The hard drive crash has just left me totally deflated and depressed - as if I wasn't already depressed enough. I'm still on dial-up. Just loading the compose Post screen here on Blogger took almost 2 minutes. I can't visit other blogs because of the time they take to load. I mostly now just check email, do the occasional jigsaw on Shockwave.com (I play Minesweeper or Spider Solitaire while I wait for it to load), read a few posts on 123MB, pay ebills and that's about it for the internet these days. I didn't even turn it on yesterday.
The last day of winter it was 72 degrees. The first day of spring I had 1/2 inch of snow!! I decided it was appropriate to be out and about in 34 degrees with a 25 mph north wind and went to Joann's for floss.
On the 10th, while I was looking for the new bird feeder that had disappeared the same evening I put it out, I discovered a dead raccoon just beyond my patio. I was fairly sure at the time and because I have not seen her since, I've sadly confirmed that it was my favorite little gal, the one born and raised in my back yard who always seemed to be happy and smiling as she sat beside the step and used the step as her table to eat from. She had the most sweet and genteel manners. Yes, I cried. I am going to miss her. I could not see any fight marks. When Animal Control arrived, I asked about possible rabies, but was told unless other raccoons were dying it was unlikely. While he was here the lady up the street came down to see if she could get a large animal trap. Something big had killed her cat within the last day or so. (We've had coyotes in this urban neighborhood before, and I lost my sweet Charity to a large predator 3 years ago myself.) Consequently, later that same evening I was shaken when I found and treated a large puncture wound in Brulet's head (my neurotic flame point Siamese.). At first I thought I was treating yet another Henna scratch (she's very territorial and uses Brulet for batting practice) when I found instead a fresh bite from something bigger than a house cat. I kept him in most of the next 2 weeks just to make sure neither of us had been exposed to rabies. Though I looked carefully for other bite wounds, it was 3 or 4 days later when I noticed the lump on his ribcage which he would NOT let me near. At first I thought it was a broken rib, but when the lump got bigger I realized it must be an abscess. If necessary, I would have taken him to the vet, but it has since opened, drained, and is healing well.
I've been keeping the cats INSIDE as much as possible. Henna, who eats and sleeps and gets her exercise by taking out her frustrations on Brulet, doesn't mind. Brulet has driven me CRAZY wanting OUT OUT OUT!!! Even if I check around for frantic cat before I open a door, he can zip past before I can stop him.
I've been to 2 all-day severe weather / tornado conferences the past couple of weeks. If I had to do it over (and was even just 15 years younger), I skip the law degree and major in emergency management instead. Back when I was having to make life choices, that wasn't even a degree field. If the degree was offered locally, I might consider it even if there is no possibility of ever actually working in the field. I know the staff at the local Office of Emergency Management. Except for a perhaps 40 year old manager, the avg age of the rest of them is between 30 to 35. I'm still hoping to go storm chasing with one of the RACES guys.
I have been stitching on the fishing trawler from Sea Scenes that I'm making for my new son-in-law. It's taking a LONG time because I just can't keep focused while stitching on it. I've made no attempt to redesign what I had started for the wedding project for my DD. I'm just too bumfuzzled. A couple of weeks ago I stitched and simply finished the new Prairie Schooler freebie (now hanging from a push pin in the wall above my bed), and yesterday I spent way too much time stitching a small cat sampler just for the heck of it. I'm going to redesign a couple of the cats to look like Brulet and Henna. One already looks like Timmy, my long-term "stray."
One day I'm going to d/l photos from my camera and post some SMALL ones.
Happy spring!
No comments:
Post a Comment