A short blog today:
We were surprised and thrilled when Rachel told us her family would like to camp on the farm Memorial weekend. It’s a good thing they couldn’t come Friday night or they would have been camping when the storm thundered through our area.
They arrived at noon on Saturday, just in time to make lunch for all of us. Afterward, they set up their tent in our campground, otherwise known as our backyard.
This was just the beginning of a fun weekend.
Last night about midnight, a wicked thunderstorm came through Seymour. It got very noisy. Lightning was all around us. After I got up to unplug our computers, the electric went out–I waited a few minutes to see if the electricity came on. It didn’t and I was the first to report the outage.
Bob slept through the storm, stretched back in his ELECTRIC lift recliner. I knew he’d have to get up eventually so I went for the 9-volt batteries I had in the kitchen for just this kind of problem.
My husband continued to sleep as I worked my way behind his recliner and installed the batteries so he could get out of his chair when he woke. I then stretched out on the couch and went to sleep.
Bob woke up and tried to lower his legs, but he couldn’t. I guess those packaged batteries had been in the drawer too long and didn’t work.
He needed to use the facilities so we worked together to get him out of his chair. Bob slid forward onto the raised footrest and almost stood, but the chair tipped forward with his weight.
It was work, but Bob did get out of the chair and made it to the toilet in time. This made him happy. He came back to sit in my recliner.
The electricity returned after three and Bob happily returned to his own recliner and kicked back.
My next shopping trip, I’ll buy new 9-volt batteries and hope we won’t need them ever again.
About two weeks ago, I bought a Drinkwell Multi-Tier Pet Fountain. I purchased this water fountain for our cat, Othello.
Othello is over 15 years old and he looks it. Every morning he’d ask me to turn on the shower so he could drink water there. It didn’t matter that there was a bowl of water across the bathroom. He wanted his water from the shower. If I didn’t do this for him he didn’t drink enough water.
A friend had a pet fountain for her cat and she said it worked well. I looked at a variety and decided on the Drinkwell one.
It said dogs liked it too, but Sunny hasn’t even tried taking a sip from the fountain.
Both our cats, Othello and Cruella, do like taking their water at the fountain. The water fountain is on the first floor, so if they are upstairs at night, with only a bowl of water, they hurry down in the morning to take a drink.
Othello seems to be taking in more water now that we have this fountain.
It is a bit more of a bother than putting water in a bowl. I have to keep the level up and wash it out more often than I like. It’s also not easy to move once it is filled with water.
To wash it out I put the plastic fountain, water and all, in a plastic tub and take it to a sink where I can dump the water. Having it in the tub as I walk across the house is so I don’t slosh water on the floor.
Anyway, this fountain is helping our old cat drink more water and I think that’s a good thing.
I just went outside to give the barn (feral) cats their evening meal. I should have waited just a little longer. The porch was invaded.
If I had waited our chickens wouldn’t have joined the cats on the porch. Since chickens are omnivores, they will eat anything…I think I’ve said this before.
Cats do not scare chickens and chickens do not scare cats. For a short time, the chickens joined the cats and pecked at the food I had set down.
This is not fair. The cats never venture into the chicken coop and eat the chicken food. The chickens do not share equally.
If I try to shoo the chickens away I end up shooing away the cats. It’s best to let them all be. The chickens don’t eat much, just chicken feed.
Bob and I haven’t been able to take our 2-wheel drive cart all the way down to the woods yet this year. Too much rain has made part of our farm lane a quagmire. In earlier years, we didn’t let that stop us. If mud got the best of us we got out and pushed, be damned the yuck. Now with Bob’s health issues, we don’t want to risk it. Getting stuck might mean a long walk home.
Usually, I take nature photos. The best I could do today was a snap of six ducks in a ‘lake’ in the middle of one of our crop fields–too much rain this year isn’t good for any farm. (No, the water shouldn’t be there.)
Most of the local birds, like sandhill cranes, are nesting now so they haven’t come out to greet us yet, but we hear them so we have hopes to see our crane family soon.
This photo of ducks was taken a few years back in late September. The crop around the waterhole is soybeans.
We’ll have to start bringing our binoculars out when we take our cart rides if the wildlife stays at a distance. Hopefully, the weather will change and dry up the land–for a while–so all farmers can get out on their fields, even retired ones.