Mom today. She seemed to be so much better today, and I think having both of us there at the same time really helped with that. She even got to talk to my sister on her new phone, and seemed quite delighted that she could do it!

All in all, it’s been a very good day.

The Re-Farmer