Thursday 13: Cats

I’m still dealing with a pretty bad cough from the cold/sinus thing, so I don’t have much to blog about this week.  But I realized I have a lot of cat pictures I haven’t shared, so this is basically a cat picture and cat video dump.  Enjoy!

1.  We'll start with a picture of Moritmer in the ice cream truck.

2.  Here's a video of Theodore watching a squirrel in the window feeder.

3.  Here's one of Caroline and Theodore playing.

4.  It is nearly impossible to get all of the cats to eat their own food from their own plate, so when they do, it's a photowrothy moment.

5.  Here's a video of Mortimer watching a squirrel in the window feeder.

6.  Here's where Theodore likes to hang out on my work-from-home days.

7.  Here's my sister's cat, Kreacher, on the couch I crocheted.  I think it's holding up well.  

8.  Here's a video of Charlie going "fishing."

9.  Here are the three kittens (Blanche, Sophia, and Fergus) that my sister and S-I-L rescued last year.

10.  Here's a picture of Tara, who is usually camera-shy.

11.  Here's one of Charlie in the ice cream truck.

12.  Here's one of Caroline enjoying her desk bed.  

13.  Lastly, enjoy this video of Theodore with one of the Halloween toys.

Thursday 13: Sick of Being Sick and Some Randomness

1.    After my last Thursday 13, I had every intention of getting back on a somewhat regular blogging schedule.  I had been sick with some kind of cold/sinus thing, but was almost completely back to normal.

 

2.    A few days later, whatever it was came back, so I went to the doctor.  I tested negative for Covid and flu.  I was put on antibiotics, steroids, and cough medicine.  I started feeling a lot better within a few days, and within a week, I thought I was completely over it.

3.    So, we left for our planned vacation on the 22^nd. 

4.    We got to feed seagulls on the beach, which I absolutely love. 

 

5.    We had a couple of wonderful vacation days, but on Saturday, I started feeling really tired.  We had been out late the night before at a comedy mystery show, so I wasn’t surprised to be tired.

 

6.    By Sunday evening, I was sick.  Uncontrollable cough, sore throat, etc.  I opted to try the Teladoc program that’s available through my health insurance, which worked out really well.  I was prescribed different antibiotics (and a longer course), cough medicine, and an inhaler.  They did not think it was Covid or the flu.

7.    By Monday night, Nick was also getting sick.

8.    We were due to come home yesterday, the 29^th, so we basically spent from Saturday through Wednesday morning hanging out at the rental.  Fortunately, the bed and couch were very comfortable, we had packed plenty of books (with plans to read on the beach), and the rental had several streaming services.

9.    We left for home early yesterday morning and have spent most of our time sleeping since then.  We both still feel pretty awful, but are hoping to be over whatever this is by the time we go back to work next week.  I’ve been sick for the better part of a month now, and I’m sick of being sick! 

10. Our awesome neighbors took care of the cats while we were gone, and sent plenty of pictures and updates.  Some of the kids did their schoolwork at our house during the day, so the cats wouldn’t be lonely.  Isn’t that sweet? 

 

11. While I wasn’t sick, I crocheted another scarf.  This one was for one of the neighbor girls.  She seemed to like it when I gave it to her. 

 

12. Recently, her mom told me that she still uses the purse I made her, though usually as a tote bag when she needs to take clothes or books somewhere.  That made me so happy to hear! 

13. I’m working on catching up with visiting all of your blogs and hope to “see” everyone soon.  In the meantime, I hope everyone has a happy and safe Halloween tomorrow.  And if you have any tips on getting/staying well, please share them! 

Thursday 13: Hi

Since I haven’t blogged in almost three months, I thought a Thursday 13 would be a good way to start back and catch up.

1.    Since cat pictures are always a good way to start, enjoy this one of Caroline.  The bed she’s in clamps to the side of my desk, so she has a comfy place to “supervise” me on my work-from-home days.

2.    Caroline has had a lot of work to supervise during my blogging break.  I got assigned to help another team with a project that had a very tight deadline, so I was putting in some extra hours.  We made it, though, and (fingers crossed) it should be January before I’m dealing with any more super-tight deadlines. 

3.    Charlie does not involve himself in my work. 

4.    Nick and I celebrated our 17^th wedding anniversary in September.  It doesn’t seem like it has been that long! 

5.    Theodore turned one at the end of August.

6.    It’s beginning to look and feel like Fall is really here.  We’ve had highs in the low 70s and lows in the mid-40s. 

7.    I’ve switched to my Fall cards for my buddies with Chemo Angels and Senior Angels.

8.    I’ve been crocheting again. 

9.    I found this tutorial and liked the way it looked, so I made one (with no plan for giving it to any particular person).  I enjoyed making it, and I love the texture the stitches create.  (Note:  I used an H hook and a shorter starting chain for a narrower scarf.)

10. During the decluttering/organizing that we did during the spring and summer, I realized that I have A LOT of yarn I had forgotten about.  I came across this green, which is our neighbor’s (Lori) favorite color.  I asked Lori if she’d like a scarf in that color, and she said yes. 

 

11. When I dropped off Lori’s scarf, I asked if anyone else would like a scarf.  Fortunately, a few people said yes.  I’m almost finished with a pink scarf for one of the girls.  Next up is a light blue one for one of the girls, and a dark blue one for one of the boys.  One of the other boys really liked the original gray one, so I gave that one to him. 

12. We got the cats an ice cream truck (remember how much they loved the taco truck), which they enjoyed.

13. I’m working on catching up with visiting everyone’s blogs and hope to “see” you soon.  

Thursday 13: Hi

Since I haven’t blogged in quite a while, I thought a Thursday 13 would be a good way to start back.

1.    Since a cat picture is always a good way to start a Thursday 13, enjoy this picture of Tara.  She’s camera-shy, so I’m always happy when I’m able to get a picture of her.

 

2.    I don’t really have a great reason for not blogging much.  One of the main reasons has been that I find myself alternating between ridiculous amounts of doomscrolling and then taking myself entirely offline for a while.  Also, I tend to blog about very unimportant things, and that has felt wrong lately.  Recently, my friend at my work showed me where they keep all of their documentation to be here.  I’m not sure what else to call it.  This person legally immigrated here over 30 years ago, has multiple advanced degrees, and works for the government.  (I want to be clear that I am not saying that this person’s degrees or employment status make them more worthy of not being snatched off the street and potentially sent to a concentration camp.  I’m just trying to make the point that plenty of people, regardless of other factors, are living in fear simply because of their skin color.  And that is not OK.)  But, recently, they came to me and said, “Because I’m brown, I want to make sure someone here knows where all of these things are.”  They then showed me where to look in their wallet for various forms of documentation.  On one hand, I’m glad they showed me because, unfortunately, I think it’s good for someone to know.  On the other hand, that is not a conversation we ever should have needed to have.  I hate that they’re in a position to need to pick a person at work to have that conversation with.  It’s hard to come home and write a blog post about groundhogs or flowers after something like that. 

3.    I don’t want to make it sound like it has just been misery that has kept me from blogging,  It hasn’t.  I have a very bad habit of trying to start way too many projects at once.  In April, I decided to start a massive decluttering/organizing project on the whole house, sign up for the A to Z Blogging Challenge, take on a fourth Chemo Angels buddy, start the garden, continue working on our big drainage project, and work on some other projects in the yard.  Some of those things have gone better than others, and some have spilled over and are still going on.

 

4.    On the decluttering/organizing front, we have made tons of progress.  This closet used to have things falling off the shelves.   We didn’t keep track, but between donations and a few things that went to the dump, we got rid of probably dozens of carloads of stuff. 

 

5.    We each got rid of about half of our clothing and reorganized where and how we store a lot of things.  It makes keeping up with laundry, putting away clean laundry, and getting dressed so much easier.  Plus, it makes me ridiculously happy every time I see my shirts organized by style and color.

 

6.    Theodore absolutely loves storage cubes!

 

7.    With our neighbors’ help, we have finished one of the French drains we were working on.   After this project is finished, I will be very happy if I never have to shovel gravel again!

 

8.    We are almost finished with the second French drain.  We just need to add the overflow valve and finish filling in the trench with the pipe. 

 

9.    We haven’t started on the third one yet.  Between heat advisories and storms, it has been hard to do much work outside.  We hoped to be able to hire someone to finish the project and do some grading work, but after the estimate, that’s off the table for a while. 

10. Some parts of the garden are going better than others. 

 

11. The Orange Chef’s Choice tomato plant is doing fairly well.

 

12. The Roma tomato plant is barely hanging on.

 

13. I’m working on catching up on visiting all of your blogs, and hope to “see” you soon.  

Visitors

V is one of the harder letters (at least for me) in the A to Z Challenge. 

That means it's time for another critter corner video!

This one at least has V (Visits) in the title.