update

I made it – and got garden stuff

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Well, I did it.

I had no choice.

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

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

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

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

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

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

My right arm is so messed up right now.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Anyhow.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Then, there is the portable greenhouse.

Which has its own challenges.

High winds and cats, mostly.

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

*sigh*

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

The Re-Farmer

Ouch

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Well, I did get out to work on some shoveling. I needed to focus on the inner yard so that we could drive the truck up to the house.

It was a beautiful day for it and I did get a decent amount done, but I wasn’t able to finish it. My right elbow gave out, first. It became simply too painful to bend it after a while.

Once inside and settling in, I paused to take some painkillers. I keep a bottle by my nightstand, so I sat on the edge of my bed to reach it.

With my right arm.

I could barely pick up the bottle.

Then I tried to get up to get a water bottle from my mini-fridge.

That’s when my left hip gave out.

I actually had to get my husband – the one with the back injury that has left him disabled for almost 15 years – to get the water bottle out for me, so I could take my painkillers! Thankfully, I keep a cane with feet standing by my bedside; I use it to help me stand up out of bed. It’s on my right, but I had to move it so I could use my left arm to get myself standing, because I couldn’t put any weight on my right arm.

Being broken sucks.

I’ll have to make sure to take my anti-inflammatories soon, but I’ll need to take those with a full meal.

Ouch.

Meanwhile…

I sent a text to the garage. Obviously, we weren’t going to be getting the truck back today, and I acknowledged that I could see that. I brought up that, with all the weird things going on with the truck, we need to talk pre-financing to find out what we can trade it in for. Plus, about selling my mother’s car on consignment. I was hoping to wait until after the snow was gone, at least, before trading the truck in, and getting a few more payments against it, but we just can’t hold off anymore.

I got a response, just before they closed for the day. The part had not arrived yet. He said he would phone to find out where it is, and agreed about talking pre-financing. Since he has the truck there, they have access to all the information they need to look up the trade in value, etc.

It is highly unlikely we’ll be able to get another truck. Ideally, a minivan would be the alternative, but their resale prices tend to be even higher than trucks, apparently. SUVs, on the other hand, tend to be more reasonable. In the end, beggars can’t be choosers! We’ll take what we can get, as long as it’s something my husband can get in and out of without too much pain, and there’s room for his walker.

*sigh*

The Re-Farmer

Some news

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First, the cuteness.

Kinda creepy cuteness, though…

Beep Beep and Susan in a cuddle puddle.

That eye, though… it wasn’t blinking. Just… staring like that…

👁️👁️

Anyhow…

I got some news from the garage today. They think that they got a bad differential, and are now working to get me a new one, on warranty. Which makes sense, since that shaking and shuddering started right after it was installed. The weird electrical stuff is probably unrelated, but who knows, with this truck!

No time line yet, though. They are closed now, but I hope to get some info tomorrow. We need to at least a small grocery shopping trip for the fresh stuff, plus a trip to the mail.

At least my husband’s prescription refills will get delivered as usual, tomorrow!

Hopefully, we will get the truck back soon. It might be nice to stay home, but not to much when it’s not a matter of choice. Having zero transportation a real problem.

The frustrating thing is to get lectures and “advice” from my mother, and even my sister, though through conversations with my mother. With my mother, she can’t understand vehicle stuff, so I don’t bother telling her details. That doesn’t stop her from deciding she knows everything and can start telling me what I should be doing. Even just telling her, we don’t know what the problem is, and the garage is having a hard time finding it, her response was to say, “can’t they find someone who can?” or “… someone who knows what they are doing?” As if hopping from garage to garage will find someone who can magically know exactly what’s going on, instantly. Then telling me to get a new truck, buy the truck from my BIL (who isn’t planning to sell it until he can replace it, in the summer), oh, and maybe I could make payments! Uhm… Mom. I’m already making payments. We’d have to get re-financing. To which I was told, I should talk to my brother. He’ll take care of it for me.

…

I told her, I wouldn’t be talking to my brother. I’d be talking to a financing company.

“Oh…”

She also started telling me about a conversation with my sister, and how she was saying that what we need is a second vehicle.

Yeah. We do. But we can’t afford insurance on two vehicles, while also making payments. We certainly can’t afford to be making payments on two vehicles at the same time!

Then my mother told me that my sister should lend us one of their vehicles.

…

I said no, they can’t. My sister uses the car to go to work. My BIL uses the truck. I also told her, I don’t want to be getting anyone else involved in this. I’m talking to my brother about things, and I’m talking to the garage about our options, and that’s it. No one else needs to be part of it.

I don’t know if she got it or not.

Ah, well.

As an aside, I’m happy to say that my mother has been making sure to have her new phone with her at all times, wearing it on a lanyard around her neck. We’ll have to walk her through how to make calls again. She apparently tried to phone us – I think on our land line – but said there was nothing; our phone wasn’t working. Except, of course, it was. She also tried to call my brother and that didn’t work. So she manually dialed a number and got my SIL. She thought she was calling my brother’s cell phone number, but called my SILs cell phone number, instead. We didn’t even know my mother had my SIL’s cell phone number! She was just as surprised as we were. It’s not like the numbers are at all similar.

My siblings and I have been able to reach her, though, and not have to go through the nursing station, which we are all happy about. Strangely, for me, it was a long distance call, and it shouldn’t have been, so my brother will be looking into that.

So the new phone is working out for my mother, even if she’s going to need more help in how to make outgoing calls. She said she asked someone at the nursing station to help her, and they refused, which is odd. I’m sure we’ll get the rest of the story later on.

Hopefully, we’ll soon have our truck back and working properly again, and I’ll be able to visit her again and help her figure things out.

Little by little, it’ll get done.

The Re-Farmer

Whoops!

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I got distracted and forgot I didn’t make a post!

It was a quiet day, and I was even able to get some crochet done.

I do have a bit of a morning update on the truck.  More perplexity.  They test drive the truck a couple if times yesterday.  

It was working fine.

At least, the first time they drove it.  The last time they drove it, it started making noises again.  They needed to wait for an available hoist si they could check out whatever us going on.

I got a city trip and a visit to my mother with no issues, but that short trip to the dump had do many issues in such a short time, with all those warnings from the onboard computer, it’s bizarre fir it to be working fine after being parked for a day and a half.

My brother says my truck is cursed. 😆

The Re-Farmer

Finally got a visit in

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Yes, I finally made it to visit my mother at the new TCU today! The truck even behaved normally the whole time. 😄

But first, the cuteness!

I got home late enough to do the evening feeding, and couldn’t resist getting a picture of this fluffy beauty.

Zoomed in from a distance, because she? he? is pretty feral and none of us have been able to get close. It does come into the sun room to snuggle with other cats and eat, so that’s encouraging, at least.

I headed out to visit my mother shortly past noon. I made sure to check on the truck before hand, and the clock still showed the right time, and even the door chime dinged appropriately, so whatever gremlin we’ve got in the electrical seems to be napping.

While today was warmer, we’ve been having intermittent snow and “snow showers” throughout the day. The highway was good, though, and while visibility was reduced, it wasn’t by much – at least not while I was on the road.

When I got to the hospital, I went into the wing I thought my mother was in, but it turns out the TCU was in a completely different wing. I did get to see what the long term car section looked like, though. While at the nursing station, looking for someone, I saw a lot of seniors all over, and several of them demanded to know why I was there and what I wanted! Thankfully, a staff member (a janitor, I think) showed up. I told her who I was there to see, and she knew my mother’s name, then led me through the hospital to the wing my mother was in.

I’d brought some stuff my mother requested, including more Pepto. There was someone at the nursing station, and I was able to leave it with her.

I also had a chance to ask about the photos my brother left of our vandal and my sister. Our vandal has visited a couple of times already, and my mother’s been there for just over a week. I was able to let her know that the last time he was there, he ended up with a check for a substantial amount. This is one of the issues with him; he’s managed to get many thousands of dollars our of my mother over the years. In this case, the check was written out by his wife for my mother to sign. I made sure to say, this was just so they know it happened, not that I was trying to blame anyone. Knowing my mother, she probably didn’t need a lot of persuasion and may well has suggested it herself.

The nurse I spoke to took some notes about it, so other stiff will be aware. I also talked a bit about my sister, as they would have her photo, too. I explained that with her, it’s more that both our vandal and my mother can manipulate her so easily. She has caused problems by going along with them when she should have said no.

Then I had to ask which room my mother was in. I had it in one of my family group messages, but couldn’t get a connection to look it up. It turned out I wasn’t even able to send updates to my family, either.

The nurse told me where to go, and I soon found my mother. She has the bed against the window, but her room mate had her curtain completely closed, so I wasn’t interrupting anyone else.

The visit was… difficult.

We started to talk, but there was some banging going on down the hall. I starting going through the bag of things I’d brought for her, but she was very disturbed. She moved to sit in a chair and started to tell me where to put things, then started to cry (it may even have been partially genuine) and complain about it, saying I had to get her out of there. She brought up the banging, and thought her room mate was doing it. !! I said no, there’s some sort of construction or repairs happening. My mother said we could go to somewhere more private and let me to the common room.

Which was directly across the hall from the banging.

At the time, a workman was using a chisel on the edge of a door for what turned out to be the installation of a keypad locking assembly.

The common room clearly had been a hospital room in the past and wasn’t particularly big, but it was in the corner of the wing, so it had two big windows and lots of light. Someone in a wheelchair was at a table working on a jigsaw puzzle. My mother introduced us. She has her own favourite armchair, right in the corner between the two windows, with a hospital bed table. She told me she eats her meals there.

We started talking and she kept telling me how terrible things where and how much she wanted to get out of there. She made it sound like the banging was happening all the time (the work on the door would have started just today), and talking. Apparently, her room mate sleeps all day and talks to herself all night. Which is curious, since both my brother and my sister have said they’ve talked to her during their daytime visits and found her very nice. After a while, the guy working on the puzzle started to leave, and my mother thanked him for the privacy.

As we talked for the next while, my mother was all over the place. She went from complaining about the noise and how she has all this money, but is stuck living there (I told her, everyone else there is in the same situation as her, regardless of money), to talking about how my sister should visit more often (she’s visited my mother twice in the first week), and even complained about my brother and his wife giving her an Easter card. Now. A month ahead of Easter, so that means they’re not planning to visit her on Easter. I reminded her, they are going on a pilgrimage. They’re going to be overseas. When are the leaving? I don’t know. How long will they be gone? For weeks! They’re going to be walking very far! She scoffed, but seemed to realize complaining that they were going on a pilgrimage for Easter wasn’t probably not a good idea! It didn’t stop her from claiming my brother was “running away” from her (he’s visited her more often than I have!), and so on.

I do think I was able to get her to calm down about things a bit. I tried talking about how this was temporary, and just one step to getting her to where she wants to be, and how the system works. She didn’t like that, but she also started to get upset because someone else came into the room and sat in one of the armchairs behind me. She kept glaring at him over my shoulder, and making comments about him being there while she had company. I kept reminding her, this is a public room!

At one point, she started to get things out of her purse, then got up to leave, telling me to wait for her. It turned out she had gone into the hall to talk to the guy working on the door, complaining about the noise, saying it was making her go deaf (my mother’s hearing is better than mine) and started crying again. He told her he was almost done and it wouldn’t be much longer, so she came back in.

I had hoped she had forgotten, but my mother got out her checkbook. She said, she wanted to pay for the work on the truck. !!! I tried to defer, but she insisted. I admit, she was generous about it, in her own way. Normally, she would ask for exactly how much it cost, then write out for an amount to the penny, or somewhat less. She didn’t even ask how much it cost, but told me to how much to write it out for so she could sign it. It will mostly cover the cost of the repairs.

I’m not going to deposit it until I’ve checked with my brother. He manages her accounts very well on her behalf. At one point, she asked me how much was in her account, thinking my brother told her. I said, I have no idea. It’s none of my business! I’m not sure if she approved of that, or was angry I didn’t know. 😄

We talked some more about her living situation and getting her into somewhere permanent. It’s frustrating to simply not know. In the end, it’s the government that decides, through the health care system. We have no say in the matter, but now that she’s in the system, it should work out better than trying to get where she wants to be from outside the system.

I noticed my mother had her rosary around her neck, so I suggested she pray the rosary. She said it gets hard to pray (referring to her own mental function; she does recognize that she is having increased cognitive issues). I reminded her that God doesn’t need words to know what she is praying for. I suggested that, if she starts feeling really anxious, to even just hold the cross on her rosary and use that to keep her mind on God. I couldn’t remember the exact words at the time, but reminded her of Romans 8:26 Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. (yes, I had to look it up – I remember the words, not the chapter and verse! 😄) She immediately knew the verse I was referring to, and it really seemed to perk her up. So we held hands and prayed together, and that seemed to help her a lot more.

Eventually, though, I had to head out, as I knew the roads would not be very good for long. She walked with me to the door. One of the things we’d talked about was the vitamin for her dry macular degeneration, and I’d explained that I made the calls to get a prescription faxed to the nursing station. She said she wasn’t getting them yet, so I said I would ask. Thankfully, because she walked me out, it helped me remember – and I’m glad I did!

They never got the prescription.

We talked for a while, and I said I would call the optometrist where she got the original prescription from and find out what was happening. I was concerned about my mother walking back on her own using her walker, but one of the nurses had seen us and was waiting. She assured me she would get my mother to her room okay.

From there, I made a stop at the gas station to update the family. Not to get gas, though. While I was visiting with my mother, the gas prices went from $1.359 to $1.419!

I’m glad I left when I did, as conditions were starting to worsen, but I got home okay – and the truck behaved the whole time.

As soon as I was settled in, I made a bunch of calls. Apparently, the prescription for my mother’s eye vitamin did get faxed, yesterday. In the end, the receptionist I spoke to said she would try and print out what she had in her system and fax it again, as the optometrist was working a different location until next week. Some time later, I got a call from the TCU letting me know they got it. She then explained that this vitamin comes in two forms. A soft gel, which my mother was getting in her bubble packs, and a tablet form. They only get the tablet form. If my mother wants the soft gel, we would have to provide it. I explained that, with my mother, she believes that because they look different, it’s the wrong medicine – she believes that of all her medications – and that we’ve tried to explain it to her. I said to give her the tablets for now (I don’t want her to go without it, as she is complaining about vision loss), and to explain to her what that specific tablet is. We’ll see how she does with that, for now. If necessary, we’ll have to get something set up with the local pharmacy for those.

I’m glad I finally made it to visit my mother, but it’s so frustrating. I understand why she’s not happy there, and absolutely understand her desire for more quiet. It’s part of what we like about living in the boonies, after all! At the same time, I know my mother well enough to know that a lot of this is self inflicted. My mother is one of those people that always sees the worst in others, and interprets things in their worst possible light. I remember when my father when through a lot of this, and at every stage, he was always so thankful, so grateful, to the people around him, whether it was the home care aids or the nursing home staff. He always let them know how much he appreciated them for how well they took care of him. Every time I called him, he would go on about how great they all were. My mother? She’s the complete opposite, most of the time, and it’s not getting any better as she gets older. In fact, the only person she will speak highly of these days is…

Yup. Our vandal. She says, they’re getting along good now. I reminded her of that last letter he wrote to her, and the horrible things he said to her, and that he hasn’t stopped. He may be behaving around her when his wife is around, but he’s still doing things (I didn’t tell her about him driving by while I was shoveling out the plow ridge, slowing down to a crawl at the end of the driveway). She thinks he’s changed. I said, I hope so, but he’s why my late brother’s two kids now say they want nothing to do with our family, thanks to his lying about us. She dropped the subject.

All we can do is hope she can finally get to the nursing home she wants to be in, but I’m starting to wonder if she’ll even be happy there. There will be people talking in the halls. There will be noise. At least she’ll have her own room, though. Maybe that will be enough.

We shall see.

Nothing else we can do. It’s all up to the system…

… and the system sucks.

The Re-Farmer

Costco stock up trip: this is what $800 looks like

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$799.40 to be exact. 60¢ under budget. 😄

First, though, an update on the truck.

The first thing I noticed when I started it this morning was that the clock’s time was wrong. I’d reset it yesterday. Which means, we lost power to the console during the night, and it came back.

As my daughter and I were starting the drive, we were talking about what’s been going on with the truck, and how weird it was for the tire warning message and light to not be there anymore.

Then, just shy of the highway, less than 2 miles from home, both the light and the message came on.

*sigh*

We had left earlier than usual to meet someone from the rescue to get our top loading cat carrier back, but also to stop in the town my mother is in (again). We picked up a couple of energy drinks and sandwiches for breakfast, then went to the feed store to pick up the lysine. They were still closed, though, so we kept on going to where we were arranged to meet up. We had plenty of time to eat our sandwiches and just sit and talk.

Once we had the carrier again (they even cleaned it!), it was off to the city and Costco.

I could not believe how full the parking lot was, for a Wednesday morning! It was really busy in the store, but the bigger surprise was as we left. There was a huge line to the customer service desk, running all the way to the main doors outside. I don’t usually see that kind of line except after Christmas.

Still, we got what we needed to get here; anything left on our list will be done on our next Walmart run.

There is is. $760.67, before taxes. After the cart was re-loaded, we had to stop and my daughter reorganized things. Because of the crowds and line to the Customer Service desk, we had to do it outside. As our stuff was being scanned, a guy showed up to load the cart and he basically just threw everything onto the flat cart with no attempt to be secure or even logical about it. My daughter and I are both very keen on packing and stacking things well, so it was hard to watch! 😄

This picture was taken before my daughter was done reorganizing so no, those eggs did not stay balanced on top of the pierogi at the end of the cart!! 😄

This is what we got today.

We did get cat supplies, though with the generous donation, we should only need maybe one more 40 pound bag of kibble before the end of the month for the outside cats. We didn’t need any for the inside cats, so the two 9kg and two 11.6kg bags are all for the outside cats. I think the price on the 11.6 kg bags went up. Either that, or they were on sale that last time I remember getting them.

We also got a case of canned cat food and a case of XL puppy pads. We now have enough canned cat foot that we won’t need to pick up more for the rest of the month. Usually, I get a couple smaller cases at Walmart to have enough for the month.

For non-food items, we got our toilet paper, AAA batteries, and some more Head and Shoulders that gets used as an anti-fungal body wash.

For beverages, we got a case of Coke Zero and a case of Monster. The Monster variety pack had replaced one of the flavours from before, and it’s to one I like but haven’t been seeing in stores much at all lately, so I’m happy. It was also on sale, so that was bonus. There is also a 3 pack of oat milk for the girls.

In dairy, we got a 4 pack of cream cheese, a carton of whipping cream, a block of Old Cheddar cheese, plus 5 pounds of butter.

For meat and other protein, there is a double flat of 60 eggs, a panini pack of sandwich meats, some pickerel fillets for the girls, two big packs of drumsticks that were $5 off at checkout, a pork blade, a pork loin, and a variety pack of dry sausages that was on sale. I also got two garlic coils, as the price was almost half what they are, locally. Oh, and some canned chicken. The price on that seems to be staying under $20 for six cans of late.

There is also a bag of carrots – organic, but they were on sale, and we didn’t see any non-organic ones anywhere, a 20 pound bag of Russet potatoes, frozen perogies, a case of ramen noodles, a bag of basmati rice, a case of tomato soup, large jars of mayo, peanut butter, and pickles. There is a two pack of butter chicken sauce, a shaker of powdered garlic (which, oddly, had more product for a lower price than the granulated garlic I usually get), and a large bag of granulated sugar.

For bread products, I got a 2 pack of rye bread and we got two packs of tortilla wraps. Finally, as a treat, my daughter selected from toffee and chocolate chip cookies.

Note that we did NOT get any beef. We haven’t been able to afford beef at Costco for a while, now. Lately, I’ve been picking up the odd package on sale, locally. The last couple of times I was in town because of the truck, I got some stew meat and some ground beef with sale prices much better than Costco these days.

Once the truck was loaded up, we filled the gas tank. Costco gas was at $1.239/L instead of $1.359/L everywhere else! It cost $51.69 to fill the tank.

On the way home, we stopped at the feed store and picked up the lysine. It came in adorable little 1kg buckets from a different brand this time. The price went up, so the two of them cost $67.20 after taxes. The containers I got before had been $20 each. Still better than buying it elsewhere.

When I saw the buckets, I commented on them, and that I would probably be keeping them to reuse. The woman behind the counter completely agreed with me – you can’t have too many buckets!

She also asked me if I was still wanting to get chicks.

I said yes, absolutely.

She asked if I was after a specific breed or anything like that, and I said I just want laying hens. She named several breeds, and I was fine with any of them. Then she asked about the date I’d want them, snowing the hatchery’s schedule on their white board.

There was no way we’d be ready for them in April! I told her, we need to be able to assemble the chicken coop first, which means, no snow on the ground. (Yes, I know; they’ll be in a brooder for weeks, first, but I still want to have the coop assembled and ready, before we get them.) So she put me down for the latest date they had, which is May 27. She has two other people who are interested in getting a smaller number of chicks than the 24 chick minimum the hatchery sells them for. I told her that, with our coop, we can have a maximum of 10 chickens, so we can go under, but not more than 10. So she will talk to the other two people and see what can be worked out to split an order of chicks between us, as well as splitting the shipping costs. With three people, we’ll be paying $15 each for shipping instead of $45.

Hopefully, we’ll be able to work something out with the other two people and get it all arranged and ordered. I’m flexible on the delivery date, too, as long as it’s not in April! She said, all three of us have said we are flexible on things, so this should work out quite well.

My daughter had been waiting in the truck all this time, so once we were back on the road, I updated her about the chicks discussion.

I think she is actually starting to look forward to having chickens! My daughters had been very reticent about it. Especially her sister. They have online friends who keep chickens, and my older daughter had commented about chickens getting sick, and we wouldn’t be able to take them to a vet.

Well, no, but we would be getting what we need to treat them ourselves! The feed stores carry medications and supplements for chickens, as well as feed. There’s lots of info out there on treating chickens.

Then we got to talking about where to set up the coop.

Ideally, I’d like to have it where we can easily see it, which would be in the south yards. Most of it isn’t level, and some significant portions of it floods in the spring, so that likely won’t work. I mentioned I was thinking of having it sheltered in the maple grove, or even where we currently have a pile of maple logs from the trees cleared away from the roof. The ground under that log pile is quite level, and I can see it out my bedroom window. Inside the maple grove would be more sheltered and there are fairly level spots there.

My daughter suggested we set it up against the retaining wall blocks at the end of the old kitchen garden. I had considered that area, but it would have to be at the northernmost end, as the south end is next to an area that gets deeply flooded in the spring. It’s not as sheltered from the wind, but it does get more light than if it were in the maple grove.

The other thing to consider is being able to secure the coop from being blown over in high winds. We’ve previously talked about getting panels that we can set around the mesh sides on windy days. The roosts are under the floors of the nesting boxes, rather than inside. There are three nesting boxes, with access from outside, at each end of the coop. When we assemble it, I want to find a way to attach a couple of roosts in the space in front of the nesting boxes, so they can roost for the night indoors, and not be exposed to the wind.

Ultimately, though, where we set up the coop will be temporary. I still plan to have some sort of polytunnel or greenhouse of some sort over garden beds in the main garden area. The coop and chickens would spend the winter inside that. So while we will need to secure it to make sure it doesn’t get blown over in high winds, we still need to keep it mobile.

I quite enjoyed talking it out with my daughter!

Anyhow.

Once at home, I had to drive up to the house to unload. I had some concerns on whether or not I’d cleared away enough snow before my body gave out. Especially the area I pull into behind the garage, so I can back up to the house. Sure enough, while in 2 wheel drive, I got stuck. I switched to 4 wheel drive and was able to back up. It was hard to tell, but I think that shuddering had started up again, while I was reversing in 4 wheel drive. The distance was so short, though, I really couldn’t say for sure. I just made sure to switch back to 2 wheel drive as soon as I was stopped, so I wouldn’t forget later.

Then it was the assembly line to unload the truck into the house. Last of all, my daughter and I took the kibble bags into the old kitchen. The whole time, we were constantly needing to make sure Sir Robin didn’t get into the house! He so wants to be inside!

Once the last of it was done, I left my older daughter to put things away while I grabbed some hot water and did the outside cats early. My younger daughter took over doing the kibble while I topped up the water bowls. Once all the cats were distracted, I was able to drive the truck out of the yard. I only had to scoot two of them away, first!

So there was have it. Finally. Our Costco stock up trip is done!

We will still need to do the Walmart and Canadian Tire trips, but that’s not as urgent, and there isn’t a lot we need to get there.

What I do need to do is visit my mother! I am planning to do that tomorrow afternoon, so I’ll be calling her tonight to let her know. My sister should have been able to visit her today. Maybe. During the drive home, we hit some pretty crazy blowing snow conditions, but it did clear up before we got home. As I write this, we are at our predicted high of -13C/7F, but the wind chill is -28C/-18F

Oh, my! Not only are we warming up over the next few days but, as I write this, we’ve got a high of 6C/43F forecasted for Sunday! 6C!!!! Wouldn’t THAT be nice!!

So, tomorrow (Thursday), I visit my mother. The day after, I have my doctor’s appointment. Saturday, I want to make a trip to the dump. Just a regular garbage and recycling run, though; my mother’s old mattress and box spring, and the broken office chairs, will have to wait for another day. Monday, my daughter has a doctor’s appointment. After that we don’t have anything scheduled until my dentist appointment near the end of the month, but March is also a birthday month for my older daughter. For her special birthday dinner, she usually chooses Pizza Hut pizzas. So at least one more trip there (no one delivers where we live. 😄)

Well, our mechanic has said, we need to drive the truck often. Mechanically, it’s running fine, with the possible exception of the shuddering in 4 wheel drive that comes and goes. I can just keep it in 2 wheel drive until absolutely necessary. They’ve checked and re-checked, and they can’t find anything wrong that could be causing it. The weird electrical thing has only affected the console and radio. The dashboard display has not been affected.

It’s still hell on my nerves, though.

The main thing is, we have transportation again, AND we finally got our first stock up shopping trip done – a week later than usual!

All is good.

I just have to keep telling myself that!

The Re-Farmer

No, I’m not crazy

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It’s a good thing I have such a good relationship with our garage, or they would think I AM crazy!

But first, the cuteness.

This morning, my daughters told me I needed to very quietly go over to my husband’s room and check out his hospital bed.

I found Big Rig, in her natural habitat.

Burrowed under his covers and using a neck pillow for her chin.

A couple of hours later, my husband sent this photo. Cheddar and…

…

He said the paw disappeared right after he took the photo. 😄😄

On to the weirdness of the day.

Today, I had an afternoon appointment to get the truck looked at again. When I headed out – very early – I found the console display was still working, but the warning dings from the door still weren’t happening. I didn’t even try to test it out on 4 wheel drive, though. I was already stressed out. Whether the shuddering was happening or not happening, it wasn’t going to alleviate that stress.

When I got to the garage and dropped off the key, I spent time some time talking to the owner. I told him what was working and still not working, and that I hadn’t tested the 4 wheel drive (he understood why not!). We talked about the battery, and the possibility of there being something draining the battery while it’s parked. The battery is only 2 years old. He said some batteries only last that long. We got it from him, though. It wasn’t the highest end battery, but it’s far from the lowest end, either. We also talked about the cold potentially affecting it, and I remembered to tell him when we first had an issue with the battery, early in the winter.

Then I was off.

I walked across town (all 5 or 6 blocks) and had lunch, then walked the last couple of blocks to the beach. The ice fishing village is still there.

There was also heavy equipment clearing the snow to make roads and open areas on the ice. I seem to recall seeing fliers for some sort of ice event coming up.

Clearly, the ice on the lake is still incredibly thick!

Then I started walking back, stopping at a few places long the way. I even remembered to stop at the pharmacy and get our printouts to do our taxes. My husband finally got his second T4A, so we can do that now. My daughter will be able to claim prescriptions on her taxes for the first time. I couldn’t get her pharmacy records without her permission (I have a signed document so I can get my husband’s, every year), but I was able to arrange for it to be included with her prescription delivery later in the week. This will be the first year for both my daughter and I that we can claim the Disability Tax Credit.

By the time I got back to the garage, it was about 45 minutes past my appointment time. The truck was still in the garage and the mechanic was about to take it out for a test drive to see if it was still doing that shuddering thing while in 4 wheel drive. I suggested he try it in the grocery store parking lot, rather than the highway, since it seems to be triggered in slippery conditions.

The mechanic asked me about the door chime. I told him it still wasn’t working when I drove over.

It’s working now.

???!!!

They didn’t do anything. It was simply working when he drove it into the garage.

When talking to the owner, he said he could even hear it from his office when the truck was driven in, and the mechanic got out, leaving the keys in the ignition.

I told him, when I parked in their lot, it still wasn’t working.

Like I said, it’s a good thing we have a good relationship. If I say it wasn’t working, he doesn’t doubt me. It’s just so very strange!!!

He told me he tested the battery himself.

It’s fine. No sign of any problems.

We talked about that for a bit, and he told me of a possibility that had occurred to me when I was first driving the truck home and realized the console display wasn’t working. It is likely that when the battery got low enough, it started shutting off anything unnecessary that was using power. With some vehicles, once the battery drops below a certain threshold, you can’t even start them until it’s been charged again. Once I recharged the battery on Sunday, that would have allowed the console display to start working again. Why the door chime didn’t start working again until today, we don’t know, but it’s likely related.

Around then, the mechanic came back with the truck, parking it just outside the bay doors. Watching the cameras, we saw him step out, look at the camera, raise both hands and just shrug.

It was working fine.

I told him about needing to drive into the city, and various other things I need to drive to, and he said it should be fine. Driving is good. Sitting parked is not. I do know that, but I try to avoid driving in winter in particular.

I did remember to ask for a price on the light on the back of the cab that I idiotically broke because the garage door wasn’t open far enough. He started to look it up and then said, get it from Amazon. I will get a better price there. Then, once I have it, I can bring the truck back and he’ll install it for me. I asked if he had a part number and he said just to look up, third brake light.

I even got to talk to the mechanic a bit as I was going to the truck. He also assured me that it should be fine for all the driving I need to do.

From there, I drove across to the grocery store, then updated my family. There were just a few things I wanted to pick up for today because, tomorrow, my daughter and I will be finally doing the Costco run! I plan to go to the older location we’ve been going to for years, instead of the new location on the other side of the city, as the old location is right next to a Canadian Tire.

Just in case something goes wrong. Because I’m still absolutely paranoid about the truck! 😄

Right now, though, not only has all the recent weird stuff gone away on its own, but so has the tire warning stuff that’s been there for so very long.

Which means that truck is actually better now than it was before, with no one having actually done anything but do lots of testing and checking.

For that, all I can say is, Thank you, God.

When I got home, I texted the garage about the tire warnings that have been there for so long, now being gone. He said, it must be a ghost! 😄😄 They’d had trouble getting readings off the sensors the last time I brought the truck in for the front tires to be worked on. They checked all four sensors because of those warnings. I remember watching four guys going from tire to tire, looking perplexed at their device’s screen. We had originally thought it was because the batteries might have died or something, but clearly, that cannot be the case! The main thing was that the tires themselves were fine.

So that’s where we are at now. The truck is home, and we’ve got a lot of driving to get caught up on things that should have been done a while ago.

Since we are finally going to be going to the city tomorrow, I’ve contacted the person from the rescue that picked up Kohl from us, taking the carrier with her. The sun room cats have knocked one of the carriers off its shelf a few times too many and it can’t be clocked shut anymore, so we need to get the carrier back. The carrier is now with someone else, and we’ve just arranged to meet along the way tomorrow morning, before she gets to work. We’ll be leaving quite a bit earlier than usual, but that’s okay.

Now it’s stock up shopping, doctor’s appointments, dump runs, runs to the feed store and, of course, finally getting to visit my mother! Once again, we are now the closest to where she is.

Oh, and our vandal and his wife have already visited her twice since she’s been transferred to the current TCU. The staff there have been warned about him, and yet… today, my brother told me that a check just went through my mother’s account. A check for a substantial amount of money, made out to our vandal and written out by our vandal’s wife for my mother to sign (my mother can no longer write checks out herself), dated just a few days ago. This is one of the reasons why we didn’t want our vandal to be able to have access to my mother without supervision. The problem is, they can’t have a staff member just hang out in the room with them. So, they managed to somehow guilt my mother into throwing money at our vandal again. The crazy thing is, while she has been able to help out with paying for things at the farm, even things she offered to pay for in advance, she does things like try to back out, or tries to use it as a way to control us, or guilt us, and makes a big deal over the fact that she “helped”. Which she has never done, when it comes to our vandal. And there’s nothing we can do about it, as long as her cognitive decline is as relatively mild as it is now. She isn’t at the state where my brother, as PoA, becomes wholly responsible to act on her behalf in that regard. At least we were able to get the doctor at the hospital to agree, officially in her file, that my mother cannot sign legal documents, and that if she is convinced to do so, it would not be legally binding. I don’t think that quite applies to writing checks.

Meanwhile, my mother says she wants me to bring her some of her cash stash she asked me to hang on to for her. Most of which got deposited into her account, which my brother explained to her when going over her finances recently, but she still thinks I have all of. She has no need for money where she is, and we don’t know where the money she had before went to. Sure, she sometimes insisted I take some cash for gas, but almost never enough to actually cover the cost of gas. A few bucks here and there. We did learn she tried to give money to staff at the hospital to basically bribe them to pay more attention to her, but never managed to actually give them any (that probably would have gotten them fired). I guess now we know where the rest of her cash went to.

We also know why our vandal and his wife have been finding ways to visit her so often, even though he’s supposedly at death’s door right now.

*sigh*

It is so hard to protect my mother, when she works so hard to sabotage our efforts.

Anyhow.

Visiting my mother is on the list of things I need to do, now that I’ve been assured the truck has been checked and rechecked and everything is running just fine.

Time to get things done.

The Re-Farmer

Our 2026 Garden: West Coast Seeds are in, plus an update

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Oh, goodness. What a morning.

I heard back from the garage when they checked their messages this morning (they don’t check while the shop is closed), and the mechanic agreed that it was likely a burnt fuse. I ended up talking to him on the phone and we made an appointment for tomorrow afternoon so they can look at it.

Then, I headed to the post office to finally pick up our packages. One of them was my West Coast Seeds order that came in almost two weeks ago!

Also, I’m an idiot.

I’m also short. Have I mentioned, I’m a bit on the short side?

Well, I didn’t open the garage door quite far enough. As I backed out of the garage, I hit the door. Broke the light above the box on the back of the cab. Just cracked the plastic, but still… What a doofus!

Our driveway may be mostly clear, but there is still that mix of hard packed tire tracks and softer snow on either side. The hard packed snow was already getting slippery – we have been warming up all night and were just a few degrees below freezing. Still, I got through all right and onto the road.

Where it started again.

That strange shuddering that wasn’t there when the mechanics test drove the truck before I took it home.

I was still on 4 wheel drive, as I needed it to get the truck unstuck, so I stopped and switched to 2 wheel drive. After that, it ran fine.

Then I saw the clock.

The time was wrong, but the clock was visible. I turned on the radio, and all the display information came on, as usual.

The console display is working again so, obviously, it’s not a burnt out fuse!

When I got to the post office, though, I confirmed that the warning dings for keys still in the ignition or headlights left on, that are supposed to start when the door is opened, didn’t.

I got our mail and a few groceries in the store, then headed home. As soon as I was settled, I sent a message to the garage, along with the picture of the broken light, asking what it would cost to get it fixed. Then I asked him to call me so I could tell him what was going on with the truck. I did add that it was NOT a burnt fuse, but maybe the ignition switch?

He called me back right away. I described what was happening, both with the shuddering back while on 4 wheel drive, and with the console display being on again, but not the warning dings that should go off when the door it opened.

He doesn’t think it’s the ignition switch, as he thinks that would cause other issues as well, but he will check it out.

He also asked how much we had left to pay off the truck. He knows we just can’t have this happening all the time, and we’ve already talked about trading the truck in a bit. We’ll see what happens when I get there, tomorrow.

I would really, really like to get our stock up shopping finally done!!

Meanwhile, I got to check out my new seeds and decided to make a short video of it.

You can also see how the seedlings are doing. Not the best. I’ve added “walls” around two sides of the trays to help keep the heat from the heater from blowing right past everything, and moved the thermometer to one end, away from the heater. I’ve actually seen that thermometer at 20C/68F since moving it closer to the trays! When I was doing the video, though, it was more like 17C/63F or so. It really should be closer to 24C/75C for the seedlings, but we just have no way to give them that. Still, I’m seeing more of the extra California Wonder bell pepper seeds I added, just in case, emerging. We’ve only got 3 surviving Caspar eggplants, but at 75 days to maturity, technically I could direct sow those.

There we have it, though. My little West Coast Seeds haul

I’m looking forward to trying these.

The Re-Farmer

So tired

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What a day.

After three days of shoveling and snow blowing, my daughters made sure to let me know that they would take care of the cat stuff, inside and out, this morning. Much appreciated, as we did reach that -31C/-24F last night. I don’t know what the wind chills were at the time, but from the weather reports I read this morning, we did get wind chills of -45C/-49F during the night.

Sleeping in a bit past sunrise was nice, at least.

Then I headed down stairs to check on the seedlings. I heard the septic pump running and went to the old basement to check on things.

I found water on the floor.

Not a lot, and with how uneven the floor is around there, it wasn’t quite clear where it was coming from at first. Then I opened the access pipe, and found it full of liquid and toilet paper.

I uncovered the floor drain and it was backed up to there, too, though not to overflowing.

*sigh*

What a way to start the day.

Thankfully, that commercial drain auger we got is enough to punch through such clogs without bothering to even plug it in. It’s the bottleneck somewhere between the basement and the tank that was the issue again. Thankfully, I caught it as early as I did.

Once I got through the clog, I switched to the old garden hose that’s missing its end. I don’t even bother to take it off the tap that used to be the cold water tap for the washing machine before the laundry got moved upstairs. The hose just gets hung up on hooks from the floor joists above.

The next part took longer. The drain from the weeping tile goes through past the floor drain and into the access pipe. It was blocked all the way, and took quite a bit of work with the hose to flush it all out. Then the concrete floor got hosed down and cleaned up.

Great fun.

Not.

My goal of the day was to work on clearing snow from the inner yard, though I also wanted to put the charger on the truck battery. We’ve had issues with it being low before and, with the cold we’ve been having, I had my concerns.

It took me a long time to get my act together and get back outside.

The first thing I had to do was get the extension cords running out the back door of the garage, for better reach.

What is is about extension cords? How can an inanimate object seem so determined to actively try to trip and injure? Granted, with the cold, the cords aren’t as flexible so there are plenty of loops that don’t want to straighten out, but those loops were constantly finding ways to wrap around my feet!

Then I could get little Spewie out the back door before heading back in to hook up the charger. Then I had to drag Spewie through the snow. It might have been easier to just pick it up and carry it!

Finally, all set up, plugged in and ready to go!

Nope.

As soon as I heard the off sound, I stopped it immediately. The auger wouldn’t turn, but the motor was trying to get it to!

I tried to turn it manually, which normally is easy, but it would not move.

I did make sure to brush it off when I put it in the garage last night, but I think somewhere in the workings, something froze and it keeping the auger from turning.

I didn’t have the time or energy to fuss with it.

It was going to have to all be shoveled by hand.

*sigh*

I’d already used the shovel and ice scraper to break up the more drifted areas that I knew were too packed or deep for little Spewie, so those were still handy.

I didn’t quite get it all, though.

I focused on clearing the area closest to the house. Then I cleared the most drifted areas along the sides, as well as clearing to the outhouse and to the litter compost behind it. I took it slow and careful. Given my physical state by then, I knew I was at higher risk of hurting myself. What I didn’t clear wasn’t deep enough to cause problems for the truck.

I hope.

Part way through, the battery reached full charge and I pause to put that away. I didn’t bring my key, so I didn’t check on the console display. I’ll do that tomorrow. I plan to call the garage as early as I can and see if I can swing by. I’m about 80% sure it’s just a fuse. I don’t have a fuse tester and even if I did, the last time I tried to check the fuse box, shortly after we bought the truck, I couldn’t get it open. It’s supposed to easily pop off. There isn’t supposed to be any sort of trick to it. I just wasn’t able to do it. I even got our mechanic to show me how. He got it off not problem, without doing anything different than I had. I’m obviously missing something, but I’ve no idea what. I mentioned that to my brother. His response was, YouTube is your friend.

YouTube is not my friend.

I did later try to look, searching specifically for the 2011 Sierra. I got videos on how to find the fuse box – with I already know – and what’s inside, a video on how to test fuses, but nothing on how to open it. Then I found lots and lots of videos on the Silverado and various other makes and models of trucks that had nothing to do with my search terms.

I just don’t have the energy to work it out.

Taking it easy did mean I was out there for quite a while. When I was done, it was late enough that I went ahead and did the evening cat feeding before heading in.

I am so tired.

One of the things I wanted to do before it got too late in the day was to call my mother. I was rather dreading it. I knew she’d be asking when I would visit next, which I probably won’t do until I at least talk to our mechanic, first. I knew that if I told her that, she would start giving me a hard time again. She doesn’t understand anything about vehicles, which is fine, but that doesn’t stop her from demanding explanations for things she can’t grasp, then making sure I know exactly what a failure of a human being she thinks I am for having any problems at all.

Still, I knew I had better call. My brother and his wife had visited her yesterday, so I knew she was struggling with things. My SIL said she was seeming pretty depressed. She doesn’t like where she is, even though she just got there and there are activities that she didn’t have access to while in the hospital, and the other TCU didn’t seem to have at all. Life is not meeting her expectations. She had told them, she has all this money, but not even a bed to call her own.

She doesn’t have a lot of money, really. What she has may have been considered a lot, 70 years ago, but our dollar is worth so much less today, it really wouldn’t get her very far. It certainly can’t buy her way into the nursing home she wants to be in, either.

My SIL said she asked my mother if she maybe wanted her own little house here at the farm, like her mother had when living on my aunt’s farm, before she moved here for her final years. My mother said no. She isn’t able to take care of herself on her own anymore.

Anyhow.

I called her up and she did sound rather down, right from the start. I asked how she was doing and she said I probably didn’t want to hear it. She was also in the common room with other people around, so she wouldn’t have wanted to talk about it. They did leave shortly after, though. She then started telling me about how she has such a tiny bed (?? it would be a standard size hospital bed), such a tiny space in her shared room, there’s always noise and TV and talking and laughing… No peace. No privacy.

She’s been there for less than a week.

We talked about how this is temporary and hopefully, she will soon get transferred to the nursing home she wants to be in. I did remind her, thought, that there will be noise in the nursing home, too. She would have her own room, though. If nothing else, she could close her door.

I did confirm that she got communion today, and it was brought to her by the same guy that was bringing it to her when she had her apartment. She was happy about that, at least.

Of course, she started asking me when I would come to visit. I told her I did get the truck home and got stuck in our own driveway, because there was so much blowing snow. I then mentioned that there was something else that I needed to get checked, even though the truck seems to be running fine. As expected, she started demanding explanations and started giving me a hard time about it. I basically just cut that off and changed the subject. I told her, I just don’t know when I’ll be able to visit, but I would let her know before I do. She did make sure to tell me what she wanted me to bring to her when I do make it out.

*sigh*

She told me she had been able to get her short wave radio set up and working. My brother had tried to set it up while she was in the hospital but just couldn’t get a signal. It was even worse in the first TCU, but where she is now, she can get a signal. She was looking forward to listening to Mass in Polish soon, so we didn’t talk for too much longer. She did start going on about how she wants us all to find someplace for her, where she can have peace and privacy. I told her, even if we found someplace, if she leaves where she is now, she goes to the bottom of the waiting list (or off it entirely, now that I think about it) for the nursing home she wants to be in

I don’t think she heard me. I had a hard time hearing her at times, though for a different reason. It was as if we were losing the connection, but when I mentioned it was happening, she said something about how she was accidentally doing something with her fingers. ??

Well, hopefully that won’t be an issue for much longer. After going back and forth with my brother about it, he went ahead and ordered a phone for seniors for my mother. It’s in already, but the SIM card is still on the way. The phone company has a senior’s plan, too. It’s a cell phone that looks like a small cordless phone, and is even more basic than the phone she had before. It has a charging dock just like her old cordless handset had. The display screen shows the time, day and date as default, which I think she will find useful, too.

I would absolutely enjoy having a phone like that for myself, instead of a touch screen smart phone. Those may be convenient, but I’ve never liked touch screens.

Hopefully, it won’t take her long to figure it out, and we will be able to call her directly instead of having to go through the nursing station and have them bring a cordless handset to her.

The call with my mom wasn’t as bad as I half expected it to be, at least. I just don’t quite understand what my mother’s expectations are anymore, other than unrealistic. She hated being at her apartment because there was no one around in case she needed help, but now that she’s where there is always someone around that can help if she needs it, she hates that there are people around all the time, and they make sounds.

Ah, well. Hopefully she will get to where she wants to be, soon. She told my brother that her room mate has been there for a long time already, and is staying. Which doesn’t make sense, since this place is for temporary placement only, not permanent.

As for me, it’s time to pain killer up for the night and get to bed.

I am so very tired. Tired physically, tired of the truck, tired of always being on guard when talking to my mother, tired of winter, tired of cold, tired of the plumbing in this house, tired… tired… tired.

I need sleep.

The Re-Farmer

Exhausted

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Exhausted and cold! The high winds we got today were from the north, and my bedroom is north facing. It’s usually one of the coldest rooms in the house, but now I feel freezing. Meanwhile the rest of the house is warm enough to not trigger the furnace to turn on. I’m actually having a hard time typing!

I’ll be warm soon enough. I plan to go to bed as soon as I’m done this, even though it has just turned 6pm.

But first, the cuteness.

The yard cats managed to somehow flatten the cat cave, in spite of the wire supports I put on the inside. That hasn’t stopped them from using it, though! The first picture was taken when I did the morning feeding. The next two, after I did the evening feeding.

A bit early, because I did not want to go outside again.

The cab was booked to arrive at our place at around 11. I planned to meet him at the gate, since I wasn’t expecting a car to make it down our driveway though, at the time, the truck would have made it.

Yeah, some foreshadowing there!

I headed out a bit early, knowing I could wait out of the wind in the garage. The main door was open, but it faces south, so there was no wind at all coming in.

Thankfully, my brother installed a wifi booster in the garage where the lawnmowers are stores, so I was able to get a call on my cell phone. It was the taxi driver. He apparently didn’t read my directions all the way through and was at the highway, asking which side I was on. I gave him the rest of the directions and he soon arrived.

The drive into town was downright scary!

Portions of the gravel road were completely hidden by blowing snow, with hidden drifts beginning to form. It was worse on the highway. Even in town, with building to cut the wind.

Just as scary was realizing this guy was not a particularly good driver, and wasn’t driving to the conditions. Not the worst driver I’ve been a passenger with, but with the roads the way they were, it wasn’t long before I was seriously concerned he’d slide off the road! Especially as he was speeding through our little hamlet, where things are always way more slippery. We were talking about the conditions and I told him I was in no hurry, and to feel free to take his time. Thankfully, he did slow down.

Once past our hamlet, visibility kept getting worse anywhere there was open fields. We could barely see the road, nor oncoming traffic until they were quite close. As we were getting close to town, in a wide open area near the airport, I could see a dump truck just into a cross road, it’s back end leaning precariously into the ditch! Then a huge gust came up and he literally had to stop. Zero visibility. The only thing we could see was the top of the truck because he pulled over right near where it was. Thankfully, it started to clear up relatively quickly. Once he was able to start moving again, we realized he had gone off to the side by a fair bit. Thankfully, we were right in the intersection, so he was more on the gravel road instead of more into a ditch!

When we got into town, I had him stop at a bank first, where I could take out some cash to pay him, rather than try to use debit on his phone. The car was a regular car, so he was tracking the mileage and fare on his phone. As we were talking, he told me he’s been in business for just over a year. He had quite a bit more driving in these conditions to pick up other fares, too!

After I got the cash – including a well deserved tip – he drove me to the garage.

The truck was parked outside by the building. It was blocked by a car, but it was running, so I knew it wouldn’t be there for long.

I went in to talk to the owner and the mechanic that has driven the truck with me. The owner just handed me the keys. No charge!

We talked for a while, and they have concluded that the issue was never with the transfer case. It is fine. They’ve concluded it had something to do with the ABS trying to kick in. I do remember seeing the ABS light flash briefly when I was driving it. I was told what to watch out for, but in the end, there is nothing wrong with the truck. There was nothing to fix.

!!!

The owner’s wife and toddler were there as well, when I mentioned I was blocked. It turned out to be their car. I was in no hurry, though, and used the command start to warm the truck up while waiting until his wife headed out.

The truck was running fine, but… ???

There was no clock display.

The dashboard displays were fine, but not clock. I tried turning on the radio. Nothing.

This was while I got the truck out and crossed the street to the grocery store. With the road conditions, I wanted to get the shopping done as quickly as possible. My plan to stay in town and time my return for when the post office reopened at 2pm went out the window. I wanted to get home before things were drifted over too badly!

Once the shopping was done, I messaged home saying I it would be a slow drive home, and asking for someone to open the gate. I didn’t want to have to stop and lose momentum.

It was, indeed, a slow drive home, but visibility was not as bad as earlier. I did have to stop at the same intersection as on the way out, though. This time, because my side of the highway was blocked by the massive tow truck that just got the dump truck out of the ditch! So only one lane was open and I had to wait for oncoming traffic to get by. I didn’t have to wait long.

Then, I got to our own driveway…

… and got stuck.

The end of the driveway and at the gate was still clear. The walls of snow were high enough to prevent drifting. The rest of the driveway had more snow on it than when I left.

Which would have been okay, if I’d managed to stay on the hard packed tire tracks. Unfortunately, I slid off, and once I was off, that was it.

Yes, I even switched to 4 wheel drive, but I just wasn’t moving.

*sigh*

With the way the truck was now diagonal across the driveway, I could only reach the driver’s side doors. I let my family know and started pulling bags on the passenger side out from the driver’s side and taking them to the house. My younger daughter booted up and came out to help as soon as she could. The green you see on the hood of the truck in the first picture is one of the grocery bags.

Then I left my daughter to put everything way and start cooking the individual flat bread pizzas I picked up, because I knew none of us would be up to cooking from scratch today. She got quite a bit done while I was gone, and was still doing the last load of my laundry for me.

Once everything was in, I got on the lovely bib overalls she got for me, because they cut the wind like nothing else, and headed back out. I was able to shovel around the truck, then had to get the ice scraper to break up the packed snow and ice that had “fenced in” the tires. I was protected from the wind enough that I actually started to overheat a bit!

That done, it was time to break out little Spewie.

There was enough drifted snow that I started out by clearing in front of the garage, so I wouldn’t get stuck again trying to pull in, then cleared the driveway up to the truck.

That took quite a long time.

Before I stopped, though, I did clear the foot path to the gate wide enough for my husband’s walker, then cleared a path to the electricity meter. That was so drifted over, you’d never know a path had already been dug out there. Several times.

I had thought to do a bit more clearing once the truck was in the garage, so I made sure the extension cord was out of the way before getting back to the truck. A bit more clearing with the ice scraper, and I gave it a go.

Thankfully, I was able to get out with little trouble and parked in the garage.

In the second picture of the slide show above, you can see the tracks where the tires had sunk on the sides of the packed tire tracks. Had I not cleared it with little Spewie, I probably would have gotten stuck again.

The last picture is where I got stuck, and the rest of the driveway that needs to be cleared.

Not today.

I realized I was done at that point. With the ice and snow I’d gotten loose with the ice scraper, it needed to be shoveled clear, first, so they wouldn’t break the blade on Spewie, and I just didn’t have the energy left to do the rest of the job.

It needs to be done, though. We’ve got someone coming out with a kibble donation tomorrow. If they can’t get through the driveway, we’ll have to haul it through the snow, and that area is now so uneven, it would be dangerous. I also want to clear the turn around area in the yard, so we can drive up to the house to unload our stock up shopping.

Plus, I still don’t have the clock display working. I texted the garage but haven’t heard back. I might need to go back for them to take a look and see what happened. Might just be a fuse.

In the end, I put Spewie away in the storage side of the garage. Normally, I’d properly put away the extension cords, too (I had to use two 100′ cords to reach the truck), but this time I just pulled them in off to the side, so they are easily accessible tomorrow.

How much I can get done tomorrow, though, is questionable. I did make sure to plug in the truck. As I write this, we are at -22C/-8F, with a wind chill of -38C/-36F. We’re supposed to drop to -31C/-24F during the night, but at least the wind is going to die down. Still, tomorrow’s high of the day is supposed to be -21C/-6F Sunday’s high is supposed to be -16C/3F, so I might leave doing the inner yard for then.

By the time I got in, it was coming up on 3pm, so I ended up doing the outside cats’ evening feeding. I had no idea I had been out that long! It wasn’t even quite noon when I got home.

The next while was spent updating the family and finally sitting down to eat. When I was still thinking of heading home late enough to go to the post office when it reopened at 2, I expected to have lunch in town. That didn’t happen. All I’d eaten all day was a hunk of cheese for breakfast, and half a can of Monster during the drive home. My poor little pizza was pretty dehydrated by the time I got to it. 😄

I also found a text from my sister, letting me know she’d tried to call our mother, but would be trying again later. My mother was busy – playing bingo and having birthday cake!

That is such good news. My mother had been going stir crazy with boredom while in the hospital. She wasn’t at the first TCU for long, but if they had any activities, we never heard of them. I think most of the people there had more severe cognitive issues and dementia. That where my mother is now already has her doing activities is fantastic news.

I really should call her myself, but I’m just too tired.

I already took my anti-inflammatories with my supper/lunch/breakfast. Now is the time to take some pain killers and crawl into bed!

The Re-Farmer