Dairy Daze...and Now Beyond

  This kitten is going to drive me into an anxiety attack.  She lives to climb. I mean, she LIVES to climb. Due to earlier reasons I have posted about; namely TWICE getting herself stuck up a tree and not having the nerve or skill to climb back down, I no longer allow her to go outside by herself. In the house she climbs all over everything she can, and as high as she can. Now she only gets outside if I harness her up on a lead and take her outside for a walk that way.  This morning I took her out while I hung out laundry. I attached another lead to the pink one that came with the harness. It’s a good thing I did. She sniffed around and explored a bit out by the clothes line. When I finished that I followed her around the yard exploring here and there.  Then she started eyeing a tree and talking to herself: prrrt, prrrt…. She took a run at one and went up maybe 4 feet then came back down.  Then she ambled around a bit more til she saw the tree in the picture abo...

 In my Facebook history yesterday I found this entry. Eleven years ago we went and got ourselves a puppy.  Bella. TDIDW, the dog I didn't want. She is still with us and has been a faithful companion on many, many walks.  I have blogged on here many times about her, and shared many pictures.  Her black coat is now speckled with white as she has aged. But she is still as alert and eager to run as ever.  Too much so, as she always has been. She's prone to disappear for a while on our walks.  In fact two days ago I took her out for a walk at about 7:15 AM. We didn't go all the way down to the creek bottoms, at least I didn't. I just went to the sawmill and did random exercises while she chased squirrels to her hearts content. However, usually she will run for about 20 minutes, then come back to me and I'll leash her up again and we'll head back up for her breakfast. It didn't work that way. Haha. Sometimes she goes rogue. I waited and waited until about 7:50 AM...

Spring always does arrive somehow, even before the actual date. The daffodils always sense it coming, though they usually get snowed on. Just like they did last night.  But they break through and shine anyway, surrounded by last summer’s dead leaves.  A reminder that life continues on.  We lost another person close to us last night. Our neighbor, Bob. He’d not been doing well for over a month now. Then a couple of weeks ago Gary spoke with him and said he’d turned almost completely yellow. He’d had a dr appointment last Monday, but he wouldn’t tell Gary what was said. Just told Gary he was taking it one day at a time.  Last night our other neighbor texted me and said that there was an ambulance over at Bob’s. Then last night Bob’s ex called Gary and said that Bob had passed away in the hospital last night.  We will miss him. He’d been there for 9 years. Always had a joke for Gary when they met.  So far 2025 stinks.  But I hang on to my faith in Christ....

  Since the last incident where this crazy kitten got stuck up a tree, two weeks ago, I think it was, I haven’t let her out of the house….unless she is in her harness and on her lead. She doesn’t much care for it, but she tolerates it ok.  She is only about 5 or 6 months old, and I can’t picture having to keep her as a strictly inside cat the rest of her life, but I am super nervous about letting her outside.  So we are attempting to give her tree descending lessons. Haha!!  Gary, who is over 6 ft tall, will give her a little toss up over his head onto the side of a tree. She does manage to back herself down, but she seems to be fine descending from that height. It’s just when shee ed gets up over 15+ feet that she can’t seem to figure out how to turn around and come down.  Argh! If I knew of a strictly indoor home where she would be loved and cared for, I’d give her away. Worrying about her constantly when she is outside wears on my nerves. 

 

 I know you are all getting tired of my rescued picture posts from my hacked Facebook account, so here's another fun Howard adventure story.  Because Gail had never been to a sale barn with an auction in full swing Gary decided that all 4 of us should go.  So we loaded up and headed to the Lebanon sale barn for their once per month special cow sale.  Gail was fascinated by the whole process.  It was all beef.  A few bulls, then cows and calves and cow/calf pairs. The benches were mostly full.  There were whole families there; mom, dad and 4 kids under 10 it looked like.  One was a baby.  There were several families like that. Plus everything in between in the farm family genre. Lol. I liked just watching the people.  We sat way up high, where the dust wasn't too bad, but still about halfway through I could feel my allergies beginning to work on me. Thankfully I'd remembered to bring a mask. That really helped. As we were leaving Gail sai...