As I write this, it’s -7C/19F. I think it was about -9C/16F while I was outside this morning, and we’re still expected to warm up to -5C/23F.
It’s gloriously warm out there!
Funny how acclimatization works. :-D
Before I go on, however, I just have to share this horribly low quality picture of Nosencrantz.
Our cat is broken.
I didn’t want to disturb her with a flash.
Baby girl is enjoying life! She is the most chill cat, ever. Gosh, I’m going to miss her when she gets adopted out!!
We’re still keeping her and Butterscotch in my office/bedroom. Or should I say, we are mostly keeping the other cats out, letting them in only under supervision. Nosentrantz has shown little interest in leaving, though we take her out and carry her around. Most of the other cats are okay with her, but some are not. Beep Beep, Tissue and Turmeric, in particular, are not happy to see her. Mind you, Beep Beep is just a b*** and will randomly go after other cats anyhow, but Tissue and Turmeric will try to go after Nosencrantz, specifically. Which is a bit funny at times. Nosencrantz will be sitting on the red blanket, watching the other cats mill about, un-phased. Turmeric will see her, stand up by the bed and start batting and hissing at her, and Nosencrantz will just look at her, like she’s nuts.
Which she is.
Butterscotch, on the other hand, hardly ever comes out of her favourite corners. She’ll move from one corner to the other, come out to eat, drink or use the litter box, and if no other cats are around, she’ll come out for pets. She especially likes my husband. But she wants nothing to do with other cats! Even if they’re completely ignoring her, if she sees any, she starts snarling. She’s even started to snarl at Nosencrantz, sometimes! She just wants people. No cats.
As for the outside cats, they are quite enjoying the warmer weather!
They are very active outside, and we see them running and climbing all over the place.
With so much packed down snow, it’s become difficult to clean out the heated water bowl. The cord is completely buried, so all I can do is tip out the water into the snow.
Nice to see Ghost Baby making an appearance. I do wish we could convince her to come closer. She’s the most feral of all the yard cats.
I’m amused by the spot on the roof of the cat’s house. Even with snow on it, they’ll sit in the spot above the heat lamp inside. :-D
I took advantage of the warmth and got the burn barrel going, which required digging it out again, digging out the path the the electric meter, then started working on clearing snow away from the house.
Some of it was quite hard packed, and needed to be broken up with the ice chipper.
I think I got about a half dozen wheelbarrow loads hauled away, before the burn barrel was done and it was time to go inside. Not a lot of snow can fit in the wheelbarrow before it all just starts sliding down the sides.
Agnoos really likes it when I’m tending the burn barrel, for some reason!
It’s going to take many trips to clear the corner out. The girls and I will chip away at it over the next couple of weeks, while the temperatures are warmer, but not yet melting. We’ll need to clear away the well cap, too, which is going to be the most difficult part. We did try to keep it clear, but there was just too much snow.
While we have several snow shovels, the ergonomic one in the photos is our best one, and we prefer to wait until it’s free instead of using one of the others. Once I was done, my daughter used it to clear parts of the roof, so we don’t end up with water leaking into the house again.
Unfortunately, she noticed the shovel is starting to crack in the middle.
Crud.
Looks like we’ll have to find a new one sooner rather than later. The other shovels we have are not as strong as this one, and are far more likely to break with the packed snow we have to clear. Except for the one steel one we found, and that one is just too heavy for a job this big!
My husband’s disability pay came in today, instead of Monday. We weren’t sure if they would do that again, and my plan had been to do at least part of the big shop today, if it did. Unfortunately, I was not feeling well this morning. The deli pizzas I picked up as a treat yesterday apparently did not agree with me! So that will have to wait until tomorrow, depending on how I’m feeling. I would have at least liked to make the closer trip to a Walmart. With the paw paw and tulip tree seeds, we’re going to need more soil, soon.
It was another bitterly cold morning today BUT this should be the last day of it. We’ve already warmed up considerably (it’s late afternoon as I write this), and it should keep warming up and stay very mild, well into March.
That will be nice!
I topped up the kibble inside the sun room – then took a hammer to break the layer of ice that had formed at the top of the heated water bowl! Yes, it was on and working, but it is warmed from below. It got so cold last night, the top froze over.
Chadiccus is so done with this cold!
I got some updates on the kitties the Cat Lady took.
Nicco and Saffron are doing very well after their visit to the vet. They were found to be quite healthy, for all their tiny size.
The two of them are getting along well, and they are looking to adopt them out together. Which is interesting, since Saffron has been one of the more aggressive ones responsible for the scratches on Nicco’s nose. It’s just the two of them, though, which changes things dramatically.
I let the Cat Lady know that the two of them are only a day apart in age, and that Nicco is Cabbages’ older sister, by a few months. :-)
Cabbages, meanwhile, as discovered how to open up drawers! I’m not too surprised, as most of the cats here have figured out how to open most of our cupboards, but we don’t have many drawers they could get into. They’ve shown no interest.
I did warn her about Cabbages’ love of digging in dirt.
They’ve already discovered that, apparently, and have had to lock their spider plant in another room!
I should send her a picture of the cage we had to build around the smaller jade tree.
Gosh, Cabbages is looking so great!! Hard to believe she came so close to dying, and all the other vets were recommending euthanasia!
If you would like to contribute to our fundraiser to reimburse the cat lady for Cabbages’ vet bills, click on the button below, or click here. If you would like to read more about it, click here.
This afternoon, I got a phone call from the Cat Lady. She had just gotten off the phone with the organization that’s helping with the cat vet visits and adoptions, and wanted to call me about it right away.
Things are going to be set back for a while.
The vet clinic/hospital we’ve been using is off the list for about a month. Apparently, they’ve been taking in an unusual number of sick cats, and the vet expenses are getting too much. (They run entirely by donations and adoption fees, so the money is always tight.) So no appointments are going to be made there in March, though the Cat Lady is going to look at other towns as possibilities for our cats.
There has also been an issue with one of their fosters. They had taken in kittens that turned out to be sick with something I can’t remember the name of. The kittens were lost, and how the foster has to disinfect their entire home, and the home cannot have any cats in it for at least 30 days, to ensure no other cats catch this. This was one of the fosters lined up to take cats from our place, which obviously is not going to happen for a while.
So it looks like things will be set back at least a month before the next pair of cats goes out.
Which just means nothing much changes for us. As it is, by the time we would be starting on the outside cats… well, the males would be going, but from the activity I’m already seeing outside, there are already new litters on the way. Usually, they start giving birth around the end of April, early May. I don’t even know how many females we have out there anymore, though there are now two fewer, with Butterscotch and Nosencrantz now spayed and indoors.
In other things, I cleared it with the garage, then arranged to have my mother’s car towed in. Much to my surprise, I was asked if I needed a ride in, too! Some drivers are taking passengers now, though masks are still required. I mentioned I have a medical exemption, so I was put on hold while that was looked into. It took so long, she finally just made a note of it on file and left it to the driver.
They don’t wear masks themselves, so I’m not worried about it.
Of course, they had to ask the usual questions, and I just had to laugh out loud when I was asked if I had to isolate. No, I don’t have to isolate. That’s our normal state out here!
After an hour or so, I got an automated call assuring me that no, they had not forgotten about us. Things were just that backed up.
Then I got a call from one of the two companies, telling me that they still hadn’t found an available driver in our area. I reassured them that we were in no hurry; it could even wait until tomorrow. I had just been messaging our mechanic and, while he had the part, he was so busy, he couldn’t be sure when he’d be able to get to the van today.
After updating the garage about the tow, he suggested doing it tomorrow afternoon, instead. So I called CAA back and ended up cancelling the tow for today, and will book it again tomorrow.
I’m glad I double checked with the garage. Otherwise, I might have gone into town with the tow truck, only to have no way to get home again, if the van wasn’t ready today!
I’m actually happier with the switch to tomorrow. It’s supposed to be much warmer than today, and warmer still, on the day after! This should make it safer to drive, and do at least a smaller trip to the city. Thanks to the Cat Lady swinging by yesterday, we have enough dry kibble to last us. She even gave us more canned cat food and some treats! Cat food was the only thing we’ve been running out of, partly due to the stores being out of stock so much.
So that’s more or less worked out.
Not what was planned for the day, but that’s okay. We’re good!
The bitter cold is still hanging in there. Even with the sun shining so bright and clear, we don’t reach our high of the day until late in the afternoon. Thankfully, the deep freeze is supposed to end today and tomorrow, and then keep warming up as we head into March. I’m not holding my breath on that, since the cold has already been sticking around longer than forecast.
The outside cats have handled things well, with their shelters all over the place, plenty of food and access to warm water.
The winter sown seeds are still buried, though. I just cleared them a bit; any more than that will be done when we’re hauling snow away with the wheelbarrow, so we don’t end up with melted snow draining into the basement.
We ended up leaving the doors to the sun room partly open all night, when we saw cats using the swing bench as a bed. Potato Beetle prefers to eat in here, well away from the main crowd of cats – and an aggressive Distinguished Guest. Agnoos has a liking for the sun room, too.
Plus, sitting on rigid insulation instead of snow must be much nicer on the butt!
The heated water bowl was frozen over, though I’d made sure to turn on the power bar, so I topped it up with some warm water, too.
It wasn’t until I uploaded this picture of Broccoli, peaking at me, that I suddenly remembered something.
When I took the set up on the mini-greenhouse frame off, I had unplugged the power bar.
I never plugged it back in.
Yeah, that might explain the heated water bowl not working!
It’s plugged in now. :-D
Meanwhile, I’ve heard from the Cat Lady today. She sent me pictures of a very roly poly and healthy looking Cabbages, snuggled up with her daughter.
They watch cat videos together.
*melt*
Yeah, I’m thinking Cabbages might not be going anywhere else. She is quite bonded with Tiny Human!
At the time I’m writing this, both Nicco and Saffron should be recovering from surgery. The cat lady promised to let me know how they did. She’ll be swinging by here today to drop off kibble for us, so we’ll probably get updated then.
If you would like to contribute to our fundraiser to reimburse the cat lady for Cabbages’ vet bills, click on the button below, or click here. If you would like to read more about it, click here.
This morning turned out to be a busy phone morning. At least by our standards. :-D My husband had phoned in a prescription refill to be delivered today, so I called for my own refill, only to discover they had no refills left on file. Just last month, they’d had to fax my doctor to get more refills, and for some reason, he’d only added another 30 days.
So while they faxed the clinic again, I called them up. The receptionist figured my doctor wanted me to come in, and could I do that this morning?
Uhm. No. Even if we had transportation, they’re a 45 minute drive away.
When I explained we had no transportation, she set up a phone appointment for me, for late this morning.
That done, I tried to move on to other things, only to have the phone ring again.
It was a Jehovah’s Witness lady that calls every now and then. Normally, I don’t have any problem chatting with her, but had to cut it short this time.
Then my mother phoned, just 10 minutes before the doctor was supposed to call me!
Normally, our phone rings maybe once every week or two. :-D
The call with the doctor went well. He did want me to get some blood work done. I told him we have no transportation right now, so I wasn’t sure when I’d be able to come in. They no longer fax requisitions to other labs, so no chance of getting it done closer. Which is fine. Whenever we have wheels again, I can go in at any time, pick the requisition up at the reception desk, then turn around to the lab across the room.
I think I’ll wait until after March 15, when our province is supposed to finally open up completely.
Which has nothing at all to do with the trucker protests. Nope. Not at all…
We’ll see if it actually happens or not.
Hopefully, our van will be ready for pick up tomorrow. I want to contact the garage again to make sure they have the space for my mother’s car before I arrange a tow. Then I have to figure out how to get there myself, to pick up our van.
I really look forward to having transportation again!!
Oh, man. What a day this turned out to be. Talk about topsy turvy!
It started out normal enough.
The deer were visiting the feeding station before seed was even put out. Tissue was enjoying watching them. We had several come by today, including the piebald.
Nutmeg was waiting his turn in the cat path as I put the kibble out.
So many cats! I count 13 in the photo.
While outside, I shoveled out the last two paths that were left to do. One was the path to the feeding station. The other was the cat path from the kibble and cat house, to the storage house.
We had cleared around the cat’s house, since we needed to open the roof up to get inside, and had tried to maintain most of it. We’ve pretty much given up on the back, though. There’s no room for the snow anymore.
The cats have taken advantage of our being able to keep the side of it clear, and have managed to still access the space under the cat house. Only the smaller cats can fit into there!
This is the opening they’ve managed to keep clear to get under the storage house. With the lilac bush there, we can only shovel their path so far, but they’ve packed down their own trail to the opening.
I’m not happy with The Distinguished Guest. She went after Creamsicle Baby today. Hard. I had to break them apart. Poor Creamsicle Baby was bleeding at the neck a bit, though from all the black fur on the snow after they battled, he defended himself pretty well.
Since we no longer have cats convalescing in the sun room, I went ahead and cleared the frame for the mini-greenhouse and brought it inside. The cover had a couple of tears in the back, so that had to be fixed.
While trying to figure out how to secure the mini-greenhouse, I got a message from the cat lady. She was in town and we worked out that she would leave her carriers in the donation bin at the shelter, and I would pick them up later.
She also let me know that she’d left Cabbages behind, snoring with their 5 other cats. !!
As soon as I could, after it was confirmed the carriers were dropped off, I headed out to start my mother’s car to go get them.
I turned the key, there was a loud POP, and it died.
I have no clue what happened.
I opened the hood, but there was nothing visible that was out of the ordinary.
We now have zero transporation.
Crud. We’re hooped!
The first thing I did was send a message to the garage about our van. It’s booked for a new alternator on the 28th, which is when my husband’s disability payment comes in (last business day of the month. However, he does get a smaller CPP Disability payment 3 business days before the end of the month, which falls on the 24th. Normally, that would have been our day to do a big shop but, obviously, that’s not going to happen anymore! It is enough to cover the cost of the repair, though. I haven’t heard back from him yet, and just left a phone message, too. Hopefully, I’ll connect with him soon. I did mention in my message to him, that we now have no way to pick up the van anymore! I’ll also have to get my mother’s car towed to him, but I’ll arrange that after we get things worked out about the van. We moved my mother’s car into where we normally park the van, so we’ll have to get it out of the garage, anyhow.
*sigh*
My mother’s car may have the block heater, battery warmer and trickle charger, but there’s still a lot under the hood that can freeze. My suspicion is that it has something to do with the starter.
I then messaged the cat lady.
Not only could we no longer pick up her carriers, but there’s no way we’d have the van back early enough to bring the cats in to the vet.
Also, just this morning, we had decided to make a change on which cats were going in. The cats have been after Nicco again, and my daughter asked if we could have her go, instead, for her own protection. So we decided on Nicco and Saffron, instead of Turmeric and Saffron.
The cat lady responded almost right away, asking if we could get them if she came over with the carriers.
!!!!
Yup. She just took it upon herself to take in two more cats for a couple of days, then bring them in to the vet herself on the 23rd.
What an amazing woman!
After giving directions on how to find us, a daughter and I started working on patching the cover for the mini-greenhouse. We didn’t get very far, when I got a call to confirm our location. She was at the intersection, but there was a misunderstanding in my instructions, and she turned the wrong way. She was already here!
So one of my daughters snagged Nicco while I grabbed Saffron, and we brought them to the sun room for her.
Not only did she come with her two carriers, but she also brought us some canned cat food! It was left over from Cabbages, who is now turning her nose up at Tuna.
!!!
We had a chance to talk for a while, and she updated us with some surprising information.
When the vet first saw Cabbages, he thought she had ingested the poison from something like a flea and tick collar. We don’t use those. All her bloodwork had come back healthy, yet she struggled to stay alive. She’d even had a seizure after the cat lady had picked her up from us. The eventual conclusion was the toxoplasmosis somehow getting into her brain. The treatment was the same, either way, for her condition.
Well, they’ve done another blood test. This time, a toxicology test at a different, specialized lab – a $400 test!
The test confirmed this compound was in her blood. She was poisoned. The vet thinks she got into fertilizer.
We don’t have fertilizer in the house.
Somehow, the vet thinks she was getting miniscule amounts of fertilizer over a long period of time, it built up in her brain until she finally became so very ill. Our force feeding her and keeping her hydrated with the syringe kept her alive long enough for the cat lady to get her to the vet.
We are absolutely flummoxed. The only thing we’ve got is Miracle Gro, it’s kept in the sun room, and the cats can’t get at it. Cabbages has never been in the sun room, anyhow.
While she was updating us on the mystery that is Cabbages, we also talked about Nicco and Saffron. She expects Saffron to be adopted out quickly; female orange tabbies get snapped up quickly right now. Calicos, however, are very hard to adopt out for some reason.
We also found out that she doesn’t like calico’s herself, nor female cats. However, her 5 yr old daughter has informed her that if they adopt out Cabbages, she’s moving out. :-D
I know they already have someone lined up to adopt her, but it’s starting to sound like they might be keeping her themselves. Now that Cabbages is healthy, she won’t have anything to do with the cat lady or the other adults, but she and their daughter are inseparable. She gets along with their other cats – and even their blind dog! Cabbages had never seen a dog before, but not only do they get along, she even went for a ride on him! She had climbed onto him while he was lying down, and when he got up and walked away, she stayed!
Cabbages may already be in her forever home!
Meanwhile, Saffron and Nicco will be staying with the cat lady for the next couple of days, make their trip to the vet, then stay with her for 2 more weeks. At that point, they will be ready for adoption and will stay with a foster until new, permanent homes are found.
We also talked about the next vet appointments in March. It will be worked out as we get closer to the date, but the vet is saying they would prefer to have one male and one female. We have no males indoors that need to be fixed, but we do have outdoor males that we can catch. So next time we may be bringing in one indoor female and one outdoor male.
It’s a shame we can’t catch any of the outdoor females. The only ones we could were Butterscotch and Nosencrantz who are now indoor cats, and Rolando Moon, who is already spayed and not going anywhere.
Oh, wow. As I was writing this, I just got sent a couple of photos. Saffron and Nicco have arrived at the cat lady’s home, safe and sound, and are now sharing the cat cage Cabbages had been recovering in. Saffron was comfortably eating already. Nicco has her usual stressed out expression. :-D
Cabbages, meanwhile, is helping the cat lady’s daughter colour, after giving the cat lady her “equivalent to the middle finger” then went on her way. :-D What an attitude!
I knew the cat lady had already spent $1200 of her own money on vet bills a while ago, while still having weekly vet visits. Now I found out they did that really expensive toxicology test. She has easily spent over $2000 on Cabbages! That’s just in vet bills. She’s also been feeding Cabbages a special, nutrient dense, high calorie diet as she recovers.
All the more reason we started the fund raiser to help cover the costs. At $1500, it won’t cover everything, but it’ll at least cover a substantial amount!
If you would like to contribute to our fundraiser to reimburse the cat lady for Cabbages’ vet bills, click on the button below, or click here. If you would like to read more about it, click here.
Now we’ve got to figure out what Cabbages got into that caused this. We don’t have flea or tick collars. We don’t have fertilizer. I asked what else might have this compound, and she didn’t know.
Whatever it is, none of the other cats are showing signs of being sick, which makes it even more confusing. What was she getting into, that none of the other cats are getting into?
I’m at such a loss.
Meanwhile, we are now down two more indoor cats. Since we’ve brought in Nosencrantz and Butterscotch, that brings us back to 15.
The cat lady not only brought us the canned cat food Cabbages will no longer eat, but has promised to bring us more donated dry cat food, too.
What an amazing woman!
This takes a weight off our shoulders, as we can now focus on getting transportation again. I’ve let my mother know about the status of her car – reassuring her that all I was doing was keeping her informed, and not expecting her to do anything about it. She started telling me my brother will come out and fix it. No. I’m not expecting my brother to drive all the way out here to try and fix her car. Even if we did know what happened to it! But men always know more about cars than women, so I should at least talk to him.
*sigh*
Well, whatever we end up doing will depend on what the mechanic finds, after we get it towed out to him. Hopefully, it’ll be something we can afford to fix out of April’s budget. The van is already taking up every bit of wiggle room in March’s budget. :-/
Not having a vehicle is just not a good thing out here. Yes, we’re okay as far as basic necessities. It’s more about if there’s some sort of emergency, like if my husband suddenly has to go to the hospital.
The predicted blizzard conditions we were getting warnings about, passed well to the south of us. Once it swept down from the mountains and across Alberta, the system made its way mostly along the Canada/US border.
I guess there are some advantages to being further north!
What we did get was wind.
And deer.
Five of them!
The two in front are our usual visitors. The three in back are new ones. As least, that we’ve seen. For all I know, they visit when we’re not around to see them.
Unfortunately, the three visitors decided the chokecherry and saskatoon twigs were delicious!
After I took the video, I turned the living room light on, so they could see me, then waved my arms around like a fool. The two regulars ignored me, but the ones eating the twigs went away. And that’s all I wanted!
The two regulars came back later.
They were digging down really deep into the snow, to try and find more seeds!
This is what the area looked like this morning, after I put more seeds out.
That deep hole is almost completely filled in, and the snow is hard packed, from the high winds.
This wasn’t the only area blown over. I actually had to push my way through a drift, just to get outside!
It even drifted into the kibble house, though the cats did a good job of flattening it.
Check out the heated water bowl!
After knocking the snow out of the kibble trays and putting food out, I dug out the water bowls, knocking a thick layer off the top of the heated bowl. There was still water in it, though it was lot enough the cats would have had difficulty reaching it through that hole.
I ended up letting Potato Beetle out of the sun room this morning. He’d trashed a few things, trying to get out. He’s not injured anymore, and the only reason we were keeping him in was to prevent other cats from attacking him again. He was happy to be out, and hopefully, he will manage to keep away from whichever cats have been aggressive towards him.
Once the sun room door was open, though, Agnoos, Tuxedo Mask and Chadiccus were right in there! So I left the power bar on, for the light, heat bulb and the other heated water bowl, and left the doors open. When I was done and ready to come inside, I left the doors open just a little bit, so the cats can go in and out. I think there might have been four in there, at the time. We’ve since spotted Tuxedo Mask through the bathroom window, in his favourite spot on top of the board the heat bulb’s fixture is attached to, and under the light. The plan is to close the sun room all up again, after we go out and shovel out at least some of the paths – the wind chill is still pretty extreme right now – but we might have difficulties getting the cats out when we do! :-D
The Re-Farmer
ps: Just for fun, I compiled some short videos I got of the piebald deer, a few days ago. Turn your sound up, and you’ll hear the purring and chomping noises from Susan, who kept trying to eat my phone while I was taking video!!
This morning was another contradictory one, where the temperature was pretty decent and warming up, but the winds made it insanely bitter outside!
I got some photos yesterday, of the piebald deer visiting again. Her face was packed with snow, from digging under to find the seeds that had been blown over.
Check out where she is, in relation to the bird bath! For the snow to be that high – and hard backed enough to hold her weight – is really something!
The piebald chases these two away if they come around.
I got this photo before heading outside this morning. They’re really digging into the snow to find seeds! When I came around with my little bucket of feed, they ran off, but watched me from the trees. When I next looked through the living room window shortly after finishing up outdoors, they were already back.
The outside cats were quite enjoying breakfast, sheltered from the bitterly cold wind that was coming from the south.
We are still getting blizzard warnings. One patch of snow has already passed us by, and we did not get much snow, compared to areas to the south of us. There is more visible on the weather radar I can see is on its way. The forecasted high has dropped, while the expected amount of snow has increased.
Thankfully, we can hunker down and wait it out. I feel for the people who have to drive in this!
We had some concerns about a red spot on the incision showing up, but it seems to be almost gone now.
Beep Beep is one of the cats we’ve been allowing in to “meet” Nosencrantz and Butterscotch, even though she tends to be one of the meaner cats. Butterscotch has snarled at her just like any other cat that goes by, but Beep Beep has been pretty laid back about the whole thing.
Doing the morning rounds today was surprisingly painful. Yesterday was colder, but there was pretty much no wind and bright sunshine. I did the shoveling without even wearing gloves. This morning, though we were at a much milder -19C/2F, the wind chill was -32C/-26F. It still is the same as I write this, several hours later. That wind burns!!!! My fingers got colder in the time it took to set out kibble and water this morning, than in all the time it took me to shovel, yesterday.
We had snow all night, but not a lot of it. Mostly lots of wind. The bulk of the system passed to the south of us. We still have blizzard warnings, which is supposed to hit us tonight and through tomorrow. Tomorrow, we’re supposed to get 10-15cm/4-6in of snow and high winds. They’re not saying we’re supposed to get a high of -9C/16F, but with 42km/h winds (26mph), it’s going to feel a LOT colder!
Looks like we’ll be digging all the paths out again.
Potato Beetle is still in the sun room. My husband spent some time cuddling with him, because he was lonely. Potato Beetle, I mean. Not my husband. ;-) That gave me the chance to get a good look at the wound on his neck.
I got a better look at the older wound on his forehead, and that’s healing up quite nicely. He’s managed to clean himself up, so there was no longer a big dark patch of dried blood on his neck and ear. I also could not find the wound! I could feel a small lump on his neck, but not see anything but a bit of matter fur. Potato Beetle let my husband skritch his neck in the area, so it’s clearly not hurting him. This is encouraging. From the size of the blood patch, I thought he might need stitches, but it looks like he lucked out again. The last time we thought he might need stitches and took him into the vet, he had several puncture wounds on his back leg – likely from a coyote – but did not need stitches.
This boy has probably used up a few of his nine lives!
Still, we’ll see about keeping him in the shelter and safety of the sun room for a bit longer.
Butterscotch and Nosencrantz are still being kept apart in my bedroom/office (which is about twice the size of the sun room they just spent 2 weeks in), but we are allowing some of the more chill cats in and introducing them.
Nosencrantz will sometimes hiss at cats when they come too close, but not always. Lots of tentative sniffing going around. Then I put Nosencrantz next to David, and she lay down beside him, all snuggled up, for a while.
David is a favourite snuggle cat. It’s not unusual to find two or three other cats using him as a pillow, or mashed up against him.
Butterscotch, on the other hand, has discovered the laundry basket bed in the corner of my closet, and moved right in. The few times she’s come out, she’s tucked herself under a chair and snarled at any cat that comes into view. Which seems to confuse the other cats, because they typically didn’t even notice her until she made noise. However, if I am petting her as they go by, she is fine and even allows some sniffing to happen.
The forecast we had for things to slightly warm up turned out to be completely wrong. Early this morning, we hit -40C/-40F, and that was without the wind chill. So I waited until things “warmed up” to -27C/-17F before I headed outside. I hoped the cats would stay in their shelters longer if I did that, but no. They were outside, waiting for me, when I came out! They are made of sturdier stuff than I am!
Nutmeg is tired of winter, too!
I got word back from our mechanic about our van. It’s going to need a new alternator and, after taxes, we’re looking at close to $600. So that’s going to have to wait until the end of the month, and we’ll have to juggle our budget to pay for it. Until then, we will thankfully be able to use my mother’s car.
This morning, I decided to move it from the addition on the garage it gets parked in, and into the main garage area where the van is usually parked. Where her car is, the doors don’t open well, one of them is breaking, and it barely fits. We pull in closer to the inner wall, which means if I have a passenger, they have to get out before hand, because the door can’t open. The outer wall has shelving and a counter against it. I park at a bit of an angle, so that I can open the driver’s door enough to get out comfortably, without the door hitting the edge of the counter. If we have anything to unload in the back seat, it has to be unloaded before doing into the garage.
Which is a distraction that can lead to forgetfulness.
After clearing the snow and opening the doors, I discovered I made a dumb.
I forgot to plug in the car.
No surprise that it wouldn’t start.
I plugged it in, then continued clearing in front of the garage. It’s just light snow, but not something I want to build up.
Because we are now getting blizzard warnings, too!!!
Today is Thursday. Apparently, it’s supposed to start snowing tonight, and keep snowing through Saturday, when it’s supposed to warm up to -12C/10F, and get as much as 10cm/4in of snow.
*sigh*
Before heading inside, I tried starting my mother’s car again. It sounded better, but still wouldn’t start, and I didn’t want to push it. It sounds like the battery is frozen. My mother’s car has a block heater, battery warmer and trickle charger, so it should just need a bit of time. I’ve left the south facing doors open, so that the sun can warm up the black car a bit, and will try again later.
I can’t believe I forgot to plug it in. :-(
This is not a minor thing.
Years ago, while living in BC, my husband and I rented a car to surprise the family with a Christmas visit. The rental car didn’t have a block heater; no rental place we called had cars with block heaters. We stopped for the night in Swift Current, Saskatchewan, when temperatures plummeted to -61F/-78F with the wind chill. Much to our surprise, it started in the morning, but broke down soon after we reached the highway. This was in the days before cell phones, so my husband got out to walk for help. Stupid dangerous, but he got picked up by a tow truck. We spent another 3 days in Swift Current, waiting for the car to thaw out in a garage, before finally taking the train the rest of the way. We eventually learned that the engine block had cracked in the cold.
Thankfully, we haven’t hit temperatures that severe, but it can still do damage. And with the van at the garage in town already, this is our only transportation.
After coming back in and talking about it with my husband, he told me something I hadn’t known. My FIL had forgotten to plug in his car, the night my MIL had a brain aneurism, shortly after New Year’s. They didn’t live far from the hospital, but the car wouldn’t start, and he had to wait for an ambulance. Given the circumstances, it would have made no difference if he’d gotten her to the hospital sooner, but for a long time after that, in the winter my FIL would regularly ask my husband if he remembered to plug in our vehicle.
This is not something to take lightly. Especially when living as relatively isolated as we do, now.
I will give it a bit more time, then try and start it again. I’m supposed to go into town to pick up some things at the grocery store today. Before the blizzard hits! We’re running low on cat food again.
*sigh*
February is always the hardest month of winter. Everyone is so tired of the cold and snow by then. This year, we had those few really warm days that teased us with hints of spring. Looking at the long range forecast, immediately after the blizzard is done, temperatures are supposed to drop again, then slowly get milder through into March.
So, before we discovered issues where happening with the sump pump, our morning was pretty routine! :-D
The piebald deer was back again. Later on, I saw our usual pair coming by, and I think a singleton that’s starting to come by more often.
While puttering around the kitchen and heating up water for the outside cats, I spotted this camouflaged at, watching me through the window!
Inside cats, watching outside cat! :-D
I count fourteen in this photo.
I’m seeing Potato Beetle regularly again, and that wound on his head is looking like it really doesn’t like the cold! He won’t let me look to closely, though. :-(
With Butterscotch and Nosencrantz transitioning indoors, I’ll be able to leave the sun room doors open behind me while doing the morning rounds, again. Agnoos and Tuxedo Mask miss going into there! :-D
This is the usual pair of deer that come by every day, sometimes several times a day. Yesterday, they were coming close, even as they could see me shoveling snow. This morning, the little one was comfortable enough to actually lie down!
Unfortunately, I ran out of feed. Hopefully, my mom’s car handled the cold snap all right, and I can use it to run some errands today.
Hopefully, we’ll also get word on the status of our van!
I just had to try and get a picture of Beep Beep, who jammed herself in between her babies, Layendecker and Big Rig. She moved while I was talking the picture, so it’s not as clear, but Layendecker is at least double her size!! He’s more than double her weight. Hard to believe she grew this boy. :-D
The outside cats were out in full force this morning!
I count 15 in the picture. There was one more that ran out of camera view. With the two in the sun room, that’s 18. Rozencrantz and Ghost Baby are not in sight, which means all are accounted for. Even The Distinguished Guest, whom I was able to pet, while putting the food out. :-)
Tomorrow is supposed to get even warmer than today’s high, but we’re also supposed to get another 5-10cm of snow, so if we’re going to get any errands done, today is the day!
The Re-Farmer 