weekend to do list

This weekend is a big one for Canadians. It is the Victoria Day weekend, or more informally, the May 2-4 (two, four) which refers to both the date and a case of 24 beer. Of course the weekend doesn't necessarily fall right on the 24th of May, but it is still called that. For many  Canadians, this weekend, which includes a statutory holiday Monday, marks the opening of a cottage or perhaps the first camping event. When I was a teenager, we would go camping and do all sorts of things we didn't tell our parents about. People often have a barbecue or party which may also include fireworks. And drinking.

For other Canadians, this weekend is when plants are purchased, pots are hung on porches, vegetable gardens are seeded (with the exception of tomatoes and peppers and perhaps cucumbers). Garden centers are allowed to be open even though it is a holiday Monday because so much business is done that day.

For my husband, it means the opening of the pool. We have an in ground pool which he built and there is a process involved in getting it ready for another summer season. Up until this weekend, it has been tucked in under the winter pool cover with a decreased amount of water in it. I just noticed that pool salt is on sale this weekend at Canadian Tire!! Yay!

My to do list includes mostly outdoor pursuits: (in no particular order)
-whipper snip the property
-clean up front bed (again) and amend soil
-cut back and clean up rest of perennial beds
-scrub and power wash back porch
-weed/till vegetable garden
-groceries
-weed front walkway
-put in screen in door
-hydrangeas, hostas for the front bed

I don't think I will be completely successful in crossing  everything off my list, but I'm a big list maker. I like setting goals. Sometimes I even put things on my list that I've already done just so I can have the satisfaction of crossing them off😊.

My toe (see previous post if you care) gave me grief the first couple of mornings, but I wore my Birkinstocks and I think it's going to be o.k. I shouldn't be slowed down by a damaged toe  so hopefully I can post again with proof of a productive weekend. What are your plans?

Toes

I've been thinking about toes. Normally you don't even give your toes a second thought. Most of the time (here in Canada, anyway) they stayed covered up, ensconced in socks and shoes, slippers, or boots. I am not a big fan of feet, anyway. The only ones I truly like are little baby feet that you can hold onto because they are so sweet and tiny. My husband used to put our babies' feet in his mouth when they were wee little.
I abhor old gnarly feet with their various afflictions. Being a chiropodist or podiatrist is included on my list of jobs I would never want. My grandmother always had bits of moleskin plastered to an outside toe, or had pads of bandaids attached to parts of her shoes. She always wore sandal type shoes and a dress. No doubt her feet gave her problems.
My friend K. says she has Fred Flintstone feet. Indeed, her feet are rather short and stubby and her toes are thick and rounded, but she often wears a toe ring in the summer and a groovy beachy type of ankle "bracelet" to jazz up her funny little feet.
I worked with a woman who had the strangest feet I have ever seen. Her second toe extended way beyond the length of her big toe. She was a tall woman with large features and her feet were very long. With that extra long second toe they looked very odd indeed.
My own mother had quite narrow feet and often had a hard time finding shoes to fit her well. She was not one for dress shoes and her casual lifestyle of rural living and good, hard work on the property usually found her in running shoes or slip on sandals. As she aged, and eventually ended up in a wheelchair, unable to really stand up for long on her own two feet, she remained in running shoes, a bit too big so they were easy to slip on and off.

But why am I thinking about toes? I am thinking about toes because I smashed the living hell out of one of mine last night when I was about to finish up my night and get ready for bed. I somehow managed to hit my third toe on the edge of the cat scratching post in the hall outside the bathroom. My husband was right there, maybe I was trying to get around him, and he me, I don't know, but I do know that when it happened I was doubled over gasping for air and crying and saying very bad words. What is it with toes that hurts so much??

While I was bending over, hanging onto my husband with one hand and a piece of furniture with the other, all I kept thinking was, "Please don't let it be broken." I have broken  a toe once and it took weeks and weeks to heal until I didn't feel the pain anymore. I'm pretty sure this is the same toe, or maybe it was its neighbour. That break happened in the most innocuous way. I was outside on wet grass in a pair of flip flops (the kind that go between your toes) with a bit of a heel. I had picked up a bag of topsoil, or maybe it was composted cattle manure (ahh the glamour) and started to slip a little on a slight slope, caught myself, over compensated and then felt a rather sickening twinge. It was a twinge that kind of came with a colour. It was a moment of uh-oh, pain, tinged a pale Frankenstein's monster green. Over the next couple of days I watched my toe turn colour. I could barely put weight on it, and the normal gripping motion of walking was almost impossibly painful. I then "googled" the issue and learned to buddy tape that toe to its neighbour which did help me to manage the pain. Putting a shoe on it was out of the question and thankfully it was summer time, so there were a couple of ugly sandals that I could resort to. As I said, it took WEEKS until it no longer hurt and I could properly wear a shoe.

So, all of this was recalled in that split second last night when I smashed my toe. (again?) I  put ice on it for a little bit, but was wanting to go to bed, so took some pain killers and laid down, feeling a throbbing in my toe which I willed to go away as I tried to fall asleep. Eventually I did sleep and this morning, my first trepidatious steps were filled with dread. It wasn't too bad, but that "grip" motion did not feel right. As I look down at my toe right now, it seems to be the same colour as the others, so maybe I came out of this unscathed. I shall see what the day brings. Unfortunately, I am scheduled to take part in a special commemorative walk on Thursday of this week (it is currently Tuesday), so I really hope that this all feels fine by then.

My daughter, a dancer and a runner, had a purple toenail for ages until it eventually grew out. My uncle, a dairy farmer, would occasionally have a black big toenail from when he was stepped on by one of his herd while working between the cows during milking time. A colleague's son had to have a toe amputated after a botched standard procedure ingrown toenail operation went very wrong. The cat my roommate in university owned had extra toes on her front paws and was named Thumbs as a result. (That cat was insane!).

Toes. You don't think about them until you are made aware of them. For something so small, they are so significant.

this is depressing

O.K. I know we have had snow in May before. My daughter's birthday is May 3rd and there has been a light dusting on  her birthday once. Also, I recall one Mother's Day weekend when I wanted to buy plants at a garden centre but didn't because it was snowing.

Today is Sunday, May 15, 2016 and here are some images of my Ontario morning.

My newly scrubbed and power washed porch is no longer visible.

My poor tulips.

I don't know what the weather is like in your neck of the woods, but this is seriously depressing here. I hope it melts soon.

Time to Spruce up the Porch

It occurred  to  me  that  for  someone  who has a blog named Coffee on the Porch With Me, I have a pretty sorry looking porch. I guess technically it's a deck. In fact, I have two, one that faces east and one that faces west. Both porches are partially covered  by the roof and partially exposed. Both porches are also directly in the line of fire of very large spruce trees. Those are, of course, the ones with the small  needles, just the perfect size for collecting in the spaces between the boards

Two weekends ago I took all the furniture off the back porch, swept it off, and used the garden  hose to shoot all of the pine needles and other detritus  between the boards.

Today I started to do the same thing to the other porch which is much bigger. There was so much stuff stuck between the boards  that I had to retrieve  my handy dandy hooked blade  tool that I use to dig weeds out from between the stones of the front walk. I managed to pull out a ridiculous amount of needles and maple keys  (bleh, cat fur, bird feathers, unidentifiable items) and then finished up with the hose. It had  begun to rain during all of this  but I was determined to get that part of the job done.

Interrupted  by the rain

Furniture set off the porch

Mother's day flowers, the picture doesn't  really capture the colour

This will be the next step.

I will then use a deck cleaner and a stiff brush to scrub the boards and make both porches presentable again. When you live in an old house in the country, the jobs are never ending.
There are also three cans of paint and five more perennial beds with my name on them! However there is also a nice Mother's Day supper in my future as well.

twenty Tuesday

Today my baby turned twenty. It was a lovely day with lots of laughs. We went out for supper and then came back home for cake. I put together a "grab bag" kind of gift for her, a soft sided container with this and that in it. Her more substantial present will be chosen online. She is thinking either a new pair of running shoes (specific customized colours on the Nike Web site), or a little Kate Spade bag.

She is living at home through the summer and getting good hours at work. We are all looking forward to nicer, warmer weather. The sixteen year old has track and field day tomorrow. Scooter is now going outside and can't get  enough  of  it .  He  has  even climbed a tree and successfully gotten down  again.

My somewhat nerdy husband and daughter are happy that May the 4th is tomorrow (May the fourth be with you!) Right now they are settling in to watch the first Indiana Jones movie, I remember this movie from when I was in high school. At that time you could rent a vcr from a video rental place and my friend Susan ' s father  rented one for the weekend and she, I, and her twin red-haired brothers (think Weasleys) watched it over and over and over.
Isn't  it funny that we had to rent a vcr and now people can watch a movie on their phone!

I wonder what kinds of developments my twenty year old daughter will see in her life time?

Well Isn't that Just the Cat's Ass?

I am the proud owner of three different kinds of kitty litter. This free cat has cost me some money. This free cat was on his last chance. Allow me to explain.

He would not use the litter box, or shall I say either litter box. We purchased two of them, just in case a larger one with turn around capabilities for a small cat with a large fluffy tail was required. A different kind of litter was put in each. Every day he would poop about five inches away from the litter box, and urinate on the floor, right by the baseboard, where it could seep in and really set in a good, lingering odor. I also bought a special odour eliminating enzyme spray.

My husband thought we should just eliminate the litter box altogether and just keep making the newspaper landing pad smaller and smaller until we just put a piece of newspaper into a litter box. I was game. I am also, however, the first one up, whether it is a work day or a weekend. This means that I am the one to discover the rank little present left for me in the mudroom, and I then must dispose of it, open a window, spray some enzymes, and curse the cat (although not directly at him, because you should not shame them, it could create a bad situation) (as opposed to the one I was already in).

A couple of mornings ago, it was my turn to do the early morning soccer practice run for the sixteen year old. As I went out through the mudroom to go outside and start the car, I smelled that familiar reminder that the cat had no irregularity problems. I did not have time to deal with it, and I was just turning around and coming back home to continue putting on my face and making some breakfast for myself. My husband was in the shower.

When I came back a few minutes later I was greeted by a scene of such carnage and disgust and I almost couldn't believe it. The fluffy little ba&t@rd had not only ignored the newspaper, but obviously had an issue that morning whereby he was trying to rid himself of his "refuse". He has an incredibly fluffy bottom, so he retained a great deal of what he had attempted to eliminate. There were drag marks in not one, but three rooms of my house. It was like a sick twisted scene from a horror story. That would have been bad enough, but he decided to go upstairs and continued skidding his way down the carpeted (it is an UGLY carpet, but that's beside the point). I ran around with a giant roll of paper towel and a spray bottle of bleach cleanser, spraying and wiping and swearing over and over. I also took the time to yell at my husband to get out of the shower because he was going to have to help me wash the cat's ass.

It is not fun washing a crappy, stinky, yowling, long haired devil that is trying to slice you with all of his claws, especially since I still didn't have a stitch of make up on, and although food was the last thing on my mind, I would have to eat some form of breakfast before work. I didn't even have time to deal with the ugly rug upstairs and decided it would have to wait until I got home from work.

All day at work I couldn't get the image of cat poop skid marks out of my mind (and before the animal lovers out there tell me he has worms, and maybe he's sick, and I probably fed the the wrong food...he's fine, he's been checked over by a vet, and he gets freaking Iams Kitten Food, although I suspect he has had a sneaky bite of the big guy's adult cat food from time to time). I probably washed my hands a dozen times, not including the bleach I probably soaked into my skin from the cleanser I was squirting on my floor.

When I returned from work, I was just thrilled to see a couple more gifts on the mudroom floor (about an inch from the newspaper), and yes, I think he was having intestinal issues. I dealt with that, and then went crazy with a mop, bucket and more floor cleanser. I also dealt with the upstairs carpet. While I was doing all of this, my husband and daughter gave the cat a very thorough wash because this morning's once over wasn't enough, and quite frankly he had "soiled" himself a bit more. My daughter is sporting some serious bandaids from the war wounds she suffered.

I was so upset, saying, "This is not what I bargained for when we got another cat. We only did this for the stressed out older cat, and his fur likely would have just grown in eventually anyway. I have had so many cats over the years and I've never had a cat that didn't know how to use the litter box!" I was ready to pack him up and take him to the no-kill cat shelter with my letter of proof from the vet that he had already received his first round of shots. Somebody would adopt him and love him (before they realized he wasn't litter trained). I felt like the worst mother ever, telling my son that we likely weren't going to keep this cat either (refer to my earlier kitten story).

Then out of desperation and because I am just as stubborn as this cat is, I asked my husband to call the local pet supply place and see if they had some sort of magical kitty litter. Well, indeed they did! It comes with a money back guarantee if your cat does not use it. Off we went, all four of us, like some delightful family outing to buy the special kitty litter. It had some special scent that a cat just can't resist doing its business in.

We took it home, ate take out pizza (there was NO WAY I was making supper after cleaning my whole house, again), then my husband filled up a litter box with the magical kitty litter. It was ignored. My daughter and I even took his favourite shoe lace and enticed him with it, dangling it in the middle of the litter box. He would run toward the box, get close to it, stop, meow sorrowfully and turn tail. All we managed to get him to do was balance on the edge of the litter box and slowly but bravely reach forward with one paw to try and retrieve the end of the shoelace.

Oh dear lord, we had a cat that was afraid of kitty litter.

He WOULD NOT put more than one paw on or in that litter. It had no magical powers at all. Maybe the old man who we got him from had punished him for mistakes by holding in at the litter box and giving him a swat? Maybe he was like an autistic child who dislikes certain textures? But there was no way that Scooter was going to be caught dead doing anything in kitty litter.

In a last ditch effort, I thought about the newspaper. He was often successful going to the bathroom on just newspaper. Maybe he was o.k. with that texture. So I emptied out the second litter box and cut up a bunch of newspaper into strips and put them into that litter box. That evening, he was closed up in the mudroom with two options. He could try the magical (and apparently terrifying) kitty litter  or he could try out the newspaper in the box.

The next morning the angels sang. Mr. Shitty Pants, as my husband deemed him, used the shredded newspaper. I praised him up and down (the cat, not my husband) and promised I would buy him cat treats, which I did.

The end.

Happenings - April 23

Just an updating post... today we head to the city in which our daughter lived and attended university this past year. Her father had retrieved her a few days ago with a vehicle full of boxes, bags, clothes on hangers, pillows... Today, however is the cube van day in which we bring home a single bed frame, a mattress, a desk, a kitchen table and four (although not all are completely intact anymore) chairs, a small coffee table, boxes of kitchen items, her remaining food, and whatever else is still at the little house she shared with three other girls. In addition, the cube van will make an extra stop to pick up some of my husband's aging mother's furniture. We will "keep" it for her due to her living with his sister and eventually requiring further care as her dementia progresses.

Now people, we live in a relatively big, old century plus home, but we have managed to fill it (overfill it) just fine on our own. I have NO IDEA where to put all of this extra furniture. Our daughter will not be needing any of it this coming school year, as she will be a Don at university and will have furniture already in her dorm room. As to how long we will be required to keep and honour my mother-in-law's items, I don't know the time frame on that one.

I am not the neatest human around. Nor will I win any "House Beautiful" awards any time soon, but clutter and having things where they shouldn't be drives me bonkers, so this will be a test of strength.

Last night I had my second massage therapy appointment with a fantastic young lady who is also a champion martial arts competitor. I have been having excrutiating lower back pain which radiates into my hips making consistent sleep a thing of the past for months now. I've tried chiropractor, stretching, increased movement, saw my dr. and had half my weight in blood drawn, as well as a pelvic ultrasound to eliminate scary possibilities. I was on my way to finding out who had placed the pins in a voodoo doll bearing my resemblance, when I decided to try massage. I used to have massage for back pain when the kids were little and lifting them in and out of car seats did me in.

Please do not imagine dim lights, soft music and a sense of euphoria. This is massage which involves stripping the fascia and working on months old pressure points. At times I am doing my "having a baby breathing" or gripping onto the edge of the massage table. Last night was an a-ha moment when she pinpointed very thick and tight i. t. bands (iliotibia -  no doubt I have bastardized that spelling) which run from the side of knee up the side of your leg to your hip. She figures my muscles in my lower back have been compensating. Now that we know, I can do foam rollering at home as well as continuing with the massage. I am looking forward to sleeping on my back, something I haven't done for so long I can't remember. This young lady is fantastic, and so passionate and knowledgeable about her work.

Scooter, the crazy loud fluffy cat, is coming along well. The two cats get on in the sense that Scooter LOVES Sampson and desperately wants him to play and be his best friend. Sammy tolerates him and has only given an exasperated hiss a couple of times. There have yet to be any curl up together and groom each other moments, but that would involve Scooter actually slowing down. He loves to play and has numerous toys, his favourite still being a long shoe lace which he carries in his mouth, trailing it around the house.

He still hasn't got the whole litter box thing figured out, but at least he goes in the same spot everyday and uses newspaper as his landing pad. My husband is trying a method much like you would use to train a puppy, where the area of newspaper gets diminished over time and eventually the newspaper will end up in a litter box (minus any litter), then slowly litter will be introduced. This is one thing that is really bugging me because I have never had a cat that doesn't use litter without a problem. Silly little boy!

My husband and I are both five years away from retirement and we have begun to attend retirement workshops so we know how to prepare our insurance, money, and most importantly, dental work!! Yup, get all your dental work done before you retire because it is crazy expensive when you don't have your usual coverage and it costs a lot more to have a new plan.

Lastly, I LOVED Prince. I had the Purple Rain album and played certain songs over and over and over. The odd time I get on the treadmill, I still find that Kiss is one of the best songs to move to . I know it is none of our business how he died, just as it wasn't any of our business how Michael Jackson died, but when someone is a part of one's life and their songs define certain moments and memories, it is difficult not to be curious.

That has been my week. I will post again from underneath a pile of mismatched things later.