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Morning kitties, plum recovery, and we have rain!

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My plan had been to take some recordings for my July garden tour video. It was raining a little bit while I was feeding the yard cats and doing my rounds, so that got postponed. I’m happy to say that the rain became heavier, and it’s still raining, several hours later. It’s supposed to continue to rain for at least two, maybe three, more hours.

This is such a good thing!

So my recordings will wait until later today – as will my trip to the post office to pick up my package of seeds from MI Gardener. I’m really looking forward to seeing those!

For now, here are some adorable kitties.

Sprout is there with three of the four feral kittens. I did see the tortie, but it was hiding when I took the images.

The white and black cat nearby is Ink. I can tell she’s nursing, and it seems that she is keeping her babies in the unoccupied farm across the road from us. I do wish they wouldn’t go there. Crossing that road can be quite dangerous for adult cats, like the late Poirot, never mind for kittens!

The next picture is of Pinky and her two, in the garage. I had to zoom in from well outside the garage to be able to get that shot. If I come any closer, the kittens run off.

As I was finishing up and about to head back inside, I spotted the adorable trio in the last photo, all snuggled together. That cat bed is supposed to be a cat cave, but it always collapses. I finally just rolled down the side, and the sides still collapsed! The kittens seem to like it, though, so that’s good.

Havarti was hanging out in the sun room doorway, and I wasn’t able to get a picture of him. When the weather is good, I have the outer door secured open, so it doesn’t blow around in the wind. With the rain, I secured it mostly closed (there’s a brick to make sure it can’t close all the way) to keep the weather out, but the cats and kittens can still get in and out as will.

So we currently have four socialized kittens, six feral kittens, and several cats that I can see are nursing, but no sign of kittens. From what I can see, they have small litters. Maybe two or three active nips, though it’s really hard to tell at times. Adam will jump up on the cat house to eat kibble and will let me pet her. She might have one active nip, but I really can’t tell. I get the sense the Brussel has had a second litter, but that’s based strictly on behaviour. She doesn’t seem to have any active nips, though with her long fur, I could easily be wrong. Then there’s Slick. I am sure Slick had an early litter that she lost, then got pregnant again. She isn’t pregnant now, but I can’t see if she has any active nips. Does that mean she lost another litter? Or maybe has just one kitten, and I can’t see the active nip? She has been letting me pet her while she is eating, but only when there are other cats I can pet at the same time, so there’s lots of movement. If it’s just her, she won’t let me close enough to touch her.

While doing my rounds, I was very happy to see how quickly the Opal plum is starting to recover so many leaves being eaten by deer.

At the base of every leaf that was eaten, a new leaf is emerging. Pairs of leaves, actually.

I really need to figure out some sort of fencing around the garden. The remaining beet greens, more radish plants, and even some carrot greens, were gone this morning. I do have a cover – two, actually – that will fit this raised bed, but not with the radish plants being so big.

Not that they’re going to stay big for long, at this rate.

The peas also look like more of them have been eaten. I did add the pinwheels, but those are a deterrent only if there is a wind to move them. Same with the wind chimes. The new lights I added are working – I can see them from my bedroom window at night – but they don’t seem to be much of a deterrent either.

One of the suggestions I’ve read is to have a radio set to a talk radio station playing all night. I think we even have some old “ghetto blasters” that we could use (anyone else remember those? They were so popular in the 80’s), but I’d have to set up some sort of shelter to put one in and protect it from the elements. I don’t think I’d want to do that, though. Hearing talk radio from outside during the night would not go over well. Usually, when we hear voices in the night, it’s something to be concerned about and check on, not ignore.

With the garlic bed empty and waiting to be cleaned up, I’m considering. Should I bother trying to plant something in it? In theory, we still have enough growing season to plant something like bush beans. Perhaps a late planting for a fall harvest will actually work. The beans we planted earlier all seem to have stalled and stagnated.

We could also try planting anything that either needs about 40 days to harvest, or handles frost well. So we could try growing peas, beets, chard or spinach, too. I could even try zucchini. Anything we plant now would have to have a cover over it, though, since these are all things the deer like to eat.

With how things I direct sowed this year have been stagnating, though, is it even worth planting something? Either things will stagnate again, or it will give us at least something to harvest. We should be harvesting all sorts of things right now, and there’s just nothing.

I’ll look through my seeds again and decide. I might just leave the bed and save it for winter sowing, so we will have something next year.

What do you think?

The Re-Farmer

Morning kitties, and afternoon jacka$$es

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Okay, let’s start with the cute stuff!

Kittens!

This is what I saw out the bathroom window this morning.

I’m not sure which of the adult cats is in there, snuggling with Eyelet, Sir Robin and Havarti. It’s not Colin. Maybe it’s Mochrie? Well, whoever he is, he does enough a nap with the littles!

When it was feeding time, I got to see Sprout and her four ferals.

When I come back with the kitten soup, after putting out the dry kibble, Sprout always hisses at me. It’s been years, and we’re no closer to socializing Sprout in any way. I hope we have better luck with her babies, but the tortie and the calico in particular are a lot like their Mom!

Today was setting out to be a slightly cooler day with the possibility of rain this afternoon. All we got was some light cloud spit. The smoke is really bad today. I’m hoping the rain missed us and hit the wildfires, instead!

My husband had called in a prescription refill yesterday, that couldn’t wait until a Thursday delivery. One of his “controlled substance” meds that he can only refill when he’s down to 3 days of being out. So a trip to town was in order.

The pharmacy opens at noon on Sundays and I got there about 15 minutes early, so I popped across the street to a small department store that was open. I ended up getting a different type of sticky tape to trap insects that I’m used to. The old kitchen is so full of mosquitoes that when I go to get the cat stuff ready in the mornings, I can actually hear the whining of them, and I get surrounded by clouds of them. Thankfully, we have insect repellant now, so it wasn’t too bad this morning! We needed something to get rid of them, and I’m hoping this thing works.

I came out of the store just before the pharmacy opened, and there was a whole crowd of people waiting for the doors to open! Weird.

It didn’t take me long to get what I needed, and I was soon off to my next stop, which was the grocery store to refill a couple 18.9L/5 gallon jugs of water.

The grocery store parking lot was looking pretty busy, so I made a point of parking well away from the store, with no vehicles around me. With the large jugs to get in and out of the vehicle, I like to be able to bring the cart right up to the door to unload it into the space behind the front passenger seat. The space behind the driver’s seat is where we keep our hard sided and hard sided, insulated, reusable grocery bags. In the middle is where we keep the emergency kit and other supplies.

Yes, this is relevant. The main thing is, the only space for the jugs is behind the passenger seat.

I went through the store to see if there was anything else we needed, but only picked up a small package of stew meat and an energy drink for the drive home. So it wasn’t long before I was heading back to the truck with the full water bottles.

There was, of course, a large truck parked right next to me. One the passenger side.

The truck was facing the opposite direction, which means it drove through an empty parking spot to pull into the spot beside me. There was an empty spot on the other side they could have gone into, but nope. the biga$$ Silverado just HAD to park next to me.

I get to the back of the truck and assess the space for a moment. Then I grabbed the stew meat and went to put it in the bag with my other stuff, on the front passenger seat. There is a woman in the Silverado passenger seat, so she could basically just look down at me – the Silverado is quite a big taller than my Sierra! I put the meat and my energy drink in, then went to the back door on the passenger side. Did I have enough room to load the water jugs?

I opened the door and checked. If it opened all the way, it would be against the Silverado. If I left it half way open, I figured there was just enough space to fit a water jug through. I got the first one in fine.

While I was doing this, a guy came over and got into the driver’s seat of the Silverado. So I now had two people in the truck that could see what I was doing, and how little space I had between the vehicles. I figured they would move.

Instead, the guy started unwrapping his half a Dagwood sandwich and started eating.

Needless to say, I’m pretty irritated by this point, but whatever. I just and the second jug to put in, and then I could leave.

As I was settling the water jug into place, I heard a “tick” behind me.

Putting the jug in shook the truck enough that my door opened the rest of the way, and was now touching the truck.

I didn’t see if the woman even looked down to see if there was contact. I moved my door and checked them, but could see no damage. So I closed my door, then went to return the cart to the cart corral.

When I got back to my vehicle, the guy was standing between them, still carrying his sandwich, looking at his door. As I came around to see what he was up to, he looked at me and said that there was some damage.

My response was, so?

I mean really. The guy parked is biga$$ truck next to me, with tonnes of space he could have parked in, instead, didn’t move when he could see I was trying to load large, heavy jugs of water through the narrow space, and now he’s worried about a ding?

Then he said that he was going to have to file an insurance claim.

Really? For that?

My first thought, of course, was “scammer”. If he meant to intimidate me, it didn’t work. I just got more pissed off.

I told him, I deliberately parked far from the store so that there would be no one around me. He’s the one who decided to park right next to me. He made a gesture to the space, as if to suggest it was enough. Which it would have been, if it was just a person getting in and out. Not so much for carrying large water jugs and trying to squeeze them through the half open door. Particularly since, with the weight and awkwardness of them, I should have brought the cart right up to the door, not carry them from behind my truck, squeezing myself and the jug through that little space.

He then started going on about, what else can he do? He has to file a claim. This is an $80,000 truck. It’s a brand new truck. What else can he do? As he was talking, all I could think of was how smarmy he sounded. Smarmy and condescending.

And yes, I did flat out tell him at one point that he was being an a-hole.

At some point, I told him, you’ve got a working truck, and you’re worried about a little bit of paint? He got all huffy, asking me if I could see any tags or stickers showing that this is a “working truck”. WTF was he even talking about? My truck is a working truck, and it’s got no tags or stickers.

Then he went on again about how he’s going to file a claim, no matter what, and went to take a picture of my license plate, saying he was going to be giving me his information, etc. After all, what else could he do? It’s a $100,000 truck.

…

So we were going to exchange our information. Fine. He was going to get his registration papers. Okay. We’re at the back of my truck and I looked at my passenger side door.

Do you really want me to go get mine, and risk hitting your truck again?

Nope. He told me I needed to get them through the driver’s side door.

Right. He wanted this short, fat, middle aged woman to crawl over the console to reach the glove compartment from the driver’s side.

I scoffed and just went and got the papers.

No, I didn’t hit his truck with my door again.

So we took pictures of each other’s registration papers and driver’s licenses, using my tail gate as a table. I’d already taken a picture of the paint from my truck on his door – and of him, walking around with his phone and his big sandwich, taking pictures. Before leaving, I made sure to get a couple more pictures showing the space between and around our vehicles.

Then I got into my truck and started updating my family, before heading home. They left while I was still doing that.

Guess he didn’t need to sit in his truck to eat his sandwich, after all.

The family updated, I headed home and unloaded the truck by the house. Which is when I remembered to get a better look at my own door.

Sure enough, after a bit of searching, I could find a bit of grey paint from the Silverado on my door.

Which I don’t care about, of course.

Once everything was settled inside, I made sure to settle down and write an incident report while everything was still fresh in my memory.

Sadly, I’ve got a lot of experience when it comes to writing incident reports. Usually, it was for the police or the courts, though, not insurance companies.

I made sure to include my photos with the report. The photos of his driver’s license and registration papers as well.

Oh, my.

I really hope this guy doesn’t try to file a claim – for his sake.

First up, after looking at what his vehicle was, I did a quick search. The value, in Canada, maxed out at under $83,000. If he’s stuck to $80K, that would have worked, but he then upped it to $100K

Then I noticed who the owner was.

The truck was owned by, and registered to, a drywall company.

It really was a “working truck”. It’s not even his truck. The company itself is in the city, so he was probably an employee using a company truck… on a Sunday. In a resort town and hour away. With a woman.

The company doesn’t have a website. No email address. Just an FB page. Nothing has been posted on is since 2020.

Then I noticed his license. He’s from a town bordering the city, but what was that X under “restrictions”? Mine has a 1, since I wear glasses. Restrictions also includes things like “maximum speed of 70km/h”, “daytime only”, “hand controls”, “commercial class”, etc. I’ve never seen an X before.

So I looked it up.

It turns out to be a driver’s restriction “addendum”.

It’s used when someone has more restrictions than there is room for on the license.

A list and description of those restrictions must be carried by the person, by law, at all times.

Interesting…

Eventually, I took a look at the photo I took of the ding on the door.

The door of that precious, new, “$100,000” truck…

The first thing I noticed was the pair of scratches in the paint, above the ding I caused.

Then I had to zoom in because… were those… so many…

Chips in the paint?

Yup.

The first photo above is the one I took, untouched. The blue paint from my truck is in the “clean” spot, where he’d dragged his thumb across.

In the second picture, I used red to mark the scratches, and put a dot beside every spot that was clearly a chip in the paint. There were others that I didn’t mark because I couldn’t be sure if it was a chip, or road dust.

As someone who lives off a gravel road, I recognize stone chips in paint. Except the chips were really high up the door. I’m short. That’s a tall truck. Some of those dings at the top of the photo were almost chest height on me. Normal driving on a gravel road shouldn’t result in paint chips, that high up.

According to the registration papers, this truck has only been driving since the end of May of this year. Not even two months, yet. It’s also set to expire at the end of August, so it’s only registered for 3 months, plus a couple of days in May.

That’s a LOT of dings for just a couple of months driving – and that’s just in the area in my photo, on the passenger side door.

There’s also a smear that I am not sure if it’s a smear of dust, or if it’s a smear of paint or something.

Now, I did ding this guy’s car. I tried hard to keep my door from opening all the way, but couldn’t stop it while I was settling the water jug in place.

With the guy’s behaviour and attitude about it, any possibility of apologizing disappeared. Plus, I was already ticked that he’d parked so close to me, when there were so many other places he could have parked and not had anyone next to him, then didn’t move when he saw that I was struggling to get the water jugs into my own truck.

Of course, a polite, able bodied young gentleman would have offered to assist the fat old lady lugging 5 gallon jugs of water and trying to get them into a vehicle. Not that I needed it, but it would have been polite. I’ve certainly done as much for others, when the opportunity rose. At the very least, if he was so worried about the truck, he would have moved it before I started hauling over that second water just.

I somehow doubt that the company that owns the truck is going to think it’s worth paying the deductible to file a claim for negligible damage, while it was being driven by, presumably, an employee (not the owner, since the company name is a surname that isn’t his) using it for personal reasons during off hours.

Well, as my husband put it, if they do file, we’ll let the insurance company sort it out.

What a way to end my time in town today!

Thankfully, the rest of the day has been far less… interesting.

The Re-Farmer

Morning kitties, and a mid month shop

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Well, I won’t be working on the wattle weave bed today, as we ended up making a trip into the city for are mid month shopping.

The day started, of course, with feeding the outside cats and doing my morning rounds.

That orange and white one, Colby, will come SO close when I’m putting the food out, but won’t quite let me touch him! The little tortie is the shiest of the bunch. Still can’t get near the mama, though she will sometimes come to the house for food.

Pinky, the garage kitten mama, always come to the house at feeding time, leaving her kittens in the garage. She does NOT like any of the other cats, and is quite aggressive towards them. If they come to the garage, she will chase them off. I did move their food tray closer to the the door between the middle and the side where the back door is, and have been seeing both kittens. I saw the white and grey one outside the garage, near the back door, this morning. Hopefully, that means they will soon make the trek across the yard and discover the wonders of regular food, water, shelter, toys and other kittens to play with.

The dump opened at 10 today, so I didn’t want to do anything that needed more time. I watered the garden beds last night, so they were okay for the morning. I’ll need to water them again, this evening.

My younger daughter’s desktop – currently the oldest in the household – has been dying, and she’s been looking online for a new one. She settled on one at Best By, but they would not accept any version of our mailing address. Not the physical address, no postal boxes, not even the physical address of the store the post office is in. No shipping company alternative that services our area. Nothing.

Oh, and they won’t ship to one of their own physical stores, either.

Their methods of contacting someone through the website were useless, so my daughter hoped to be able to talk to someone at an actual store about it.

That meant a trip to the city. There was a brick and mortar location near a Walmart we go to during are monthly stock up trips, so that worked out.

After loading up the truck with a couple of weeks of garbage, we headed out. When we got to the entry to the pit, my daughter got out and walked ahead of me. The area in front of the pit hasn’t been cleared since the last time I was there, 2 weeks ago, and it was bad, then! My daughter made sure there was nothing that could puncture our tires so I could drive in, stopping me when she reached and area of shattered glass. I did have room to back up towards the pit, at least. Well. To the pile of garbage and what looked like the remains of a small, busted up shed, in front of the pit.

I don’t understand why no one has gotten the front end loader to push all this into the pit. The custodian can’t do it; she’s a senior with mobility issues, so that’s not part of her job, but arranging it to be done should be part of her job! Unless council, for some reason, is refusing to get someone to do it? I don’t know, but it’s getting really bad in there.

That done, our next stop was the post office. The post office itself is closed today (Saturday), but my MI Gardener order of seeds is in, and I thought it might be in the mail box.

It wasn’t.

In fact, there were three parcel slips in there. I was only expecting one package. I’ll have to come back on Monday, when the post office opens again, and see what’s there!

That’s what I get for not going to the post office, after getting our truck back.

After picking up what mail we were able to, it was off to the city.

The first stop was in a mall with a tiny Best Buy shop in it.

My daughter explained her situation to the guy there, and it was clear she was not the first person he’s talked about this. He knew the answer right away.

Basically, there is no way to get something as large as a desktop computer purchased from their website delivered to a PO box, nor with they deliver to a physical address as far out as we live. Including the store the post office is in.

We’re just too far from the city. He did acknowledge that they lose a lot of sales because of this.

Apparently, it comes down to security and theft. They can’t assure that a large package delivered to a rural area won’t get stolen, so they just don’t do it anymore.

It makes me wonder just how often things had been disappearing for them to go that far!

Their own stores, however, will cannot accept personal orders for pick up, either.

The only alternative, other than buying a computer somewhere else, is to find someone in the city that was can get it mailed to, then pick it up ourselves later.

We have a few options on that, with the best one being my brother and his wife.

By the time we were done talking to the guy, it was about 1, and the only food we’d had were a couple of cheese buns I picked up at a gas station, along with a couple of energy drinks, for the drive in.

The cheese buns were from a bakery in the town north of us, and they were awesome.

So we went to the food court for lunch. As we were eating, I messaged my brother, asking if we could have something shipped to their place. It turns out they have a lock box for deliveries, so they don’t get left on the front step. The problem is, delivery companies and Canada Post mostly ignore the delivery instructions and just leave things at their door, in full view. However, with Canada Post, they might also just leave a card for pick up at the nearest post office. If necessary, my brother also has the option to work from home on the day something is supposed to be delivered.

They were good with it, though, so that was a relief for my daughter!

After lunch (I packed more than half of mine up to finish at home, the portions were so large!), I popped into the Dollarama to look some stuff for the garden – that will be in a separate post – before we finally headed to the Walmart.

I am not bothering posting a picture this time. We had a lot of bulky stuff, so the cart was full, even though we didn’t actually get a lot.

We got more cat food; a couple of 32 packs of canned cat food – we made a very large dent in our supply when we ran out of dry kibble and the inside cats were getting wet cat food only, until I was able to use my brother’s car to pick some kibble up. Then never drive it again, because of the brakes issue. I’d run out of canned cat food for the kitten soup outside, and have been taking from the inside cat supply, too.

We still have feed store kibble for the outside cats, but I got two more 9kg bags of kibble. One for the inside cats, one as a spare.

The cat food alone was about $120.

Then we got toilet paper and paper towels, which we’ve also been going through faster than usual this month.

Then it was three loaves of rye bread, two 18 packs of eggs, a small jar of mayo, three cheeses (gouda, Havarti and Old Cheddar), and a package of hoagie-type sausages. At my husband’s request, we also got some Crystal Light water flavours and a couple of large bags of pretzels. Oh, and we got 6 cans of Monster; two each for me and my daughters, and a jug of orange juice for my daughters. I did remember to get insect repellant, so we got a 2 pack of that. For the drive home, we got a couple of cold drinks.

All of that, plus $5 to the Red Cross, came out to $322.83 after taxes.

*sigh*

That done, we headed home, stopping to put in $40 in gas before leaving the city, as the prices were a bit cheaper there.

Once home and unloaded, I had to feed the outside cats to get all the kittens away from the truck, so we could move it away from the house again! By that time, it was late enough that they were being fed only a little bit early.

It was also supper time, so I have me leftover lunch, then headed outside to make use of my Dollarama purchases. I’ll be doing the watering, once things have cooled down a bit more.

Next up: finding ways to deter the deer!

The Re-Farmer

Morning kitties and tiny harvest

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Okay, I definitely over did it yesterday. Which happens a lot faster these days, then it used to!

I was preemptive on things, though. Before going to bed, along with my usual painkillers, I made sure to treat all the usual muscle groups that I’ve had Charlie horse issues with, with Tei Fu lotion. Just in case.

Once outside this morning, I did my usual rounds, starting with feeding the kitties. Including these hungry little wildlings.

The forth one did show up, eventually.

As I was finishing up, I spotted these two full belly babies, being adorable.

I didn’t see the garage kittens until much later, and not both at the same time, but they are there, and getting their own bowl of kitten food. I should start moving the bowl closer to the back door, to encourage them to go into the yard and discover all the amenities, awaiting them!

I should have watered the garden this morning, but my body was giving me a great big FU on the subject. I did manage to get a tiny little harvest, though.

Just a few Spoon tomatoes. In the next photo, there’s a few sugar snap peas, the Spoon tomatoes, a few tiny little strawberries from the old kitchen garden and some raspberries. I was able to leave a bowl full of berries and tiny bowl with the Spoon tomatoes for my husband, as a morning treat when he woke up.

Once back inside, I pain killered up and went back to bed for a few hours.

Being old and broken really sucks sometimes – and I’m still almost the most able bodied person in the household! Both girls are feeling better, though, hence the “almost”. My younger daughter still has to watch herself with the wrist, and has been doing mild recovery exercises. I heard her talking with her sister today, marveling at how much better her wrist feels, even with the remaining pain and discomfort from the surgery, without Squidly wrapped around the bones. She’s so happy to have been able to get that done!

On a completely different note, thanks to some assistance from my older daughter, I was able to pay the deposit for getting the main door and frame replaced. We had 30 days to accept the estimate. After that, we’d have to get a new estimate and, with the way prices are going up, the cost would likely increase if that happened. I’m okay with them taking a while to get the job done, though. That’ll give us time to raised the balance without having to use more debt. *sigh* It needs to be done, though. It’s not like we can go a winter with nothing but a storm door there!

Ah, well. It is what it is. We’ll manage. We always do!

The Re-Farmer

Getting things done

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It’s been a long day! I didn’t have to go anywhere, and the weather was good, so I finally got some progress outside.

First, the cuteness!

The mama and her secret babies seem to be good with my coming into the garage and leaving food for them. No attempt to move them again. I guess actually picking up the smokey kitten was just too much for the mom.

Still, seeing both kittens at the same time – and eating with Mom – is pretty rare!

In the next photo of the slideshow above, we have full belly babies, enjoying the morning sun on my late fathers old car. I’m pretty sure this is two litters, but they behave like one.

I’ve been checking on the garlic while doing my rounds and they will be ready to harvest soon. With that in mind, I finally opened up the canopy tent I bought on clearance last fall and set it up.

I have to admit; for a cheap canopy tent, it came with the highest quality pegs I’ve ever seen with any kit we’ve bought before!

Usually, they’re skimpy pegs that easily bend. I’m quite glad for the high quality ones, because with a couple of the legs, I had quite a time finding a spot where I could actually put the peg through without hitting something.

The tent was packed in a cardboard box inside the case. After I got everything out and starting working on the tent, the cats discovered it.

They were having so much fun with it, I left it there for them when it was time to clean up.

That done, my next project was to finally start on the new wattle weave bed in the old kitchen garden.

Which took all day, and is nowhere near finished, but I’ll get into that in my next post!

See you there… 😊

The Re-Farmer

More kittens, and an update

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Yes! We have transportation again!!!!

Before my friend arrived, I did have to play interference with an Eyelet, who wanted to follow me along. Which meant cuddle time!

It’s so hard to get pictures of those eyes, but I think I managed to capture their colour pretty well. They are SO white!

Eyelet kept trying to follow me down the driveway, which is not good, since I’m 99% sure he’s stone deaf. You can’t tell to watch him running around and playing, but I’ve gone past him with a lawn mower while we was sleeping and he didn’t wake up, so that’s a pretty sure sign!

I also spotted the secret kitties.

Can you spot the mama in the first picture?

These two kittens are the bravest of the four secret kitties – and the location of their “nest” in the outer yard is still very much a secret. Sprout is a good mama, but I do wish she would learn to accept us humans. When I got closer, she hissed at me and hid deeper in the tall grass. The white and grey ran off and hid. The orange on, however, started to run off, then came back. He’s getting curious enough that I think we might be able to touch him, fairly soon.

Sprout, meanwhile, just glared at me through the grass! 😄

As soon as I could hear a car coming down the road, I tucked Eyelet into the isolation shelter (which is open) and dashed to the gate before any cats or kittens could follow me! I did see Pinky’s two kittens in the garage, but they ran off before I could do more than confirm I was seeing both of them.

The drive to my mother’s town was a good time for catching up. It’s been a while since we’ve seen each other.

I did, however, have to interrupt the conversation to ask her about the noise her car was making. She thought it might have something to do with a recall on her vehicle model, but she didn’t know for sure. She needed to get it checked but didn’t want to go to the dealership in the city she bought it from, because it turned out, they suck.

When we got to the garage, I paid my bill – $56 and change, after taxes, including 12¢ for the C clip he used to fix the break in the linkage. I asked about the part he’d ordered, and he confirmed that they had sent him the wrong one for some reason. Frustrating, but their mistake saved me about $300, and the truck is working fine.

Then, since we were there, my friend asked about her car. He asked some specific questions about the noise, then asked if she was okay to go for a drive. So while I got set up in the truck and put back a few things I’d made sure to take out before leaving it for the tow truck, they went for a run. The mechanic did the driving. Later on, my friend laughed while saying it was a good thing there were no police around at the time! He was wanting to see if it was the wheel bearings, as the sound should change while swerving.

The sound didn’t change.

She was really happy with him, though, and booked an appointment with him for next week. I happen to not have anything scheduled on that day, so she’ll be coming over to here, first, to pick me up. We’ll go for breakfast somewhere nearby, then visit with my mother.

Which is what we did after we were done at the garage. Well; breakfast for her, lunch for me. We had a great time catching up before heading over to my mother’s.

I didn’t call ahead to my mother that we were coming by. Normally, my mother doesn’t like surprise visits like that, but I knew she would be happy with this one. She has always liked my friend, back from when we first got to know each other in junior high. Even back then, she called my mother “mom”, just like I called her mother, “mom”. When my mother nearly killed herself causing an accident, years ago, my friend happened to be there to witness it, and took care of my mother afterwards. If it weren’t for that, we would have never found out what happened that day, since my mother basically lied about some of the details, and left lots of information out.

My mother was thrilled with the surprise visit. She was also just as tickled to be called “Mom” by my friend, still, after all these years.

I had showed the pictures I took of Eyelet this morning to both my friend and my mother. My friend has a one cat right now. She was telling me I needed to come visit her and meet her cat, and I joked about bringing Eyelet along.

Long story short, after her car is done at the garage next week and she drives me home, I will grab Eyelet and follow her to her place in the truck for a visit. We will see how Eyelet and her cat get along. If they get along, she might adopt Eyelet! She does know he is probably deaf. I do want to make sure she knows he’s probably got ear mites and worms, and has never had vet care. At least I’ve seen him use a litter box in the sun room, though, so he’ll figure that out rather fast.

Once done at my mother, we parted ways.

I’m now rather glad my sister wasn’t available to drive me today. It was so good to catch up with my friend, while getting the truck back. She has a very eclectic work schedule, so even for her to have today available at all was serendipitous. It worked out for her, too, since she is now going to get her own vehicle looked at with a mechanic/garage owner she really likes – unlike the dealership garage in the city she’s been having issues with!

It’s late enough now that I won’t be starting any projects outside, and will just do my evening rounds after feeding the outside cats. Right now, other than a potential grocery shopping trip for my mother, I have 4 days of pleasant weather to get work done outside. Finally! I have two large projects I’ve had to set aside for now, partly due to being pulled away for other things, and partly because I had to give my left arm time to heal from my fall. It is still bothering me, but at least I can do more with it. If it’s still a problem when I see my doctor at our rescheduled time next week, I’ll request X-rays. It’s been quite some time, and it really shouldn’t still be hurting like it does.

Oh, speaking of medical stuff, my daughter just came by to show me her wrist. The surgical bandage could finally come off today and, my goodness, the incision is healing quite nicely! Oddly, it looked so small while the bandage was on, but now that the bandage is off, it seems larger, somehow. They definitely needed space to evict Squidly.

So that is where we are at now. The truck is back and working, we might have Eyelet adopted out, and plans to spend time with my old friend again next week.

It’s been a very good day.

The Re-Farmer

Morning (and evening) kitties, and an update

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I’ll actually start with some evening kitties. I got these shots last night.

Havarti does NOT like to be picked up or carried, but gosh, he loves pets!

He also loves wrestling with grommet.

After the heat we’ve been having, daytime highs are finally getting to be more reasonable, but last night?

We dropped to 7C/45F last night. Lower than was in the forecast.

We’re expected to drop that low again tonight, though some apps say to expect a low of 9C/48F which means we might actually be hitting lower, the way the forecasts have been off lately.

Yes, we’re still in July.

Not quite cold enough to cover things, but pretty darn close. Overnight lows are expected to warm up again after tonight, but not by much.

As if the garden isn’t have a hard enough time as it is. My squash and melons still haven’t recovered from that one cold night back in June.

At least they’re protected from cats, though.

They do like the grass clipping mulch around the winter squash!

This morning, I tried to get some images of the feral kittens at the shrine feeding station. One seems to be missing from view. No idea if it was just behind something, or hadn’t made it to the feeding station yet.

Several of the older cats tend to push the littles away from the cat soup, even though they’ve already had dried kibble. I don’t make a lot of it, since it’s supposed to be just for the kittens, but there’s no stopping the adults from getting at it. All I can do is spread it around as much as possible, so everyone gets at least a little bit.

I have one more quick share for you – an inside cat this time!

Oh, Clarence. You are something special…

I need to get ready to go now. I found a ride to pick up the truck! Yay! We’ll have transportation again! Plus, I get to spend time with an old friend. 🩷 That’s about as good as it gets. 😊

The Re-Farmer

Feral kitties – secret kitties have been found!

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I was definitely wiped out yesterday. I went to bed before 8am and, other than a few cat related disturbances, slept until 6am.

Some time yesterday evening, it started to rain, and was still raining when I went out to feed the kitties. Nothing major; just a gentle, constant rainfall. It was enough to finally refill the rain barrel by the sunroom, though, and I had to add the diverter!

Sprout’s feral babies (and she seems to have all four of them now; I don’t see the other mama around as much) are getting braver. Now that we’ve got kibble again, I’m back to setting out the dry kibble first, then distributing the bowls of kitten soup. As I was going back to the shrine feeding station, I spotted the tortie, loafed in the upper level of the isolation shelter! She ran off when I got too close, but that she was there at all, and just chillin’, is progress.

They were very happy when the kitten soup bowl arrived.

Even Sprout is starting to go in there more often. You can see her in the second image above, with Colby on top of one of the box nests behind her.

I took some kitten soup to the bowl in the garage, just in case the secret kitties were still around. This side of the garage is where we store the lawn equipment, and is accessible only through the main doors. A hole was dug under the door, I believe originally by skunks, so the cats could also get in and out with the doors closed. My brother tried to cover up the hole with a sheet of metal when he stored their big mower in there, but it got dug out again beside it, before we knew there were kittens in there!

After I was able to pick up and hold one of the babies, the mama moved them, and I feared she took them to the barn or one of the sheds in the outer yard. I was still leaving food in where they were before, just in case.

This morning, after putting the food bowl in, I spotted the mama coming up through the garage. The middle is where we park our vehicle, and where my brother’s vehicle he loaned us is currently parked. It has a doorway to the other lean-to side of the garage, and the back door is beside that, so it’s not unusual to see cats cutting through the garage from the yard through there.

She went to eat while I continued on to switching out the gate cam memory card. When I came back, I saw the mom going around into the middle of the garage, making calling noises, while doing to a back corner of the garage. Currently, there is a wrapped and stacked pile of summer tires from the van we no longer have, sort of blocking the space into the corner, between a built in counter shelf on one wall, and a storage shelf on the other.

On a hunch, I moved the food bowl into that part of the garage, and left it in front of the shelf near that corner.

Walking by a few minutes later, I spotted the mama sharing food with her white and grey kitten, which you can see in the last photo above. I didn’t see the smokey one, but it would be in there, somewhere.

The mama had simply moved her kittens to the other side of a wall.

I am so glad she didn’t take them far!

Now, we just have to convince them to come to the shelters in the inner yard.

The Re-Farmer

The morning so far, and last rhubarb harvest

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I was going to simply say “the morning,” until I realized it’s not even 10am yet. 😄

We had the crock pot going all night, making food for the outside cats. I was up early to take the bones out and finish making the “cat soup”, so it had more time to cool down at least a bit before it was time to feed the kitties.

They really miss their kibble! Even the inside cats. You’d think they would find having all wet cat food would be a real treat for a change, but no. They keep begging for kibble!

I’ve heard from my brother this morning. They’ll be able to go into the nearest town to switch the insurance, so we can drive their vehicle legally. That’ll take a couple of hours so, once I get the word, I’ll be making a trip to pick up kibble. Which is good, because we’re almost out of the meaty bones we’ve been using to make the cat soup base for the outside cats. Doing this has certainly made more room in the chest freezer!

The yard cats still seem a bit perplexed about the cat soup they’ve been getting. They’re eating it, but they don’t prefer it. Except the really feral ones. The ferals will scarf down anything.

I did leave a bowl of food in the garage for the secret kitties, just in case. I have no idea where the mama moved then, but she still comes back to the garage – that’s her “home”, it seems – and I’m hoping her kittens are old enough to come out on their own and go back to a familiar place. Or, better yet, discover the inner yard, and all the things in there for the kitties.

I did see three of the four other feral kittens this morning. Colby is definitely the bravest of the bunch.

I love that first picture! I caught him in a yawn (just guessing he’s a he, because gingers are more likely to be male). He watched me from the tree and let me come pretty close. Later, I saw him going into the isolation shelter, where there was still some food left in the bowls in there.

I was able to get a surprisingly good picture of his torie sister. I had to zoom in from quite a distance.

As far away as I was, she still wasn’t comfortable with me being there, and ran off soon after.

The calico was even harder to spot, once she was done eating.

While I was slowly trying to get close to her brother in the willow, I heard a bit of a rustle and realized I was being watched through the vines.

Once again, I had to zoom right in.

I might have seen the white and grey, but I’m not sure. We have several really small adult white and greys, and this kitten is almost as big as they are. When they’re running around all over, it can be very hard to tell who I’m looking at.

After the kitties were fed, I did my morning rounds. I did not need to do any watering today, so they didn’t take too long. I did pick some sugar snap peas this morning, but it wasn’t really enough even for a day’s meal.

So I ate them for breakfast.

I thought there would be raspberries to harvest, but not really. There are lots of red berries, but they’re not “ripe”. Between the heat and the lack of rain, the berries don’t have a lot of moisture in them, so they aren’t letting go when I try to pick them, unless they’re almost over ripe. I’ve been trying to water the patch when I can, but it would need me to set up a sprinkler for an hour, every few days, to make up for the lack of rain this year. So I’ve been snacking on a few raspberries in the morning, but there really isn’t enough to do an actual harvest.

While checking on the eggplants, looking for flowers, I found this.

A little volunteer tomato!

Give the location, I would guess it is a Black Cherry tomato, as that’s what was growing here, last year. No chance of it reaching maturity, this late in the season, but I’ll leave it be. If the eggplant seems to be covering it too much, I might transplant it to where it can get more light, but that’s about it.

I did find some eggplant flowers, on another plant.

They were set back quite a bit by that one cold night last month, so it’s good to see them recovering. Hard to say if they still have enough season to produce eggplants to full maturity, though. If we get a long and mild fall, they might have a chance.

Before heading inside, I did one last harvest of rhubarb. I’ve been leaving them without harvesting for quite a while, giving them plenty of time to recover from the previous harvest. After today, they will be left to recover and store their energy to survive the winter.

I trimmed the leaves and ends outside and took advantage of their huge leaves, using them as a mulch around where my daughter’s surviving double daffodils are trying to grow. Just one cluster has emerged, and they’re not doing well. We certainly won’t be getting any flowers from them this year, but if they can last long enough, hopefully their bulbs will have enough energy stored to grow and bloom next year.

Once the rhubarb was trimmed outside, they got a thorough washing inside before being cut up.

I now have a big bowl of these in the fridge. What doesn’t get used for baking or whatever today will be put into the freezer.

And that’s my morning so far! Considering how early I was up this morning, it already feels like it’s been a long day.

Hopefully, this afternoon, we’ll finally have plenty of kibble for the cats for the rest of the month! They will certainly be happy about that.

Who knew that they would prefer dry, crunchy kibble over canned or home made, meaty food like that?

The Re-Farmer