The last two days were awesome. Today, we’re looking at 6C/43F. As I write this, coming up on 11am, we’re at 3C/37F – but the “feels like” is -6C/21F We are finally getting some of the predicted rain, at least. Later on, it’s supposed to be a mix of rain and snow. A system is pushing in from the south and affecting the southern prairies, with the potential for quite a bit of snow. Our climate bubble is in effect, still. Looking at the weather radar, I could even see the horseshoe shape in the weather system as is splits up and goes around our area. The lake effect is really something!
It hadn’t started raining yet, while I was doing my rounds.
I had lots of company this morning, too. Magda (scratching at the log in the background) follows me but still hasn’t forgiven me for closing her up in the isolation shelter, over and over. 😄 She isn’t coming close enough for me to pick her up and tuck her into my jacket anymore! She still accepts pets, though.
Speaking of pets, I managed to sneak some pets onto Brussel as she tried jumping back into the cat cage to join her babies, and her expected wet cat food and morning squeeze treat. Her babies are SO eager for attention, and climbing all over the place. I’m glad I lined the bottom of the cage with cardboard so long ago. They haven’t quite discovered the opening we’d cut into the bottom under the entry. We had done that when Toni was in recovery from her amputation, hoping her somewhat older babies would find her and nurse. Instead, Toni squeezed through! We had to bring her indoors for recovery. We were never sure which babies where hers, but the creche mothers – including Adam and Brussel – likely took them in with their own, just as Brussel has with Caramel’s first baby.
I had to go into town today to pick up a prescription refill for my husband; his “controlled substance” painkillers that he’s not allowed to refill until he’s almost out, so getting it delivered on Thursday was not an option. After getting his meds, I popped across the street to the Red Apple and went looking for smaller food and water dishes. The smallest one we have right now doesn’t quite fit into the back of the trap. It can only fit at and angle, which puts it over the trigger. They were inexpensive, so I got four of them. One will go into the cat cage, now that the littles are getting more mobile and interested in solid food. We don’t want to put much food in there, as that would encourage other cats, or even the skunks and racoons to get in there. The alternative it to close up the cage in between feedings, and I don’t want to do that to Brussel. She heads out more often, and for longer, now. I’ve even seen her on the trail came, crossing to the neighbouring property. In fact, I see a LOT of cats going back and forth in there. Which may explain some of the new faces we sometimes see. They would be from the next closest colony. Which is preferable to them being dumped cats!
We won’t live set the trap quite yet; the overnight temperatures are just too low, for the next few days, and we aren’t in a position to constantly monitor it. What we can do is move it closer to the house. I am also thinking to make a shelter over it to make it cozier and more cave-like, so that when we do activate the trap, any critter caught in there will be sheltered and warm until we can see who it is and either get them to a vet or release it. I don’t want to get any of the lactating mamas and, of course, we don’t want to get any skunks or racoons, and this trap is big enough for a racoon.
We do have two smaller traps as well, and these new food and water bowls might fit in them, too. They are more squirrel traps, though, and might be too small for an adult cat. We shall see. I haven’t taken too close of a look at them since my brother gave them to us.
Along with the food and water dishes, I also picked up some jingling toys for Brussel’s babies. They are getting so active, they need something to play with! When I got home, I put one of them into the cat bed in the cube next to where their cat cave is, and another right into the cave. Who knows. Maybe even Brussel will play with it!
As I was walking back to the house, I caught the attention of these cuties.
Magda and her doppelgangers, keeping cozy under the heat lamp! It actually gets too hot in there on the sunny days, so I’ve been unplugging the extension cord for both the heat lamp and the heated water bowl, then plugging it back in for the night. With today being so wet and chilly, they appreciate that heat lamp!
The wind and rain also means I won’t be able to work on the outside projects quite yet. If the forecast is at all accurate, tomorrow afternoon might work out. We’ll need to dig the longer extension cords out of winter storage, if it’s dry enough to use the electric chainsaw. Otherwise, there are some repair and maintenance jobs that can be worked on.
For now, though, I’ll take advantage of the unpleasant weather and start editing the recordings I made yesterday, into our April garden tour video. It won’t be a very long one, yet! 😄
Well, yesterday, we finally admitted it. The battle has been lost. We’ve thrown in the towel and admitted defeat – for safety reasons, really.
Despite my best efforts, Magda kept getting out of the isolation shelter. Once, I found a sliding window open, but most of the time, I could see nothing disturbed. The only way I could see how she could be getting out was through the roof, even though it was weighted down with bricks, and there is a ceiling of rigid insulation. I couldn’t see how she could be getting out the back, where it lefts, but how could she be getting out through the front, where it’s hinged?
Now, the insulation has been slowly scratched and chewed up through the winter, so there is a big gap where the two pieces meet. The gap between the insulation and the roof panels is very narrow, but Magda is so tiny. Was it possible?
Just in case, I found some boards and more pieces of scrap insulation that I slide in between the roof panels and the insulation ceiling. There were still spaces, but they were very small.
Once inside and in the kitchen, went to open the window, which is directly above the isolation shelter. I spotted Magda at one of the gaps in the insulation, scratching at the roof panel. When she heard me tell her to stop, she disappeared below.
Off and on, I would check out the window. Nothing was happening.
Then I looked out and found a very flat Magda, squeezed between the boards, the insulation and the roof panel, like a pancake. !!!
I dashed outside but, as I came closer, she slithered her way back into the shelter, flung herself into the cat bed and stretched out, looking at me as if nothing had just happened. !!!
I found some more scrap pieces of insulation and shifted the boards I’d added around, then kept checking out the window. I didn’t see anything.
Eventually, though, something about the insulation seemed… different.
I went out to check, and there was Magda, sitting on the lawn, looking at me. She had somehow managed to pull the insulation downwards enough for her to squirm through.
At that point, I gave up. She’s supposed to be recovering from surgery, and the last thing she should be doing is squeezing through tight spaces and dropping down from a height. Since we’ve finished the ear medication, and The Grink was looking fine, too, I opened the ramp door to the isolation shelter and let them out, putting the wind breaker box over the opening again.
Even so, when I came out this morning, I found that window open again!
While I was doing my rounds this morning, I had a whole lot of cats following me, including Magda! The second photo above was taken while I was checking the garlic bed. After I got the picture, she walked under Stinky to get to the other side of him.
She is so small, she didn’t have to duck at all to go under him.
Gosh, those two look alike. Given when he was neutered and how old she is, I suppose it’s possible he’s her daddy.
The garlic, meanwhile, is looking much better now!
Their finally turned nice and green and, with the netting in place, nothing it digging them up anymore.
Yesterday was such a gorgeous evening, I was able to do a few things in the garden, though I neglected to take photos. One of them was to uncover the winter sown bed in the old kitchen garden to give it a good watering. With the plastic cover, it didn’t get even what little rain we’ve had, and the sump pump that drains at the high end of the bed has yet to go off this year, so it’s not being watered from below, either. There was enough water in the rain barrel that I could give this bed a thorough watering. Once the cover was off, I could also see that there are quite a few seedlings in there, and what appears to be a couple of onions that I missed from last year!
Once the cover was back on and the plastic secured, I started watering the bed at the chain link fence that is now covered with mesh. I came back to the rain barrel to refill, and found two cats lounging on top of the raised bed cover!
I am not impressed.
The pre-sown bed at the chain link fence, plus the one among the east yard garden beds got watered, and I was still able to refill the watering cans to leave in the portable greenhouse to warm up during the day and add to the heat sink effect during the night.
Which doesn’t actually seem to be accomplishing anything. Whenever I check the thermometer in the morning, it’s reading the same temperature as outside the greenhouse. Still way to cold to be able to move our seedling trays into there!
In checking the other areas, I did some clearing around the walking onions. There are quite a few of them coming up right now. Unfortunately, so is the crab grass, only some of which could be pulled out for now. I check on the fenced off area where the tulips are and there are a lot more leaves showing now. Even the saffron crocuses look like there are more of them. While they never reached the point of blooming before they got choked out by weeds, clearly the corms have expanded.
After I finished my rounds this morning, I grabbed the turkey dinners I put together for my mother and headed out. I left early enough to swing past the grocery store to see if it was open today. It was, so I popped in to pick up a few things I knew my mother was running low on. I also picked up some instant oatmeal for her to try, since she’s having a harder time standing long enough to cook herself breakfast. I figured instant oatmeal would be better than boxed cereal. I got a package with three different flavours for her to try out. When I got to her place and was putting things away, I opened the box to read the instructions – she would have great difficulty reading them herself. Each flavour called for a different amount of water. Oops. Ah, well. I explained the instructions to her as best I could.
While today was just a day to visit, I of course did a little jobs for her, including bagging up her recycling. I noticed bean cans in there, which was something I’d got for her to try before, so I asked how she liked them. She was very enthusiastic in her response, so canned baked beans are now on the list of heat and eat things for her! 😁 Until now, she’d just been getting canned soups.
With the few things I picked up for her today, plus the dinners, plus her three days a week of Meals on Wheels, it turns out my mother isn’t going to need an actual grocery shopping trip for a while. It was, for the most part, a good visit. It wasn’t until the very end, when it was getting time for me to leave anyhow, that she started going off on a tangent. One was about how surprised she was that my brother didn’t phone her for Easter. I pointed out, he came over to visit her because they were going to be out of province this weekend, to spend time with the grandbabies. “Oh, two weeks ago”, she scoffed. Except it wasn’t; it was last weekend, and he spent a long time with her going over her financial stuff, as he regularly does, along with bringing her stuff for her basket and an Easter card.
Then she started going on about my daughters, and how terrible I am for keeping them “tied” to me (she doesn’t get that they actually chose to move out here to help maintain this place) and even back to ranting about how they “know nothing” because we homeschooled. She doesn’t know the girls at all, has made no effort to get to know them (she has only ever wanted to control them and get them to perform for her), but assumes she knows everything about them and about our life in general. Basically, making scenarios up in her mind and assuming they are true, then blaming all the bad stuff on my making parenting choices she didn’t approve of. It’s been decades, and she still does it! I swear, in her mind, the girls are still 10 yrs old or something.
It was definitely time to leave.
By the time I got home, it was getting close to when I would normally go out for my evening rounds, so I was soon back outside to enjoy the gorgeous weather we’ve been having. According to my weather app, we’ve been raining all day, but it was bright sunshine and warm temperatures. After feeding the cats – and playing with the kittens a bit – I ended up taking some April garden tour video. It’s been a month since the last ones I took, so I figured it was about time. I’ll be checking those soon and seeing if I need to do it again or not! 😄
Tomorrow is supposed to be quite a bit colder, with a mix of rain and snow starting in the afternoon. On a day when I have no outings planned and want to get work done outside, of course. 😁 We’ll see how things actually turn out. Some jobs I want to start require power tools and extension cords, so if we’ve got rain or snow, those will wait a bit longer. There is always something that can be worked on, though. I actually have a whole week ahead of me, with no scheduled outings until our first city stock up trip! What a remarkable thing! I might actually get some real work done outside! Gosh, that would be nice!
While doing my morning rounds, I checked on the netting over the winter sown beds.
The first thing I saw was tracks in the soil of the summer squash bed. Something had gotten in! Looking around, I found that the netting at one end of the bed had been pulled up and even torn in one spot that I could see. Whatever got in must have panicked in trying to get out, because the excess netting on the sides were disturbed, and I found another area where the ground staples had been pulled up.
I’ve got the netting pulled fairly tight along the sides, but it is rather hard to see, so I used old bricks to weigh it down more along the sides and ends. Hopefully, that will make it a bit more visible.
The other bed seemed fine, but some of the twine was looking rather loose. I think something jumped on top of the netting, pulling the supports inward a bit.
My daughter and I made an unexpected trip to the nearest Walmart area today. While we were there, we also hit the Dollarama, and I bought a bunch more ground staples. Those things are very handy.
On another note…
Magda got out of the isolation shelter again. She came over when I was going the feeding, letting me put her back in to get her share of the wet cat food. I got Kohl in there and she seems to be staying this time. I added more weight to the roof, which I still think is the only place they could have gotten out through. That may have been enough to keep Kohl in, but I would have expected it to have been more likely to keep Magda in, since she’s so much lighter. Magda was out even before my daughter and I started to head out! We let her be, at the time.
After my daughter and I got home, it was late enough to do the evening feeding, plus we wanted to dose their ears. I think tonight might be the last dose, as the bottle seems pretty empty. Once her ears were done, we put Magda back into the isolation shelter with Kohl while we did The Grink’s ears, and then gave them the wet cat food right away, to distract them from trying to get out. I’m still holding out hope that we can shave those mats off of Kohl!
Meanwhile, Brussel’s babies are increasingly active. The black and white has been climbing out of the cat cave and calling to us, regularly, and now the calico is starting to as well.
We try to handle them as much as possible, without freaking Brussel out too much. As for Caramel’s babies in the cat house, I haven’t been able to see them. Any time I’ve tried looking through the window I am either seeing Caramel in the cat bed, or there’s too much reflection to see inside.
From what I can see from the other cats, Slick and Sprout have both had their babies somewhere in the outer yard. I’m pretty sure the dead kitten I found was Adam’s. She doesn’t seem to be pregnant, there’s no sign that she’s nursing, and she’s hanging around the house a lot more than she would, if she had a litter somewhere in the outer yard. There’s a talkative white and grey that no longer looks round. That’s pretty much it for cats I could say for sure were pregnant. After Easter, we’ll set the trap up for reals and see if we can start bringing in more ladies, before they start showing. We’ll have to pace things, though. With three small cats in the isolation shelter right now, we could put in one larger cat without too much issue, but we wouldn’t want to put in another until after Magda and The Grink are done their isolation period. The Cat Lady was talking about getting us in for more spays in May, so that will work out.
Meanwhile, we will continue working on Brussel, Caramel and Slick for socialization, so we can hopefully get them in when their milk has dried up without having to trap.
On the plus side, things have warmed up again, though it’s still pretty windy. We’re even expected to hit 18C/64F tomorrow. It’s supposed to cool down again after that. We might even get rain in a few days! That would be good. Things are pretty dry out there, and a fire ban for open fires and grass burning is already in effect for our municipality. Which isn’t unusual for April, really. Contained fires and burn barrels are still okay.
Overall, it’s looking to be a nice weekend for Easter.
Once again, I found a top corner of the sliding window by the food bowl out of its track again. That corner can be reached if a cat is on the shelf above the food bowl. That Kohl fit through there too was a bit of a surprise, though!
I spotted her while I was feeding the cats and got her back into the isolation shelter, where she promptly discovered the wet cat food I’d put in for her and The Grink. That gave me time to grab some wood lathe and nails to reinforce that corner.
So this window now has a piece of wood lathe on both sides of the opening, to keep the window in its track. For now, I’ve added a strip of clear duct tape to one side of the panel for something to pull it with, since there is no longer an exposed edge to use to slide it.
Problem solved.
Almost.
Advance polls opened today and my younger daughter and I headed out to vote. On my way to the truck, I checked the isolation shelter and found The Grink, all alone again! Both sliding windows were still in place. That left only one way she could have gotten out.
Through the roof.
After we got back, I found Magda and put her back into the isolation shelter. I then took the bricks that the box we put over the entrance to shelter from the wind were sitting on top of, and put them on the roof to weight it down. You can see that in the next image in the above slide show. These bricks are salvaged from the chimney to the wood burning furnace that was removed when the new roof was installed.
Hopefully, that will keep Magda Houdini in the shelter! (You can just see her in the last picture; those windows need to be cleaned, inside and out!) It is not good for her at all to be squeezing through things and jumping down from such a height, when she is so fresh from surgery. Plus, we still need to dose her ears until we’re out of that medication.
Once we are able to move the shelter away from the house and give it a thorough cleaning, I hope to do a few minor modifications to it. One of them is to figure out a way to latch the roof so it can’t be pushed open from the inside. I also want to find some strong handles to attach to it – the ones I have on hand are not heavy duty enough for the job – to make is easier to maneuver. Eventually, I want to replace the wheels with larger ones, as well. We got the best that we could afford, and they’re good, but the shelter is heavy enough that the wheels want to sink into the ground when it’s being wheeled across the lawn. All in all, though, there is very little that needs to be modified. I’m quite pleased with how it turned out.
Today has been a surprisingly cold day. When we were out and about earlier, it was around -2C/28F, but the wind chill put it at -9C/16F We’re supposed to reach a high of 2C/36F today, but it will still be very windy.
A good day to stay indoors and get ready for Easter.
We’ve got a turkey thawing out for Sunday, and the sourdough loaf for our basket is also thawing out. After a bit of organizing and cleaning up, we’re going to select a basket from our collection and start assembling it to be blessed tomorrow, and then we will enjoy the contents on Easter morning. Today being Good Friday, it is also a day of quiet and contemplation.
On that, note, my daughter has been working on things while I write this, and it’s time for me to go help her out!
Well, Magda got out of the isolation shelter again. Poor Grink was all alone in there. I decided to catch Kohl and put her in with The Grink for company.
It wasn’t until after I got back from running errands, late enough to do the evening feeding, that we were able to grab Magda and medicate her ears. We put her back into the isolation shelter after that, then dosed The Grink’s ears.
Kohl, seemed to want out, but not too desperately. Since she might be in there, with the heat lamp, for a couple of weeks, we figured this would be a good time to bring out the clippers and give her a hair cut. She is almost solid with mats, and it must be quite uncomfortable. I know there’s at least one patch on her tail that is burrs stuck in her fur.
Unfortunately, by the time we got the clippers out for what would be their first use, she made her way into the bottom of the isolation shelter, settled on the box nest, and completely ignored us as we tried to convincer to come come to us!
We finally have up.
We went inside and did David, instead.
David wasn’t as bad as Kohl, but we’ve been using a mat cutting comb on him, whenever we could. He really hates being combed or brushed, though, so he still had mats in various areas we haven’t been able to get at.
David did NOT like getting his hair cut. My daughter and I would work at one of us holding him while the other trimmed, then trading off when he got too squirmy. We had to stop a couple of times to just let him have a break and destress a bit – and to clean up the piles of hair.
That is one very fluffy cat!
We got most of him shaved now. Almost, but not quite, a lion’s mane style. It’s a bit of a mess in places, but the mats are gone, and that’s the important part.
He is most displeased with us.
He did finally allow much husband to cuddled him and keep him warm for a bit, though.
I’m hoping to get a picture at some point, but that might take a while. 😄
Meanwhile, the littles in the sun room are getting so very active!!!
The black and white one has climbed out of the cat cave, several times. The calico has been climbing the opening, and there have been a few times I’ve seen her basically dangling from the top. Even their adopted sibling is squirming and worming around.
At one point, my daughter walked past and heard a squeaking noise. She looked over and found the black and white with its front legs outside the cat cave, looking at her and “yelling”. It didn’t stop until she reached in and started petting him! Brussel has been leaving the sun room more often, and for longer times, so we’ve had more opportunity to pick up and cuddle the babies while she’s gone. After taking the last picture, with the black and white one outside the cat cave, I reached in to pick him up, cuddled him a moment, then put him back into the cat cave. Brussel was in there that time, and she was most displeased with me!
In other things…
It looks like we lost our window of opportunity. Slick no longer looks pregnant. I saw Sprout today, which I haven’t for a day or two, and she is looking less round, too. There wasn’t a chance we would have gotten her this time, though. I do wish we’d gotten Slick, though. Well, we just have to concentrate on catching some of the others. At this point, it’s probably a matter of bringing in any cat we can trap, male or female, though if we trap one of the mamas that just gave birth, we’ll have to let them go. The vet won’t spay them while they are lactating. The problem is, with the more feral ones, chances are we won’t be able to tell until the vet actually sees it.
Well, it is what it is. We do the best we can.
Hopefully, Magda will stay in the isolation shelter this time, and get some rest and recovery – and wet cat food! She did get at some of it before The Grink and Kohl ate it all, so maybe she’ll make the association between staying in the isolation shelter and getting extra tasty food, and not having to fight off a dozen other cats for it! 😁
I definitely over did it yesterday, and was in major pain this morning, so we just took care of the cats, and then I went back to bed. Taking care of Magda’s and The Grink’s ears went much better than expected.
The first image above was taken right after treating their ears. Since they are in the isolation shelter, they get treated with wet cat food, which The Grink has been enjoying, but Magda seems to be ingnoring.
Then I went out through the sun room to go to the post office, and spotted a very scrabbly looking cat on a cat bed.
It was Magda!
Since getting spayed, she has developed the runs and is looking very messy.
On checking the isolation shelter, I found a corner of the sliding window by the foot bowl was pushed out of its track at the top. I popped it back in place, then got Magda and put her back. After closing the window up again, I noticed it was bowed outwards slightly, so I took it out completely, flipped it so it was bowing the other way, then put it back. I thought that would do the trick.
Then I went inside to change my shirt. Magda left a mess on me while I was carrying her.
By the time I changed and came back out, I checked on the isolation shelter and found the window partly open! Magda figured out how to slide it open from the inside!
The Grink was just sitting there, looking at me. She had no interest in leaving, but she did really want attention!
I don’t like that The Grink is in there alone. We’ll have to find a way to secure the window before we put Magda back, though. When I came home from the post office, I found her snuggling with Syndol. Later on, while my daughter and I were going through the garden areas, she kept following us, when she needs to be resting and recovering!
In the first photo, Caramel, in the bed she moved her kittens to, had them completely hidden. I did manage to get a picture of her babies while she was out, though. They are getting very active! With the sides of this bed being so much higher, I could just see their heads bobbing around.
Brussel’s babies are getting downright rambunctious, but they still aren’t quite climbing completely out of the cat cave. They’ll dangle a leg out, or stick their heads through the opening, but so far, that’s it.
When we noticed that Brussel was out, my daughter and I took advantage to take the babies out and snuggle them. I got some pictures, though it was really hard to get good ones. Caramel’s baby’s eyes are opening now, and it seems more active than its siblings in the cat house.
We also had a chance to look at what seemed to be a wound on the black and white kitten’s back leg. With my daughter holding him, I could get a closer look, and it does just look like missing fur. My theory remains; some wet cat food dripped onto him and mama was too aggressive in cleaning it off!
So far, all seems to be well, though I was not seeing any cats going to the food bowl inside the trap today. It may simply have been too windy, even though it’s mostly sheltered by the catio. If we’re after Slick of Adam, though, we’re unlikely to catch either of them in that location. Any female we manage to get will be good, though. We’ll have to figure something out.
The first two images in the slideshow above were taken before they went into the clinic.
Then there were some of the wounds I got from trying to get the others. I couldn’t find the scratch and bite proof gloves last night. *sigh*
The next two images were taken right after I loaded them into the truck to bring them home. We were told to leave them in the carriers for another 2 hours. The driving time was almost half of that. In the end, we put them into the prepared isolation shelters, as we knew they would be much more comfortable and relaxed in there. They both practically live in there already. They also got some wet cat food, which they were very enthusiastic about. Just a small can between them (we got some donated wet cat food that were in cans about half the size of what we use for the indoor cats), since they were still recovering from surgery. The last image if of them enjoying the wet cat food. Later, they were just as enthusiastic about the kibble.
I was pretty unhappy about not getting the pregnant cats we were shooting for. The Cat Lady met me at the clinic, and we talked about the possibility of bringing one of the mamas in on short notice, if we can trap one. We now have a protocol. If we do manage to catch one, we can give the clinic a call to see if they’ve had a cancellation or an open space the next day. If so, we would leave her in the trap overnight (good time for a fast), then bring her in the next day. The trap is pretty big, so we could potentially keep a feral cat in there for a couple of days but, if it would take longer, we’d have to let them out and try again.
The littles did have ear mites, as expected. Magda had one ear that was quite bad and likely infected. They sent us home with some medication to give to both of them. Into their ears, once a day, until we run out.
It’s a good thing they’ll be in the isolation shelter for two weeks, but it’s not going to be easy to do their ears every day! I’ve made arrangements with my daughters for one or the other to join me when I do my rounds in the morning, to help dose their ears.
I’m sure they’ll enjoy not having ear mites for a while, but these are yard cats. They’re going to get ear mites again, eventually. There’s nothing we can do about that, as long as they are outside.
After I left, my younger daughter finished feeding the outside cats, including giving Brussel her wet cat food inside her cat cave, and a squeeze treat later on. Brussel did growl and her and swipe when my daughter pulled her hand away with the empty tube, but the swipe had no claws.
I got some photos of Brussel and her babies later on.
You can just barely see Caramel’s baby’s head in her fur!
In the next photo, you can see that Caramel has moved her babies – to one of the new cat beds! A much cozier cat bed. You can just barely see kitten fur on and around her back leg.
While waiting for the cats to be done, I basically hung out around the nearby Walmart. My older daughter sent me some funds and a shopping list. I also found a pair of jeans to replace the ones I tore while at my mother’s, yesterday. I didn’t try them one, so I hope they fit! I was looking for the same style as the ones I was replacing, but apparently, Walmart no longer carries that style. I bought the closest I could find. They are currently being used as a bed by Peanut Butter Cup. Before her, David was using them as a bed. They are certainly getting broken in. Just not by me! 😄
I also went to a nearby Dollarama and ended up getting some things for the garden that I’ll write about in a separate post. Then I realized I’d forgotten something on my daughter’s list, so it was back to the Walmart. Once that was done, I settled into the truck and had a nap. I slept remarkably well, too! Even with some very strange dreams that woke me up feeling very confused. 😄 Eventually, I drove across the street to the Canadian Tire, where I found a few other things I’ll include in my next post. While I was there, I got a call from the vet clinic, telling me when the ladies would be ready for pick up. I had time to finish at the Canadian Tire and got there a bit early. They brought the ladies out anyhow, along with the medication and giving me more detailed instructions on measuring the dose with the syringe that’ll be used to apply it into their ears.
The ladies were pretty active at the time, and not happy about being in the carriers. Otherwise, they apparently behaved really well and didn’t give them a hard time when it came to being handled. During the drive, they quieted down, though, and rested the entire way.
They will now be in the isolation shelter for 2 weeks, so we can let them out on the 29th. They’ll be quite content together in there. Other cats, however, are already trying to get into the shelter to join them! Quite a few use the isolation shelter regularly, and stay there all night. They’re going to have to make do with the sun room for a while, instead!
Meanwhile, we’ve set the trap up next to the catio, open but not set. We want the cats to get used to it being there. I’ve got a food and water bowl in there, but it’s a bit too big. It sits on top of the tripper mechanism. I’ve already seen several cats going in to eat. We’ll have to find smaller containers to use in there for bait before we set it. We’ll probably catch all sorts of different cats we don’t need to take to the vet. I just hope they don’t start avoiding it once they realize the door can close them in. There isn’t a lot of choice in the matter, though!
So that’s how it went with the cats. Once I got home, it was such a gorgeous day, I was able to get lots of garden stuff done!
The first two images above are from a poplar branch. I don’t think I ever noticed before that they get catkins like pussy willows do! So we have signs of spring, even as winter is trying to hang on as long as possible!
The last photo is the covered bed in the old kitchen garden. As I was out there, it was about -1C/30F. In both the covered bed and the portable greenhouse, the thermometers were reading about 0C/32F Not much difference – even in the portable greenhouse, after adding the water filled garbage can as a heat sink. I don’t think the water has in there long enough to get completely warmed up, yet.
On the schedule for today was to head to my mother’s to take her to her doctor’s appointment in the early afternoon. I still had plenty of time, as I was sitting down with my breakfast after doing my morning rounds.
Then the phone rang.
It was home care.
No one was available to do my mother’s morning meds. She’s scheduled to get them done, along with extra time to help her get dressed, if she needs it, empty her commode or even heat something up for her breakfast, at 8:55
It was almost 8:30 when I got the call.
*sigh*
So I quickly called my mom to let her know that I would be heading over as soon as I finished breakfast. My mother kept trying to keep me on the phone as she complained about my having to come out for this and I kept having to cut her off and repeat that I needed to eat and run, and we could talk when I got there. After the third or fourth time, she finally let me go! 😄
When the home care aids do her med assist, they have a folder that’s kept in her lock box where they sign off for the day’s visit and make extra notes, if needed. So when I do the med assist instead, I write up the time and date, saying that I did her meds, and include any other notes that might be necessary. So I knew what time I got there to give her her meds. It was exactly 9:15 by her clock, so only about 20 minutes late.
What I noticed as I was getting her meds out was a bubble in her pack that should have been empty, but wasn’t. Her previous Friday morning pills were still there. So I asked her about it.
She told me that she had taken her meds herself, from one of the extra bubble packs on her fridge, that morning.
!!!!
I was sure I’d pushed them far enough back that she couldn’t reach them! I don’t know how she got them down!
I told her, that was NOT a good thing to do. Apparently, the home care aid agreed, because my mom told me she put the rest of the packs into the lock box. Between the bubble packs, their folder, the blood work requisition forms, and other items in there, having an entire month’s worth of packs in there is tight, even with a lock box as large as this one. That’s why I hadn’t put them all in there myself, when I brought her refills home.
*sigh*
After giving her her meds, I did a few other little things for her, like emptying the commode and taking care of her garbage. My brother had recently visited her and brought a few grocery items she’s always running out of, but when we spoke on the phone last night, I told her to see if she needed anything else and to make a list. She did need a few things, and we still had plenty of time, so we went over the list and then I did her grocery shopping for her.
After that was done, we still had time to visit.
If you could call it that.
She spent a whole lot of time criticizing me for not being dressed “presentable” enough (while I was there, I accidentally tore my jeans), and for having messy hair (my hair was braided and I had hat head), and I should have short hair like she does. In the past, these are criticisms that would have caused me to have all sorts of issues, but I am well past that point in my life now. I call her out on this stuff, now. She doesn’t really get it. She feels completely entitled to say stuff like to about and to, anyone and everyone. Even complete strangers! Then starts going on about how people who aren’t “presentable” are uncivilized, etc.
She totally doesn’t get the double standard and hypocrisy she’s displaying!
Then she brought up the Easter baskets; I’d picked up a paska at the grocery store for her own basket. She remembered that we do Easter baskets, too, and bless them ourselves. She suggested that I bring our basket to her place on the Saturday before Easter, then she and I could go across the street to her church to have them blessed together.
I told her, the last time I brought our Easter basket to be blessed with her, she gave me a hard time about having a bad basket.
Oh, she said. That’s because it was so huge. Would you like me to give you an Easter basket?
I told her, we have all kinds of baskets of all sizes.
She told me I should just bring a small one. Just a little one…
I told her, our basket is the right size for our family.
Now, part of the reason for the size of basket we use is that we spread everything out so nothing is completely buried, rather than jamming everything on top of everything else. We also do things like have our ham on a small plate, have oil (we’ll be having truffle infused olive oil this year) and vinegar in little jars, salt in one of the many pinch pots I collect, a bowl with olives, another with butter, etc. The containers take up a fair bit of space. Plus, of course, we like to lay it out to make a pretty display. So there is actually not a particularly huge amount in the basket. But, it’s the size of the basket that bothers my mother, and people will think bad things if they see such a big basket getting blessed in church…
Never mind that I’ve seen people bring in even bigger baskets than any of ours to be blessed!
Anyhow, when she kept going on about how we should have a small basket like hers, I told her, THAT is why we don’t bring the basket in for blessing with her. She then started saying that maybe I could have a less hard heart, just for her…
…
I pointed out, she is the one that has the hard heart with this! She totally does not understand that she is the biggest reason we don’t go to church right now. We’ve tried going to some of the local churches, including the RC Church I grew up going to, and I was saddened to see how … wordly… they had become. My mother’s church is the only one that seems to remain true, so even though I’m Orthodox Lutheran now, the RC church by her place is the one church I would be going to.
Just not with my mother. I did try to, and she made it quite clear that she did not think I was good enough. I don’t put up with that.
I so miss the church we went to before moving out here!
But I digress!
My mother ended up wanting us to leave even earlier than I’d planned. That did give me time to stop at a gas station, and at a post office in the town my mother’s appointment was in (she believes the staff at her local post office steals her mail. Especially her mail to Poland). We still got there an hour early.
I did have some issues with my mother trying to drive from the passenger seat! Like telling me which way I could go to leave a parking spot and not understanding why I wasn’t driving, when I hadn’t even finished putting on my seatbelt yet. The direction she was telling me I should drive would have had me popping a curb and driving over concrete. Or insisting I undo her seatbelt for her, while I was backing up into the loading zone at her place, so I could have the space to help her out of the truck. It’s been a long time since she’s done stuff like this.
As for the appointment, it did go well, overall. She did dive into something completely new – though she says it’s been an issue for at least a year (???) – before we finally got to talking about her hospital stay and the results of her last two blood tests to monitor her kidney function.
Her kidneys are fine.
My mother was written up for some X-rays, which we could do right after the appointment, and some blood work, which required fasting, so that will have to wait. Since we’ll be doing her next kidney monitoring bloodwork in the first week of May, it can actually wait until then and she can do both in one trip.
While all this was going on, I got a message from my husband. The tax preparer had called and our files were ready to pick up. So, once I got my mother home and her new lab requisition form tucked into the lock box with the monthly ones, I had to dash off. From my mother’s place, it was about a 450 minute drive to get to the tax preparer’s office in the town North of us. After signing what I had to sign and paying for the job, I had to grab the form my husband needed to sign, drive home, get him to sign it, and drive back again! We could actually have brought it back another day, but I wanted to just get it done.
On the plus side, by the time I got home, the snow had stopped (when we were driving to my mother’s appointment, we drove into much heavier snow) and was even all melted away. Which is fine. A little more moisture is not a bad thing. We’re not getting anything close to the spring flooding we’ve had in the past. The old basement floor is completely dry, and the sump pump hasn’t gone off even once. Which means we could actually do with more moisture! It’s getting into fire season.
As I was driving home with the form for my husband to sign, I could see smoke to the west of our place. I figured someone was doing a controlled burn, though it was a windy day for it.
When I was driving home later on, on the last few miles of gravel road, I found myself behind a fire truck with its lights flashing. Maybe half a mile from our turn off, I saw more flashing lights behind me, and pulled over for the second fire truck to go by. Both continued on past our turn off. I could no longer see smoke, but somewhere near by is a fire big enough to require at least two trucks! (There could have been more that went by before I was there to see them.) There’s nothing on the live fire maps, though, so it isn’t a forest or wild fire.
Something to be aware of, with everything drying up so quickly.
Anyhow.
Today ended up having a lot more going on than expected. For now, I’ve got some cat carriers to prep and in the morning, we need to try and snag 3 pregnant females for the vet.
Caramel frequently leaves her little grublings, and whenever I’m able to check, they are like this. All curled up around each other, snoozing!
If you click through to the next image and video, you’ll see their sibling is a lot more active!
That panting sort of noise you’re hearing from Brussel is her expecting me to give her another squeeze treat! I had already given her her evening feeding, and I only give the squeeze treat in the morning, last thing before I go inside (all the other cats are gone by then).
It took some doing, but I was able to get a good photo of Frank.
I actually don’t know if Frank is male or female; he won’t let me touch him, but he just moves out of reach, rather than run away, like the more feral ones.
When I told my daughter I was calling him Frank because of his blue eyes, she didn’t get it. I told her, you know… Ol’ Blue Eyes.
She had no idea what I was talking about.
I told her, Frank Sinatra… Ol’ Blue Eyes… You know?
Well, she knew who Frank Sinatra was, but it turns out the only images she’d ever seen of him were sepia tone photos. She had no idea he had striking blue eyes.
The Re-Farmer 