I definitely over did it yesterday, and was in major pain this morning, so we just took care of the cats, and then I went back to bed. Taking care of Magda’s and The Grink’s ears went much better than expected.
The first image above was taken right after treating their ears. Since they are in the isolation shelter, they get treated with wet cat food, which The Grink has been enjoying, but Magda seems to be ingnoring.
Then I went out through the sun room to go to the post office, and spotted a very scrabbly looking cat on a cat bed.
It was Magda!
Since getting spayed, she has developed the runs and is looking very messy.
On checking the isolation shelter, I found a corner of the sliding window by the foot bowl was pushed out of its track at the top. I popped it back in place, then got Magda and put her back. After closing the window up again, I noticed it was bowed outwards slightly, so I took it out completely, flipped it so it was bowing the other way, then put it back. I thought that would do the trick.
Then I went inside to change my shirt. Magda left a mess on me while I was carrying her.
By the time I changed and came back out, I checked on the isolation shelter and found the window partly open! Magda figured out how to slide it open from the inside!
The Grink was just sitting there, looking at me. She had no interest in leaving, but she did really want attention!
I don’t like that The Grink is in there alone. We’ll have to find a way to secure the window before we put Magda back, though. When I came home from the post office, I found her snuggling with Syndol. Later on, while my daughter and I were going through the garden areas, she kept following us, when she needs to be resting and recovering!
In the first photo, Caramel, in the bed she moved her kittens to, had them completely hidden. I did manage to get a picture of her babies while she was out, though. They are getting very active! With the sides of this bed being so much higher, I could just see their heads bobbing around.
Brussel’s babies are getting downright rambunctious, but they still aren’t quite climbing completely out of the cat cave. They’ll dangle a leg out, or stick their heads through the opening, but so far, that’s it.
When we noticed that Brussel was out, my daughter and I took advantage to take the babies out and snuggle them. I got some pictures, though it was really hard to get good ones. Caramel’s baby’s eyes are opening now, and it seems more active than its siblings in the cat house.
We also had a chance to look at what seemed to be a wound on the black and white kitten’s back leg. With my daughter holding him, I could get a closer look, and it does just look like missing fur. My theory remains; some wet cat food dripped onto him and mama was too aggressive in cleaning it off!
So far, all seems to be well, though I was not seeing any cats going to the food bowl inside the trap today. It may simply have been too windy, even though it’s mostly sheltered by the catio. If we’re after Slick of Adam, though, we’re unlikely to catch either of them in that location. Any female we manage to get will be good, though. We’ll have to figure something out.
I ended up using a dollar store shower curtain I’d got to potentially use around the eggplant and pepper bed last year, but ended up using the dining table protectors instead. That should help out with warming up the soil and, hopefully, kill off any Creeping Charlie and crab grass in there. I will probably use one of these two solarized beds to plant our potatoes.
I also removed most of the mulch from the wattle weave bed and had a pleasant surprise.
In the first image, you can see the wild strawberries (or whatever they are), which I was expecting. What I was NOT expecting, but hopeful for, you can see in the next image. That is thyme! It survived the winter!
In the next photo, you can see an overview of the long part of the bed. There’s a sort of lighter colour mass about half way down; those are the self seeded Chamomile. Hopefully, it dropped seeds and will come back again this year.
The very last photo is the thermometer in the covered bed. It looks cloudy because I took the photo through the plastic cover. It looks like it was about 18C/64F in there.
Looking around, I couldn’t see much of the green seedlings I uncovered while removing most of the mulch. I likely damaged them too much. There were a lot of seeds scattered in there, though, so I expect more to be coming up soon.
The temperature inside the portable greenhouse was a fair bit higher!
40C/104F! That would definitely start warming up the water in the heat sink I set up, though when I popped the cover off to check, it still seemed cold. That would be in comparison to the very warm temperatures I was standing in!
The next image, meanwhile, is a screen cap taken right after I got a photo of the thermometer, showing what the outside temperature was at. 5C/42F A 35 degree difference (Celsius)!
It should be interesting to see what the thermometer says in the morning, after the 0C/32F we’re supposed to drop to, tonight.
Oh, I also remembered to remove most of the mulch from the strawberry bed in the main garden area – and return the chicken wire over the top. It was quite frozen under there, and there’s no sign of the Albion Everbearing strawberries we have planted there.
The next time I should have time to do anything of note in the garden will be on Wednesday, and right now, the forecast for Wednesday is for a high of 14C/57F with a mix of sun and clouds. It should be a very good day to be working outside!
Meanwhile, I moved things around with the seed trays in the basement. I had the containers with pre-germinating seeds on top of the light fixture over the heat mat, but that light turns itself off, so what little heat it produces doesn’t last long. I thought I figured out how to reprogram the timer, but it seems to have not made any difference. It’s been a while, and there has been no sign of germination. They’re just too cold. So I ended up moving the trays with the chitting potatoes to the top shelf with the winter squash, under the shop light, then set up the second heat mat under aquarium light. So now the tray with the eggplants, peppers, tomatoes and luffa seeds is on one mat, and the three containers of melon seeds are on the other.
When I checked on them before shutting things down for the night, I was already seeing hints of radicals! They will be ready to be potted up by tomorrow or the day after!
Amazing how just a little bit of warmth makes such a huge difference!
What I was really wanting to do what get the heater going in the basement for a while, and heaters aren’t supposed to be left unattended. I’m not one to just hand around watching videos on my phone, my hands are too messed up to do my usual things, like crochet, and my eyes are too messed up to read, so…
Tomatoes it is!
Towards the end of the video, I included pictures I took of the thermometer in the portable greenhouse today. I was really impressed!
While I was starting my morning rounds, it was about -6C/21F shortly after 8:30am outside. At that time of day, it is just starting to get out of the morning shade. The thermometer inside was about -2C/28F or so.
When I checked again before going inside, shortly before 9am, the outside temperature was much the same, but the thermometer had already warmed up 4 degrees to 2C/39F.
I came out in in the afternoon and, at roughly 1:15pm, it was about 27C/81F in there. By about 4:10pm, it had warmed up to about 38C/100F in there! At least, that’s what the thermometer read. It didn’t feel anywhere near that hot to me.
This would be a good place for a high/low thermometer!
On a completely different topic, I have potential good news.
I was able to get some photos and short video of Brussel and her babies that I sent to the cat lady, joking that if she sent them to her circle, maybe someone might be interested in adopting a kitten in 6 or 7 weeks.
Much to my shock, she responded almost right away, saying someone was interested in the little calico!
I won’t be holding my breath on that, considering how many times people have backed out at the last minute, but gosh, it would be awesome if the babies could be adopted out right away! There is some progress in socializing Brussel, too – I was actually able to sneak a pet as she was walking past me and she actually stopped and let me pet her more!
In other cat news, there’s potential good news about Button. The Cat Lady and her family have adopted him permanently and, while he started growing again and is at normal size now, after being treated for worms three times (!!!), he also became both blind and deaf. His eyes were permanently dilated. Well, they’ve taken him to a cat eye specialist, and they think it might be a hereditary type of glaucoma. He’s now getting treatment for it. She sent me a photo, and his pupils are almost normal again – you can see his electric blue irises again. It would be nice if he could regain at least some of his vision!
As a family, we’re not really dedicated to birthdays. As in, the actual date. Before my husband went on disability and he was still working, we would celebrated birthdays on the weekend before or after the actual date, depending on which was after pay day. The entire week, however, tended to be when the birthday person would get little gifts, or extra special treatment. The day itself was recognized, of course, but we liked to spread it out.
Now that my husband is on disability, his payments come in at the end of the month, so we budget accordingly. Which means we tend to have more birthday months than birthday weeks!
Image generated by WP AI
My older daughter’s birthday is this month. She is really hard to get things for! One regular thing we would do is have the birthday person choose a special celebration dinner. When our income was higher, this was a time when we might go to a specific restaurant that we normally wouldn’t, but dining out for four people hasn’t been something we could afford for a long time. Now that we are out in the boonies, we generally don’t bother and will order takeout from somewhere.
I had already done a birthday take home meal earlier this month, but my older daughter wanted Pizza Hut – and she was paying. Yeah. She insists on paying for her own birthday meal!
It’s still early, but today was when we decided to do pizza day. The birthday girl placed the order online with a pick up time late enough that other stuff could be done first. My younger daughter came along to help out. After a quick stop at the post office to pick up one more package, we headed to the town our doctor’s clinic is in. We got there about an hour early, but there’s a grocery store in the same area, so we could just park and go there, first.
The only thing I needed for general groceries was milk and eggs, plus my daughter spotted some dark coffee; they’ve been running out. The rest was birthday related. I ended up choosing two cakes; a tiramisu cake and a Pina Colada angel food cake trifle. We picked up some ranch and blue cheese dressing to use as dips for the pizza. We got drinks, some Cotton Candy Ice Cream, and their last box of mango Melona bars. As an extra, I decided to try some frozen finger foods for later on. Breaded pickle spears, Italian Mozza Bites and Tempura Yams.
I was going to treat my daughter for her birthday, no matter how much she balked! 😄
By the time we were done and the truck loaded up, we still had almost half an hour before the time set for our order. The location is take out only, but I figured they’d have seating for people waiting for their orders, so we made our way over anyhow. Which worked out, as they were almost done with our order!
Good grief, pizza has gotten expensive. Four large pizzas and three chicken bites bowls, and the total was just under $200 – before tip! A few years back, it was almost half that, and we were getting extra large sized pizzas.
Well, we only do this once a year. Plus, it will feed us for a couple of days, at least. Still… *choke*
Since it is a special occasion, I’ve taken a break from my Lenten fast of sugar and simple carbs.
In other things, I had a chance to chat with the Cat Lady earlier today. She sent me a post made by the woman who was able to provide us with so much donated cat food. It was very generous and much appreciated – we still have wet cat food left from that! The Cat Lady did warn me, though, not to share to much. As the Cat Lady put it, her heart is in the right place, but she causes problems. A few months back, she was “helping” someone caring for a colony, got the province involved, and most of the cats ended up being euthanized. Sadly, it seems to be happening again. There’s a call out for various supplies, fosters, donations for spays and neuters, and so on, for a colony that sounds about the same size as ours, though the number of cats we have showing up can change considerably from day to day, and even feeding to feeding. All great stuff being called for, except for on thing.
She got the province involved again.
The post had mentioned that the cats have winter suitable shelters, but not much else. Well, the Cat Lady knows of this colony. She says the cats are well cared for, and they have lots of excellent shelters. While help would certainly be appreciated – especially with spays and neuters – with the province involved, the person that’s been caring for them is going to get pressured a lot before the province finally steps in and simply wipes them out.
I know that in our municipality, their procedure to “help” people caring for colonies is to simply shoot the cats. It’s pretty much the main reason we don’t try to do any local fundraising drives for spays and neuters. We don’t want it to be generally known, how many cats have been showing up (I’ve seen another tabby that looks like a stranger recently. He has a distinctive Nicky the Nose face; that old tom hasn’t been around for years, but this cat looks like it could be one of his decedents). I want to adopt them out. Not kill them off.
Speaking of spays and neuters, the Cat Lady hopes to book us for three cats, as soon as she gets a chance to call the clinic we’ve been going to. She’s been spending a lot of time at another clinic in the city. The vet that saved Cabbages sold his clinic and went back to India for a while. He has since returned and opened a new clinic, and she’s happily been going to him again. She’s currently dealing with a rescue case that is quite severe. I was quite surprised when she said for three cats. The last we talked about it, she was hoping to be able to get two done. Hopefully, that means donations to her rescue have started to go back up again. Otherwise, it means she’s paying for it out of pocket, which they have done before. They are so amazing!
Meanwhile, I also got a note from my brother. He plans to come out here tomorrow morning. Along with needing to do some stuff among their stored items, he plans to set up “that bypass valve” on the septic diverter. He must have thought he had already talked to me about it, but I had no idea about this. He said that we’ll be able to test out the ejector to see if it’s frozen and, if it is, can switch back to the emergency bypass. Which is an awesome idea! I don’t think the ejector is frozen, though. I think there’s something stuck in the venturi valve. Either that, or there’s a clog somewhere in the pipe to the house. To be able to switch from the ejector to the emergency by pass through a bypass valve instead of having to attach and detach hoses is a brilliant idea! I look forward to seeing what he’s come up with to do this. With all the issues we’ve had with the septic in the 7+ years we’ve been living here, having that bypass is a godsend.
Aside from that, I’m planning to make a dump run tomorrow. Time to finally get rid of that broken microwave! I’m glad we replaced it with the multi-function toaster oven. The girls have been using it more than they’ve been using the oven! Very handy! Tomorrow we’re expecting to have a high of only -8C/18F. Not bad, but quite a drop from today, where we ended up hitting 4C/39F, which was higher than was forecast. Things were melting all over the place! It’s expected to be almost a week before we see highs above freezing again. Nothing to complain about, though.
First, the more fun stuff. I hit the post office on the way home and found more packages than I was expecting, including – finally! – the new clamp lamps I’d ordered. They were shipped by CanPar and the address we had to use was for the store the post office is in, because the system wouldn’t accept anything else. The benefit of living in such a tiny community. The postal staff knew exactly who it was for and there was a parcel slip in our mail box.
The first photo is everything outside the box. The second is assembled. These lamps are suitable for up to 250W bulbs, so we shouldn’t have the damaged bulb that we got with the heat bulb in the sun room. That lamp now has a 150W ceramic heat bulb in it.
The ceramic bulbs I’ve installed in the lamps are 200W, and they are ready to go. I can put one up somewhere in the sun room, without having to remove the one that’s already there, but I may want to move the one that’s already there and have the warmer bulb in that spot.
The lamp in the isolation shelter will take more doing, as the current lamp needs to be removed completely. We’ll need to open up the roof, remove the rigid insulation “ceiling”, then get the lamp out. The cord is wrapped around the support it’s hanging off of, to keep it out of cat reach. I’m hoping to get that done in the next couple of days, when it’s supposed to be warmer, so that it’ll be ready when it gets colder again.
In other things, today was my day to do my mother’s errands. I had asked her if she wanted me to pick up lunch and she ended up saying to just get food for myself, she would eat what she had.
Of course, I wasn’t going to do that.
I got to town early enough to pick something up before going to her place, but nothing was open until 11am, which is when she was expecting me. I was able to run another errand before parking and waiting the last few minutes before the restaurant I’d decided on, opened. While waiting, I called my mother to tell her I would be there closer to 11:30. She told me she was reheating some potatoes to go with lunch, and I told her, I’m bringing lunch. She doesn’t need to.
She was quite okay with that, and even joked about how spoiled she’s getting with not having to cook!
Soon, I was placing our orders, which were ready faster than I expected for them just opening, then made a quick stop at the grocery store for drinks.
When I got to her place and knocked at the door, there was no answer, but I knew she was home so I started walking in. She was in the bathroom and couldn’t hear me, which was pretty much what I expected.
What I didn’t expect was the strong smell of smoke.
While setting getting the food and drinks onto the table and getting plates, I found the source.
The potatoes my mother said she was cooking had burned. She’d salvaged them, and the carrots she was reheating with them, by scraping the burnt bits into the sink, and the rest were in a bowl on her counter. The burnt bitts were REALLY heavily charred. The frying pan she’d been using was also in the sink, soaking – and totally black!
When my mother came out and saw where I was in the kitchen, she told me about burning them. She said there’s something wrong with the element she was using, in that it stays on high, even when turned down to low.
…
Which may be true. However, this stove was installed brand new, after she moved into this apartment from the one she’d been in when she first moved into the building. She has never said anything about the element being like this before. She’s also never burned anything like this before!
I didn’t say much about it, though while we were eating, I was looking around for a fire extinguisher. Being a public housing building, I would have expected one and asked. She didn’t know what I was talking about at first, so I described what it would look like to her, and she said no, she had nothing like that. Granted, she wouldn’t have been able to figure out how to use one, but it would have been good to have one if an actual fire broke out, so someone else would have it available to use.
While talking about fire extinguishers and alarms, she pointed to the spot on the wall where her CO monitor that my brother got her, used to be. When we set up her place before taking her home from the hospital, my brother checked it and found it had no batteries. We had some issues getting fresh batteries into it and being able to close up the back. There were too many other things that needed to be done, so we took the batteries back out again, and my brother took it home with him to check on later.
My mother’s comment was that she had been “fooled” by it. It had started beeping, but she should the sound was coming from the fire detector on the ceiling, which is also a CO monitor. She’s called public housing and they send someone over. The fire detector was working fine, and the beeping was traced to the CO monitor on the wall.
Long story short, they took the batteries out so the beeping would stop.
…
So not only did my mother think this was some sort of “trick”, but apparently, she thought they were smoke detectors.
I tried to explain to her how dangerous CO poisoning could be, but she preferred to think my brother was somehow messing with her, instead.
*sigh*
I dropped it for now.
Once we were done lunch, we went over her shopping list, which included a trip to the pharmacy for some items this time, and I was soon off. When I got to the truck, though, I took the time to message my family about the things that happened at my mom’s. The burnt food is something home care had told us to watch out for, as it becomes a safety issue. While driving to the pharmacy, I remembered I had the home care coordinator’s business card in my phone case, so I called her when I parked and left a message about it.
Oh, there was another issue I’d tried asking my mother about, and that was getting a Life Line. She’d talked to the woman from the Senior’s Centre; they are the ones that arrange this. Unfortunately, she was confused about the 2 versions of it she can get and wasn’t sure which one to choose. More on that later.
The items my mother had on her list for the pharmacy were easy to find, so I was soon done there and moved on to the grocery store. I was able to get everything on her list, with no substitutions, which was nice.
Today is Tuesday, which is when the common room of her building is used for group low impact exercises, arranged with the local senior’s centre, and people from other buildings come over for it, too. When I got back, they were already starting to gather, so I went around. I had told my mother to go ahead and join them and I could put things away for her, but she was still in her apartment when I got there.
After putting things away, my mother started talking about her bubble packs. It took a while to figure out what she was getting at, and then I had to open up the lock box to be sure, but my mother’s meds were completely out. She said they were going to be delivered, but then didn’t seem sure that they would actually be delivered – and was asking me if I’d picked them up while at the pharmacy! I had no idea about, and she was starting to get so upset, I told her I would just go back to the pharmacy and get them.
It’s a good thing I did.
The prescriptions were prepared for delivery later, so the pharmacist was surprised to see me, but since I was there, she brought out the annual form they need signed to continue doing my mother’s medications in bubble packs. Since they know I have my mother’s permission with this stuff, I was able to sign it on her behalf. My mother would have been very confused by getting that form!
This time, when I got back to her building, my mother was in the common room with the others. So I took care of putting things away, then doing some light house keeping. I hadn’t tested her blood pressure earlier, and it was while I was sweeping that I’d found the box with the machine in it.
My mother had hidden it under her table.
So, no testing her BP this visit! I did put it back on the table, though.
After I finished cleaning up and putting things away, I started heading out. My mother was in behind a table with someone next to her, so I was going to skirt around the group as quietly as possible to give her a hug and a kiss goodbye, but enough people recognized me and started saying hi that I just laughed and said I was going to interrupt, when right through the circle of people to get around to my mother and gave her hugs and kisses. They got a good laugh out of that!
Later on, my mother phoned me and thanked me for that. Apparently, doing this was “good for my reputation”. ??? She explained that the group talks about all sorts of things, and one regular subject is about how many of the seniors are either largely forgotten by their adult children, or treated badly by them. I got the impression my mother hear a lot of positive comments after I left. Which made her happy, so that makes me happy.
She also told me she’s talked to the woman from the Senior’s Center again about the Life Line, and she will be coming by to my mother’s tomorrow to start the paperwork for it. I told my mother that, if necessary, I expect to be home all day, so she can call me if she feels the need.
Meanwhile, I updated my siblings about how things went, including about the CO monitor. My brother soon responded. He found out what was going on. Once he was able to get the batteries in, it started to beep. A double beep every 30 seconds. The display screen also said “end”.
On the back of the monitor, it explained that the monitor needs to be replaced every 10 years and, as a reminder, it would start to double beep every 30 seconds and display the word “end”.
You’d think the public housing guys that maintain CO monitors would have caught on to that.
Or maybe they did, but my mother didn’t understand what they were saying to her.
I feel better about that, at least!
Not so about the burned food. My mother is always super cautious about that sort of thing, so it was *really* unusual for her to not just burn food, but burn it so badly.
As alarming as that is, this may turn out to be a blessing in disguise. My mother really wants to be in long term care. She is aware of how much she is physically failing, and she at least somewhat recognizes her own cognitive decline and it, understandably, scares her. I really hope this is what gets her into the care she needs!
Total change of subject.
I got a call from the Cat Lady while I was working on this. She had sent me some security camera images. The property they moved on to about a year and a half ago, backs up against a national park, where lots of people walk their dogs. Six off leash dogs suddenly showed up on their deck, just minutes after their youngest daughter had been out there with Button. Button is completely blind and deaf now, and their youngest daughter makes a point of going out there with him in a harness to get some fresh air when she comes home from school for lunch.
Her husband had chased the dogs off and they confronted the owner, who said outright she didn’t care. Even when they told her their daughter had been on the deck with a blind and deaf cat, the response was, that cat would have been eaten. !!! When they confronted her on that, her response was, I don’t care, I hate cats. !!!! She also called the Cat Lady rude names, and her very butch partner started looking ready to be violent.
They called the RCMP on them. This is not an off leash park, for starters, and they are on something like 10 acres, so that’s quite a distance for the dogs to be running around away from their owners. People that irresponsible with their animals should not have any, let alone 6 big dogs! I just can’t imagine knowing your animals are prone to violence, and not caring if the kill another animal or possibly hurt a child.
They were so relieved their daughter and Button had already gone inside, that’s for sure!
Which lead to an update on Button. His sight had been going for a while now, and then it was just gone. The vet thinks it was a viral infection, in utero. Any other kittens in the litter and the mother likely died, and they really don’t know how Button survived. It has effected his development in many ways. The Cat Lady tells me, they don’t care. They adore him. Even their dog adores him. He is in almost constant contact with a human, and they even take him out for coffee and other outings. And to think, he was supposed to be adopted by someone else entirely, who ended up backing out and adopting another cat, when his vet care kept getting longer and longer!
Meanwhile, she will be looking into booking a couple more neuters for us. I mentioned we might be able to get a female, now that Adam actually comes up to us for pets, so she will see what they can arrange. I told her, whatever they can manage, we’ll happily take. Beggars can’t be choosers! We’ve got so many friendly males, but we really need to get the females done.
She will get back to us when she has more information.
What a day she had, though! I appreciate that, in the middle of all this, she still thinks of us and of how her rescue can help us.
My brain is feeling fried, so not much to say this time.
While heading to my mother’s for the meeting with home care, I noticed the trip meter on the truck was already at almost 450km. It’s only March 4, and I reset it when I filled the tank at Costco on Feb. 28. Just over 100km of that was the trip home. The rest was the first three days of March.
If I keep getting so many calls to cover med assists like in the past couple of weeks, this is going to be a very expensive month on gas!
I got to my mother’s early, in case she needed help with getting dressed or anything like that. She was already dressed and ready. She and I are alike in one thing: if we have some sort of appointment, we can’t sleep the night before.
Yeah, I’m didn’t get much sleep last night, either.
We got to talking and my mother quickly launched into an attack on my brother. She started accusing him of keeping secrets from her again, and said a few strange things. One was how he “brags” about his technology (he doesn’t brag. Even the slightest attempt to talk about his work is so far beyond her ability to understand, he avoids talking about his job at all). Then she said, she doesn’t want his technology, but his kindness.
No one has been kinder to my mother than him. No one has done more for her than him. He has covered her butt for decades. But because he doesn’t tell her all his personal stuff, and doesn’t always agree with her, doesn’t allow her to treat him like her personal slave, that means he’s not kind to her – then she suddenly started saying that it’s his wife that controls everything. !!!!
There was one thing she said that actually confirmed something we’ve suspected for some time now. A matter of phrasing, really.
She is getting my brother mixed up with my dad.
He looks more and more like my dad as he gets older. My mother and my dad were always butting heads. A very dysfunctional relationship. We’ve noted that she’s treating my brother like she used to treat my dad. Today, she actually started talking about him as if he was my dad.
Then there was a knock at the door, and the case coordinator arrived.
We talked for while about all sorts of things. They’ve not been able to find exactly what happened with the morning no-shows. The best they could come up with is that there was confusion and lack of communication because a previous shift scheduler has been away for the past month, and there is come chaos with the people filling in for her.
I tested my mother’s BP so she could see how my mother has to move around when just shifting from chair to chair, so I could access her left arm. My mother and I had already decided that, at the end of the meeting, I would take her to do her blood work, so the case coordinator could observe how my mother gets into the truck, and moves around in general.
In the end, it looks like my mother will start getting some meal assists – all they can do is things like make her a sandwich, or reheat leftovers. My mother was indeed already scheduled for longer time in the mornings, for assistance in dressing and emptying her commode, but it hasn’t been happening, so that will be looked into. I don’t think my mother is in “bad” enough condition for her to actually get considered more urgently to get her into supportive living or long term care. Which is so very frustrating.
After the meeting was done, I got my mother to the lab in the local hospital with no doctors, just a few blocks from my mother’s place, for her blood work. Only one vial was needed, and no one else was there to get done, so it was really fast. Just that outing wore her out, though, and she was glad to be home. It was just coming up on lunch time, so I got some food together for her before I left.
And that was pretty much it. I had actually intended to go for a nap, I’m so tired, but after I had my own lunch, it just didn’t make sense to try and nap, or I’d screw up my own night. So I’m basically just dragging my butt through the day until it’s a reasonable hour to go to bed.
I need sleeeeeeepppp.
Thankfully, I don’t have any appointments tomorrow, so I should be able to have a recovery day. Unless I get another call from home care to cover my mother’s meds again! Then I have the appointment at the garage for the truck to do a whole bunch of relatively small things before they become big things, along with replacing the oil sensor. Which means a few hours in town, while it’s being worked on. I should have several parcels to pick up by then. Two are already in and waiting. One is something I finally broke down and ordered; a clear acrylic guard for my keyboard, to keep the cats from walking on it and digging under it! Ghosty in particular is truly dedicated to waiting until I’m in bed, then digging under my keyboard. She’s even knocked it right off my computer table at times! That and many is the time I’ve gone back to my computer and discovered all sorts of strange things have been opened, some of which I have no idea which keys got stepped on to find!
Anyhow.
Time to move on to things that don’t require much thought processing. Like laundry!
Last night, we got more of the bitter temperatures we were supposed to be past by now. When I looked during the night, we had hit our predicted low of -25C/-13F, with a wind chill of -33C/-27F Today, however, we reached -9C/16F – at least, that’s what the display on my truck showed me. Inside the sun room was at least 10C/50F. You’d think the cats would be hanging out in that, but they were running around outside in the sunshine. I guess with that winter fur, it might actually have been too warm for them in the sun room!
Oh, and Happy First Meteorological day of spring! 😄
Today, we had one shopping stop planned, but made extra ones, too.
The first unplanned stop was to a Dollarama sharing a parking lot with the Walmart in the nearer city. I’m still checking to see what garden supplies they’re getting in, as I’m wanting to pick up the larger plant stakes I’ve found so very useful. They didn’t have then yet, but I did pick up a couple of shallow trays that we use for the inside cats’ cat soup, as we’re down a couple. One, because the cats manage to break it. Another because it now has the new water fountain taped to it, to keep the cats from spilling all over the floor. The water fountain is also taped closed because Ghosty like to tear to top off and start splashing around inside!
When we’d gone to a Dollarama in the city, I’d picked up their last 4 bowls in a particular pattern. The bowls are more like what I grew up knowing as pulmisek. I don’t know if there’s an English name for it, but it basically means “half dish” because it’s half way between a bowl and a dinner plate in side and shape. Anyhow, today, I spotted the same pattern in side plates – something else we’ve been losing to breakage – and my daughter spotted more in dinner plates. They had lots, too. So we got four of each. With the bowls we already have, we now have four 3 pc place settings in this pattern, all for much less than buying a new set of dishes would have cost. I’m quite happy with them.
Our planned stop was to the Walmart. There, we finally found the new toilet brush and toilet roll holder we didn’t get at our last Walmart trip, this time making sure they had their bar codes! An extra purchase was a case of New England clam chowder. Locally, they cost a bit under, or a bit over, $4 a can, depending on what store we go to. Walmart is usually $2.97 a can, so we do tend to buy it there when we want a treat. Today, they were on sale for $1.88 a can. Then there were a few little things my husband requested.
Another thing we got was 10 little cans of Fancy Feast cat food. These, I will be keeping in my room so that I can give them to our elderly Freya, who seems to be having trouble even with softened kibble at times. The grand old lady deserves to be pampered! When I kick all the cats out of my room, except Butterscotch and Freya, in the morning so Butterscotch can use the litter, eat and drink without being harassed by other cats, I can also give them their special breakfast. Butterscotch is also getting on in years, though she is certainly more spry than Freya, so she will get her share, too.
After we were done at the Walmart, I decided to go to the Canadian Tire across the street, for our second unplanned stop. I wanted to look at countertop ovens and microwaves. Our microwave’s fan stopped working, so it’s no longer safe to use. We only used it to reheat things, sometimes make the occasional mug cake or, rarer still, thaw or melt things.
My daughter and I looked through the section and weighed the pros and cons for the ones that met our needs, and was more affordable. Some of these get really expensive!
In the end, we decided to get the Black & Decker countertop convection oven (not an affiliate link). With the various functions, we will probably use it more than we ever used the microwave. Most toaster ovens/countertop ovens have doors that swing down from the top. This one has French doors that open to the sides – something we felt would work better, since it will be sitting on the one counter in the kitchen the cats are allowed on, because they can look out the window. The real deciding factor, however is that it is an oven that my husband can use. He can’t bend over to take things in and out of the regular oven. This will give him a bit more independence, as he’ll be able to prepare some of his own food.
It did price out at the upper limit was what I was willing to pay, but since I found myself with a Canadian Tire Mastercard, I’ve been using it strategically. In this case, I took the financing they offer on purchase totals of over $150 before taxes. Which means the amount will be divided into 12 equal payments, with 0% interest. I could have used my accumulated Canadian Tire dollars, too, but I’m saving those up to cover planned future purchases.
In the end, it turned out to be a very productive trip. The only down side is that we ended up missing my brother and his wife. They’d gone out to the farm so my brother could get his truck running for a while. He wasn’t able to actually move it – there’s too much snow and ice around it – but that was okay. While there, he also checked on the septic ejector to make sure everything still looked good, even though we’re not hooked up to it right now. They were done and gone shortly after we started for home. They did have time to stop and visit my mother, though, and bring her a dinner from a local restaurant. She did get her Meals on Wheels today, but the less she has to prepare for herself, the better. I look forward to hearing in more detail, how the visit went. Hopefully, well, but my mother has a tendency to be remarkably cruel to my brother and have no awareness of the pain she is causing him. The last time the subject of my brother came up with me, she would just suddenly start going on about how he never visits and never calls – and then started going on about how he wants all her money. ??? The only person who is after her money (not that she has much) is our vandal, who believes she has millions squirreled away somewhere.
It makes for some very difficult visits, at times. I just hope she was having one of her good days!
I’m happy to say that today was a good day for me, at least, but I sure an looking forward to having a couple of days of not having to go anywhere!
Yesterday, I found myself falling asleep at my desk by 6pm. Eventually, I succumbed and simply went to bed shortly after 7.
I slept for more than 10 hours!
Okay, not a solid 10 hours. I do tend to toss and turn, there are cat interruptions and bathroom breaks, but overall, I did manage to get a very long, solid night of sleep out of it!
It could very well have been a relief response, now that we’ve got the septic running again and we can use our plumbing again!
When I headed out this morning, to do my morning rounds, it was about 3C/37F, and actually what will be the warmest part of the day. Apparently, we hit 5C/41F at some point of the night! We are now slowly cooling down slightly until tomorrow, when we are supposed to reach a high of 2C/36F.
With temperatures like this, I took the time to soak the kibble and lysine mix for the outside cats with hot water, as a treat. From what I could see when I got out, they have been spending more time outside than in the sun room. Much of the kibble I left in the sun room last night was still there this morning, but kibble trays outside are looking much emptier.
The cats were everywhere, and I even had several while I was doing my rounds.
I even had Stinky (top), Syndol (middle) and Magda (bottom) follow me to the sign cam. I had to carry Magda around, as much as she would let me, so I wouldn’t step on her as she ran around my feet.
When I checked the gate cam files later on, there were quite a lot more files than I expected. It turned out, our gate was very busy during the night, with groups of cats going back and forth!
Those reflective collars work very well. Even with the long haired cats, I could see them glowing in the infrared light.
These milder temperatures feel sooooo good after the last couple of polar vortexes! Things are melting all over the place. From the road reports I’ve seen, the highways are wet, but not icy, and we should stay that way for a while. Which is good because, starting tomorrow, we’re going to be doing a LOT of driving!
In other things, I’m happy to say everything is still working at it should, with the septic pump. My daughter had left one of the blower vans running after she washed and disinfected the floor around the pump. It’s all dry now, so I shut that off. We’d changed out the filter basket while working on the pump yesterday and, after giving it a general scrub down, I left it to soak in a bucket with detergent in it overnight. I took the time to finish scrubbing it clean, as well as washing the rag I use to wipe down the hose when I do drain maintenance that was also soaking overnight. All the water I was using was just enough to trigger the septic pump while I was down there, so I got to see how well it was working.
I am so glad for that filter. If we were not able to actually see the water flow, we would have no idea if there was an issue of the water no longer flowing. All we would know is that the pump was running and not stopping, and we’d have to go outside and open up the septic tank to see if the grey water side was drained or not. Or go to the ejector out by the barn to see if anything was flowing there. Can you imagine having to do that over and over, while working on the pump and testing it out? That would be ridiculous in the summer, never mind in the winter! Considering how many problems we’ve had with the septic system since moving here, that one simple thing has been a life saver!
As it is, I could sit there and watch how the water was flowing through the filter, and everything looked just fine. Since it is just pumping out into the yard, via the emergency diverter, and not 300′ feet away towards the barn, it also finished pumping really fast!
We still aren’t running the washing machine drain into the plumbing yet, though. I want to give the pipe a few more cleanouts, until we can no longer hear it backing up when we drain the kitchen sink. With how much warmer it’s going to be today, we’ll run the hose out the front door window again and do a whole lot of laundry!
I never imagined I would be so excited over being able to do laundry. Or flush a toilet. Or wash dishes. And I grew up without running water or an indoor bathroom for part of my childhood!
We’re looking at a gorgeous day today. Bright and sunny, with an expected high of -5C/23F. Which we are as I write this, shortly past 2pm, with a “feels like” of -1C/30F
My one outing planned for the day was a trip to the dump, which is open long hours on Saturdays. I was up at my usual time, which is when all the cats seem to want to use all the litter boxes at the same time, and start getting antsy for the kibble. I topped up their bowls and closed up my door so Butterscotch could use the litter without being harassed by other cats, then tried to get a bit more sleep before heading outside to feed the yard cats, then load the truck.
Butterscotch, however, decided she really liked having the room to herself (Freya was there, but she just chills on my bed after she’s dong eating) and was racing all over, before finally settling down on the cat shelf by the ceiling.
She may have settled, but quite did not happen. Instead, I got a phone call.
It was home care, letting me know there wasn’t anyone available to do my mother’s med assist this morning.
So I quickly got up, updated the family, then called my mother to let her know there was no one available this morning, and that I would be there within the hour.
My mother is convinced that no one is showing up because they want to “fix her” – meaning, keep her from getting care and med assists, so that she would die. I told her, they are short staffed. They’re always shorted staffed. There could be many reasons no one was available.
She refuses to believe that. 🫤
After reassuring her that I would be there to give her her pills, I took care of the outside cats then headed out.
The outside cats were loving the relatively mild morning! Rolando Moon (in the second photo) was just rolling in the snow.
I noticed something about the kids in the isolation shelter, though.
One was missing!
No Grink!
I eventually found him, eating in the kibble house. It’s the first time I’ve seen him out of the isolation shelter in weeks!
Anyhow…
I had reached my mother’s town and was about to turn down her street when my phone started ringing. I don’t have hands free, so I left it to ring, but I immediately thought that it was home care again. As I got to her building and parked in my usual spot, there was one other vehicle there. Again, I felt sure this was home care, and that they’d found someone to do my mother’s meds.
After I parked, I checked my phone but did not recognize the number. I was about to listen to the voice mail message when a woman with a clip board came out from the car.
Yup. She was from home care, and she had just called me, hoping to catch me before I left, to say my mother’s med assist was done. We have never met in person before, but she said that when she saw my truck turn onto the road, she just knew it was me!
She updated me on how things went with my mother. The person who was scheduled to visit my mother this morning had called in sick. The person I was talking to was the weekend schedule coordinator, and she had tried to find another home care worker to visit my mom. Unfortunately, none of them would have had the combination for the lock box in their sheets, so she did it herself! She said she would be back to see my mother again, for her other med assists.
Since I was there anyhow, I went in to see how my mother was doing.
She was complaining, so she was doing well. 😄
She was making a big deal over my having to drive all that way, and how it was such a bother, etc. etc. I told her, this is my job, and I’m happy to do it! Moving out here was not just about taking care of the property, but to be close enough to help her when she needed it, since my other siblings live so much further, and have jobs. Mostly, though, she was demanding my brother come out at the drop of a hat, even though he lived the furthest. Especially after the title of the property was turned over to him, so that it would no longer be in the will, due to the antics of our vandal. If it were my brother who had driven all this way out, she wouldn’t have had any such feelings. If anything, she would complain that he didn’t do enough. Which is how she behaved before we moved out here, and he did come out more often.
While I was talking to her, I noticed her pulse oximeter was still on her table. I’m actually surprised she hadn’t hidden it away. So I got her to sit back and relax while I set it up.
Her heart rate and O2 levels are better than mine!
Then I asked her if there was anything I could help her with, such as getting dressed for the day or empty her commode. She said no, but that’s when I found out her morning visits have not been going this. They were supposed to be scheduled extra time for this, and it sounds like this hasn’t happened.
I’m going to have to call the case coordinator back and bring that up. I’m also going to have to bring up another issue…
As my mother was griping about home care not making it in (no sympathy at all that someone had called in sick, nor appreciation that someone else went out of her way to get to my mother and give her her med assist) and it’s such a bother for me to drive aaaaalllll that way (which is about half the distance my sister would have had to drive, and a quarter of the distance my brother would have had to drive, though neither of them were available)…
It came down to her meds being in a lock box, but if there is an “emergency” like this, she could just take her pills herself…
…
… as she indicated to the top of her fridge, where there is a pharmacy bag with her unopened bubble packs.
The only bubble pack in the lock box is the one that home care aids are actively using, along with their duotang of forms they initial every time they do her meds, and her inhaler.
I suppose it would be a tight fit, but doctor’s orders are, my mother does not have access to her meds, because she messes with them.
I didn’t do anything about it at the time, as it would have brought about a rage reaction, but I did tell her this was not a good thing – and that her continuing to rail about how her medications shouldn’t be in a box, and to leave them on the fridge, and don’t tell anyone they’re up there – we all examples of why she needs to have her medications in a lock box to begin with!
I’ve already updated my brother on that, but will also be talking to the case coordinator about it. It might be having all 4 weeks of bubble packs in the lock box made things a bit tight, but when my brother and his wife brought the new, bigger lock box, everything fit in there just fine. They should never have been taken out. The home care workers had been putting them on the fridge, out of my mother’s reach, before we got the lock box, but apparently, my mother can reach them. If nothing else, she could use her cane to simply knock the bag down.
So… that was a thing.
I asked my mother if there was anything else I could do, and she remembered a couple of things we forgot to put on her shopping list yesterday. So I went to the grocery store to get those for her, as well as a sandwich and a drink for myself. I hadn’t had breakfast yet and was starting to feel ill and dizzy.
That done, and once I was sure nothing else was needed, I headed to the gas station to top up the tank again. Before heading home, I updated the family, adding that I would back the truck up to the house so we could load it for the dump run.
It’s been a while since we’ve done a dump run – there was no way I was going to do it while we were being hit with the worst of the last polar vortex – so there was quite a bit. She moved the bags into the sun room for me, then I took them to the truck. She can only use one arm for this, since her ganglion is still really painful. Once the regular garbage and recycling was loaded, we had the very careful job of loading the bags from the honeypot. It’s been warm enough, only one of them was partially frozen. Even with using the stove pellets to absorb liquid, some of them definitely got extra care in loading! With four adults, with always at least one person having digestive issues, it seems, we’ve had to change the bags out quite a bit!
Double bagged, of course.
Once loaded, it was a quick run to the dump and then home. Before I left, though, I had a quick talk with my daughter.
Last night, my husband brought up the idea of going to town to a restaurant, just to have somewhere to use a real toilet again, instead of the honeypot. He would have done right then and there, if it hadn’t already been too late in the day for such a trip. I did, however, go through the budget and crunched some numbers, and found that we could manage it.
So I asked her to bring up with my husband and her sister (who was in bed after her night’s work) about this being an option.
When I got back, we were talking about my taking my husband and younger daughter out for a lunch, then taking my older daughter out for supper, after she’d had her full day’s sleep. My husband, however, had a really bad pain night and was simply not up to it an outing, and asked us to bring something home for him, instead.
So my daughter and I headed out and chose to go to a newer restaurant in town, that is associated with a brewing company. The city we lived in before we moved out here had a HUGE craft brewing community, and my daughters enjoy good beer, so we used to go to these whenever we could. I don’t like beer, myself, but I was willing to taste test theirs. 😄 This is the first time we’ve got to a restaurant/craft brewer since moving out here, so… more than 7 years.
We ended up both getting bison burgers (both skipping the jalapeno and I skipped the tomato). My daughter upgraded to a poutine with hers, while I got the coleslaw instead of regular fried. The burger was really good – and very messy! My daughter really liked her poutine, too. My coleslaw was surprisingly bland, though. It wasn’t bad, by any means. Just not what I expected. Both our meals also came with a couple of spears of pickles, with the cucumbers pickled in their own signature beer brine. My daughter also got a pint of one of their signature brews, which she quite enjoyed.
Once we were done there, we stopped at the DQ to pick up a meal for my husband, then headed home.
For now, I’ve got a bit of a break. I’ll be heading outside again to do the evening kibble and warm water soon. It’s so night out, I might not even bother putting on a jacket! I certainly didn’t wear my down filled parka today.
Then, I intend to wrangle my older daughter out of the house for supper. Knowing her, she will try to refuse. She has barely left the house – even to just go outside in the yard – in years. A down side to living in the boonies. Her work is all digital, so she doesn’t have to go anywhere, and since she works nights and sleeps days, she’s not around to go on trips into town or whatever.
What I really want to do right now, though, is go to bed! I got very little sleep last night, my attempt at sleeping in failed, and instead of just one outing today, I have had three, with one more in the works.
I guess it’s a perk that, with all this extra running around, I get to use public washrooms and eat food other people cooked but, to be honest, I would be just fine staying home. I do want the rest of the family to be able to get out, though. I really wanted to get my husband out. It’s been a rare thing for him to have an outing that doesn’t involve medical appointments!
I really, really hope my brother can get that pump working again, tomorrow. This is the longest we’ve had to use the honeypot, do sponge bathing, etc. yet, and we’ve had all sorts of plumbing problems since moving out here. At least we do have access to hot and cold running water. We just can’t let it go down the drain to the septic tank in any usual amounts.
Today we got to stay home, with no errands to run. Technically, we should have done a dump run, but that can wait until things warm up a bit.
We actually reached a high of -19C/-2F, with a “real feel” of -15C/5F, which was nice for a change. Even when we did have wind chills of -25C/-13F, it was from a direction we were sheltered from. It was also bright and sunny, so we took advantage of it to run the house out the storm door window and do several loads of laundry. We didn’t get it all done before the hose had to be brought back in before it froze, even though we now do laundry using warm or hot water. We used to only do cold water washes, but this way, there’s less chance of the hose freezing. We are back under an extreme cold warning, and tomorrow the high will be lower than today, but it should be okay to run the hose out again for more laundry. We have extra bedding to do, after a cat threw up on my daughters bed. *sigh*
I caught a photo of this bunch, all huddled together, this morning, when it was still pretty brutal out there. The sun room was significantly warmer, but from what I could see on the critter cam, they weren’t really using it. When I first came out this morning, though, I found a bunch of them cuddled together in the cat cage, under the platform. The platform hides most of the cat cage from the camera’s view, so I never saw them in there. I would be able to see if they jump in and out of the opening, though.
As I was going in and out today, to make sure the hose from the laundry was fully drained, I saw a crowd of cats mashed together in the top of the isolation shelter. I couldn’t get close for a photo, though, as the more feral ones would panic and run out of the shelter. I’m also seeing several faces peering at me through the cat house window, so at least a few of them are using that to keep warm, too.
In between such mundane household tasks, I have been working to free up storage space here on the blog. I really don’t want to move to another platform, if I can avoid it, but we simply can’t afford WordPress’ prices for extra storage. After trying a number of things, I ended up simply deleting old posts. For a very long time, I was doing Photo of the Day posts, every day, as well as Critter of the Day posts – sometimes both in one day. A lot of these were just a single photo with a brief comment on them. Others had several photos or slideshows, also with brief comments.
A few of them were also full blog posts. Those ones, I kept. The rest, I have been slowly going through. WordPress made changes in their system since I last did this, that has made it easier for me to find the posts in the first place (you’d be amazed how many unrelated posts would show up when I used the search term “photo of the day”, which was part of the titles), and work with them. It’s also been easier to find the related images in the media tab. So I’ve been going through the list of posts, opening to view the posts, one at a time, so I wouldn’t lose track. Once the post was open, I’d open the image (or images) in another tab, so I could copy and past the file name from the URL. I had the media storage in another tab, and I’d do a search for the image. Then it was, delete the image, delete the post, close the extra tabs, then do it again.
It was a real trip through memory lane, doing this. These were mostly photos of deer and birds, but also yard cats. Some of them were adopted out, some are now indoors, and a few have either passed away, or have disappeared. While I have all of these images stored on external hard drives, I did end up saving a few onto my computer and sharing the memories with the family. Seeing old photos of tiny Dave and little Cheddar, snuggling with Fenrir – who was still bigger than them at the time – was rather heartwarming. David was not fluffy yet, and both of them are at least double Fenrir’s size now!
The frustrating thing about this is, I’d gone through these posts before, back when we first realized that posting full size, high resolution photos on the blog was not a good idea! I’d gone through and resized those huge images, or got rid of them entirely, depending on what sort of post they were in.
When it came to our photo of the day posts, though, had I started cropping and resizing all of them, even adding borders and the blog’s URL onto them. These images do not have large file sizes. That’s why I left them, even as I’d deleted others with much larger file size images. There are just so many of them!
Which means that I’ve deleted dozens of photos and old posts, and have only managed to get my storage to 98.4% full, instead of 99.2%. That 99.2% was more of an “accident”. Thanks to 53old’s suggestion, I found that WP’s photo editor now allows images to be scaled down. I could use that to resize the images, and could even see how much smaller the file size was, as a result. Very hand, quick and easy!
Yet, the percentage of used up storage space went up, not down!
It seems that WP changed this function at some point, from a one and done sort of thing, to being able to revert the image back to original size later on. Which means that, while the scaled down image might be faster loading when the page is opened, the full size file was still stored within the system. So instead of just resizing a photo, I was essentially turning one file into two files, with the full size file “hidden” from view, but still in the system – and taking up storage space.
I went back to the ones I’d scaled down this morning and reverted them to their original sized, and got back the space.
So in order to reclaim more storage space on this blog, I’m going to have to keep plugging away at these old posts. They don’t get any views anymore; I’m currently working on 2019, so they’re all older. But gosh, I put a lot of work into those images, and I was posting them because I wanted to share some really nice photos!
It’s awfully tedious, but still preferable to moving the entire blog to a new platform. I will still have to store new photos somewhere else, like on Instagram, to embed them into posts. Thanks to a suggestion, I might be able to store them somewhere else and embed them into my posts so that people not on Instagram won’t have problems seeing them. I’ll look into doing that later on, though, after I’ve freed up a bit more space here. I need to have at least a bit more wiggle room in there!
I guess that’s my project for the weekend. The temperatures will be dropping; the extreme cold warning is back and continuing for a couple more days. We don’t have any appointments until the 20th, and it’s supposed to start warming up again around the 18th, so that should work out. About the only thing we’ll need to go out for between now and then is to get the mail and make a trip into town for little things, like refilling our water jugs. Possibly a grocery shopping trip for my mother as well. No big trips to the city or anything like that until the end of the month.
Next winter, I want to really work on finding ways to NOT have a lot of appointments in January and February. There isn’t anything we can do about stuff like my mother suddenly going to the ER and staying in the hospital for 2 weeks, but we can try to book medical appointments – for humans or felines! – outside of the two coldest, most miserable months of the year!
Of course, I’ve been saying that pretty much since our first two winters out here, where we found ourselves actually unable to go anywhere at all, either because the vehicles froze, or we were snowed in.
It hasn’t really worked out that way but, for all my whining, at least the winters have not been as bad since then! There is at least that, and replacing the van with our current truck, to be thankful for!
The Re-Farmer 