Found It!

 

          I found it!

          “Found what, Peg?” you ask.

          I found the missing jelly feeder bowl. With the help of the rain, almost all of the snow is melted and there it was, sitting right where the snow had buried it. It was beyond my kick zone. I never would’ve believed it would be so far from the post. How it got there, I don’t know. A strong wind? A critter? Your guess is as good as mine.

          I picked it up and there’s no evidence of grape jelly. It was empty when it was knocked down or licked clean by whatever critter knocked it down. A possum, maybe. We’ve had possums on the patio before.

         

          We went to see the tax lady and got our taxes done. Everyone gets an extra six‑thousand‑dollar deduction this year, which was a nice surprise. And I’ll be honest, even with that little bit of good news, taxes still make me shake my head. It just feels like we’re taxed every time we turn around. We pay taxes when we earn money, when we save it, when we spend it. We pay taxes on the things we buy, and if we sell those things later, someone else pays taxes on the very same item we already paid taxes on, and as a bonus, we get to pay taxes on the money we sold it for!

I understand that taxes are necessary. The roads get plowed before dawn so people can get to work. The fire trucks roll out the moment the siren sounds. The school buses keep rumbling down the road. But while we’re over here pinching pennies, stretching budgets, watching grocery prices climb, the people in charge are voting themselves pay raises, better benefits, and shorter work weeks. And when the government shuts down because they couldn’t pass a budget, regular workers were furloughed or forced to work without pay, while members of Congress still received their paychecks. That part has never sat right with me.

I’ll climb down from my soapbox now and show you the pictures I took on that trip.

          An eagle!

 

          Poor Hatch.

A couple of mornings ago, I noticed the right side of his face was swollen. “He’s been in a fight,” I told Mike.

Yesterday afternoon, when I went out to the cat room to leave scraps for the critters, Hatch was sleeping on the shelf.

“Hey, buddy,” I said as I stepped in. He lifted his head, and when I reached to pet him, I saw he couldn’t open his left eye. I went to stroke his back and he whipped his head around, not a growl, not a hiss, but enough to remind me he’s still a wild thing. I pulled my hand back fast.

This morning when I went out to feed him, he rubbed against my leg like nothing had ever happened. I talked to him, set down his food, and when he tucked in to eat, I tried petting him again. He tensed at the first touch, but I kept my hand gentle, and he relaxed and went back to eating.

“How’s his eye?” you ask.

I honestly couldn’t tell. I can’t handle him, and he wouldn’t look at me. But I did touch the side of his face where the swelling had been. It’s gone down, and it feels scabby now.

Hatch is truly feral. He’ll live or he’ll die on his own terms. There’s no way he’d let me pick him up and take him to the vet. All I can do is feed him, talk to him, and hope he heals the way wild creatures do.

 

          Speaking of critters…

I emptied the last bowl of braunschweiger to give the girls their nightly dose of antihistamine and set the bowl and lid down for them to lick out. I found the bowl right where Raini always takes her lickables, but the lid was nowhere to be found. I got down on my hands and knees with a flashlight and started looking under everything. And of course, the moment I hit the floor, Raini trotted over and dropped her ball right in front of me. She thought it was play time. She has me trained. I tossed it for her once, just to keep the peace, and when she brought it back again, I ignored her and kept searching.

I made it a point to pull out the burnable trash can and look there because that’s where the bowl ended up the last time I lost it, but the lid wasn’t there. Eventually I shrugged, shook my head, and gave up. It’ll turn up or it won’t.

Since I was already on the floor and my hands were already dirty, I took a few minutes to toss the ball for Raini. Then I got up, washed (which goes without saying), put the lidless bowl back and grabbed a different container from the cupboard. Then I cut the schweiger into fourths, tossing three into the freezer so they won’t go bad before I have a chance to use them.

Somewhere in this house, there’s a secret stash of missing items — and I’m afraid to find out who’s keeping them!

          I’m as susceptible to advertising as the next person. Even though I don’t need anything, I saw someone endorsing these spray bottles. You can fill them with any oil you want, and it even has a pour spout. Just pull the little tab back that’s on the top and the door at the top pops open so you can pour. Normally I wouldn’t buy something like this, but they (whoever they are!) say the chemicals in canned sprays are really bad for you. Well, I don’t want to use stuff that’s bad for me, so I ordered one bottle. They give you a deal if you buy two, but I don’t need two.

It came this week. I washed it, let it sit upside down on the counter for a couple of days, then filled it with olive oil.

“How do you like it?” I know you wanna know.

I hate it! The oil comes streaming out, not the fine mist I expected. I don’t know how much I’ll use it, but I’m not going to bother returning it. I’m going back to the sprays in a can. I don’t use much anyway. 

So much for being healthier.

          Speaking of healthier...

          I hate taking pills! It’s not that I can’t, I just hate it. That’s always been a barrier between me and taking daily vitamins. I’ll do it for a while, get fed up with taking pills and stop for a while. But I know it’s good for me so I start taking them again and after a few weeks, stop again. It’s a vicious cycle.

          I’ve also been dealing with occasional dizzy spells.

          Somewhere along the line I learned that low iron could cause dizziness and that made me think back to the days when I was giving blood on a regular basis. If I didn’t take Geritol for a week or two beforehand, my iron would be low and they’d turn me away.

          Since I started taking Geritol I haven’t had any dizzy spells.

          In my head?

          I don’t know — but I’m glad.

          Geritol gives me the recommended daily amount of iron plus some other things, but it’s not considered a complete vitamin. I could take it every day but what I’ve been doing is taking Geritol one day and my multivitamins the next. Alternating between a liquid and pills has helped me to stay on track with daily supplements, and I don’t mind the taste of it.

          Here’s a caveat: there are plenty of reasons a person might get dizzy. All I know is this seems to help me and that’s good enough for now.

          Lastly, I painted this week. And despite the fact that I have two pet portraits waiting for me, I decided to try another caricature.

I was using a recipe for skin tone that included ultramarine blue.

“Ultramarine blue will make your portraits look muddy,” I read somewhere.

Did I use ultramarine blue?

Yes. Yes, I did.

I figured since it was just the shadow color — and since I was following a successful artist’s recipe — it would be fine. It wasn’t. It’s awful. I tried to lift it out, but with very little luck. After that, I just played around with the rest of the picture, not caring if it came out or not because it was trash anyway.

“Will you ever use ultramarine blue in any of your portraits?” you ask.

No. Never again.

Onward to the next disaster — I mean masterpiece.

Let’s call this one done.