Sunday, October 25, 2015

Fall Color

The leaves have been wild on my maple, turning red, and falling.  Today, finally we have rain, but not that much so far.  We really need rain here.

Parts of my yard are buried in leaves.  I rake them, only to have more fall.  I love scuffing through the piles.

I love the crisp evenings with early dark and black skies.  The air is sharp and there must be more oxygen in it, I think, because I feel more alive in the fall.


Last night, the dying light backlit the maple leaves.




The 2nd crop sunflowers bloomed and produced more seed heads, which I give the birds.


Seed head wedged into the Butterfly Bush for the birds.
I carved a pumpkin.  I waited this late because they go on seriously good sales when its only days til Halloween.

I use a kitchen knife to carve, which is not easy.  I used to have a scalpel for carving but have lost it.


I got the bed frame up with hardware I got at the store.  Looks great.  Cats are already using the top bunk.  The bottom is empty awaiting the mattress.  There was an accident.  I was trying to pull something into place when putting it together and it slipped and tore my thumbnail down the middle, over a quarter inch into the quick.  Now that was painful and still is as that free piece catches.  I've been pulling and cutting it off bit by bit, but so far, haven't the nerve to jerk free the last piece, as part of it is still attached.  Maybe today.....



This cat is sad, living at an abandoned condemned house, house/cat owner in jail, and I have been slipping by to feed him and the other cat.  But now I found out the neighbors are feeding them, which makes me relieved because I'm trying to feed a lot of cats right now.  Several houses on that block appear to have been made out of old telephone poles.  Quite unique and even strange.  The house will be demolished eventually I believe.  Transients sometimes shack up out back or even inside, but the police are watching it closely due to drug activity I think.

Speaking of housing, the Portland area is going through a nightmare of rent increases and no cause evictions, when apartment complexes are bought up by limited liability companies to either immediately flip or to operate at much higher rent rates.  People get notices their rent is going up $200 or $400 per month, sometimes with a plate of cookies.

One bedrooms are going for $1000 or more and two bedrooms for $1700 or $1800.  Problem is, low wage workers, seniors and the disabled can't find housing at such rates that they can afford and are getting evicted no cause with no place to go.   I know the nightmare and feel their pain.  I am so lucky to even have a roof over my head.  Albany rents are lower, but going up fast.  At the same time, there are empty foreclosed on houses all over town.  Seems so strange.

Dead Neighbor's house over flowing gutters today
I'm glad its raining today.  We need it.  On cue, it came, and as always, the dead neighbor's house gutters became water falls.   His house will be on the sheriff's auction block in December.  I've not seen anyone come look at it.  Most auction houses, if they're bought, get bought by house flippers or someone who will rent them out.  You have to have a lot of accessible cash to buy houses at auction.  Companies have that but most people don't.  But sometimes people can get together cash from a variety of friends and relatives.  I guess you have to do the title search yourself to see if there are liens against the property, once sold.  I don't really know.  He owed the feds and the state taxes, because for awhile, there were papers taped to his door from both.   There have been so many papers taped to his door, the tape eventually fails, then the papers fall off and get blown around and I pick them up and recycle them.

I tried to clean my own gutters yesterday which means a lot of climbing up and down the ladder and moving the ladder.  I didn't get them cleaned all around.  With the leaf raking and blowing leaves off the cat yard, my shoulder is in a world of misery.  When it gets all over used, it will suddenly just fail, and anything I'm holding will drop from my hand and sometimes my arm will just drop.  I think I'm missing some muscle or something I don't know, the one that ripped maybe, when I tried to catch that shed roof, back when I was at the slum shack and trying to build a shed.  It has not been the same since.  The doctor said  back then if anything was still attached of that, it might be ok.  Mostly it is, unless I over use.

So the rain will force a stop to over use for now.

I took these photos when delivering some cat food to the Dallas woman who took in the 7 parking lot kittens and one adult female.  I'm so glad I just went ahead and trapped them, as now they'd be trying to survive in the rain.  As it was, it was darn sad, to see little tiny throwaway kittens, sleeping under a dumpster.  Trash kittens using trash for cover.





I will end with a cat photo, of course.  Guess who is peeking at me from the cat yard, as I, once again, raked at the piles of leaves trying to bury us all.






8 comments:

  1. Love your colour, and those skies.
    Hooray for having the bed base up.
    Sigh on the nail and the shoulder thing. Rest up if you can.
    And send us some rain. We had a bit, but need more. Badly.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It's up, yes, happy to get it done. Having a nail torn and come partially off is very painful, darn it anyhow. A different kind of pain than my shoulder issue, which I've come to accept over the years as part of me.

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  2. Anonymous7:06 PM

    The leaves are glorious. People used to burn autumn leaves in gutters here and the smell was very nice, but it is not allowed anymore, for good reasons.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I can imagine burning in the gutters would no longer be allowed. Trying to type without one thumb is a learning process. It's the space bar thumb. Slows me down as I learn to instead use my left index finger.

      Delete
  3. Gorgeous leaf pics! My chooks would have a great time with your leaf piles. :) They love looking for bugs.. :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. They'd find plenty in my leaf piles.

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  4. Ouch! Nail rips are really painful. I love it that you have red maple leaves and yellow sunflowers in your yard at the same time. So pretty.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I love color also, brightens everything including inside of me.

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