Shiny Headlights

 A few days ago I shined my yellowed opaque headlight covers.  They're plastic, like so many things are on the exterior (and interior) of a car.

Scratched up too.

I cleaned them off then applied PlastX to a scrubber spunge and rubbed them down.  I did this twice on each headlight, wiping it off after each scrub job.   After that, I applied Turtle Wax, let it glaze over dry, then polished off.  So far so good.

Yesterday afternoon turned beautiful.  I'd received my second plug in device from my car insurance company.  I plugged it in, packaged up the old one to send back, and took a 20 minute drive.  I thought once I got back I'd have that email from insurance company "Good job.  You plugged in the new device."  I didn't.

The first one worked on my end, beeping when it should beep, lights on it were on.  But apparently it never communicated (via cell tower) with the company.  I kept getting alerts that I hadn't plugged in my device when I had it plugged in.  My insurance company had doubled my rates without even telling me they were going to do that when I've never had an accident or ticket.   I had called them and asked for an explanation and a cheaper rate.  Well this was their solution.  Plug in this device, you get a discount.  Only the device never worked.  At least it never communicated with them that it was working.  It seemed to work on my end.  So they said they'd send a replacement device.

I fear this second one will be the same.  The first one pissed me off royal.  It triggered all those emails about me not plugging it in, when I had, so I'd call them up, tell  them yes its plugged in......like my insurance company is my new clingy friend, the one you want to ditch.  And maybe its a scam anyhow.  Offer a discount if you plug it in, but they don't really work, they try to blame me somehow, tell me to send the device back, lose discount, pay even higher price for nothing.  That's what I started thinking last night.

My neighbor got the app type driving monitor, also when trying to find a cheaper rate.  She said she turned it off because of the constant alerts and beeps from her phone.  They're extremely intrusive.  Hey insurance companies, we're out here just trying to survive, with high gas prices, high everything and you insurance companies raising rates like crazy.  So nice your execs have yachts and second homes.  Please don't be jerking us around for sport on the side.  I don't know that my insurance company execs actually are that rich to have yachts and second homes.   I have a resentment to the ultra rich and their manipulative control freak tactics on us peons and their control over politics too.

I think its funny sometimes that conservatives howl about socialism and call health care insurance socialism but fail to see that car insurance is certainly socialism.  Good drivers paying the price for bad drivers.   The insurance roles are full of both good and bad drivers.

Here's what AI says about car insurance and socialism:

• Arguments Against It Being Socialism:
  • Not Socialized Means of Production: True socialism involves state ownership of the means of production (e.g., government-run car repair facilities and insurance companies). Private insurance is not state-owned.
  • Risk-Based Pricing: Unlike socialist distribution (based on need), insurance premiums are tailored to individual risk—higher risks pay more.
  • Profit-Driven: Insurance companies are private, for-profit entities, not public services.
• Arguments Linking It to Socialist Principles:
  • Pooling Risk: It involves a collective pooling of resources, similar to social insurance programs.
  • Mandated Coverage: Government-mandated insurance can be seen as a "social construct" to ensure collective safety, where all drivers contribute to cover the costs of accidents for a few.
  • "Privatized Socialism": Some consider it a hybrid—a private system using socialistic methods to spread costs. 

Trailer park lady with my drop trap caught an unusually marked male, we'd hoped to get for awhile.  He's extremely hormonal.   He is black but has white flecks and streaks in spots.  After she caught him, she covered the drop trap and called  me to come transfer him out.  I did.  She had a couple 2x4's atop the dark brown blanket covering the drop trap along with a small potted plant between them.  "Aw," I remarked, "how decorative." 

I got him transferred into a live trap.  Calling him Splotch.  I first met him at the park when he suddenly jumped up onto my car hood, before he realized someone was in the car and took off.

Splotch makes an appearance

Caught last night

Some of Splotch's unusual white 

Cloudy day again.  Not fair since we had some hours of sun yesterday.  Made me sun giddy.  But then there's today.  Up and down.

Passing Rainy Days

 Oregon has been very very wet the last few days.  Portland and the coast more so than here.  Today the atmospheric river is allegedly ending.  Won't that be nice.  Very windy today.  I sit in my chair, reading mostly, and watch the wind whip the arborvitas back and forth at the back of my neighbors yard.

Jack says hello!  Jack is a sweet boy who can also be a big ass.   Hormones flare when I have an unfixed male running around spray marking and fighting outside.  That was Rascal.  He's fixed now but it will take awhile for his hormones to diminish.   He hangs out around my place a lot, especially when hungry.

I don't think he has a real home.  If he does, whomever it may be is quite a negligant owner.

Hopefully in a month or so, Jack will calm down as Rascal's behavior changes.  I hope so.

My cat yard has "windows" and so strays, neighbor's cats, etc, can interact with my cats.  For the better or worse, depending on if they're fixed.

The moved cat structure has caused a lot of excitement for the cats.  They love its new place.  Well, for once I'm not in the dog house over something with my cats.

I'm thinking about moving around more items.   There's a big tall thin cabinet that was never any good but they use it to jump down to the top of it, then on from there.  I'd like to rid myself of that completely but first need to think of something to replace its current use, as a jump off point.  Same goes for a very ancient dresser, whose drawers are long gone and their space once used for cat beds.  But they no longer use its interior and the exterior is beat up from age and use.   It needs to go too.  Same issue---its top is a jump off and sit point.  Both those items were cheap used crap to begin with.

I've been watching episodes of the Great Canadian Baking Show.  It's very civil and polite just like the British version.   

I have watched gas prices around here skyrocket, cringing each day as they climb higher, wondering how I should be doing things in order to survive.  The thing with gas prices is when they go up, so does everything else, because everything gets transported.

Food prices are already quite high.  I fear they will go up too.   I get a food box once a month.  It contains nothing fresh but usually has a couple cans of corn.   I make mexican street corn, with it, not the exact version popular since I don't like mayonaise, but its close.  It's quite good.  I also like corn mixed into mashed potatoes.  Today I made peach cobbler with two cans of peaches that came in the box.  

My neighbors will be gone soon.  She finally bought the trailer she originally looked at in the park over by the fairgrounds.  It's a very well maintained mobile home, with a fenced yard, deck, all kinds of nice things.  I think she'll love the location too, very near a dog park.  I'll miss her though.  She'll still be in town but its not like being able to run next door for coffee or whatever.  She's the first neighbor on the block like that.   Her roommate, the former truck driver, I don't know where he's going but I think he's taking the RV back east or south, somewhere.  He has friends I think who want him to move onto their property with them.

It won't be for awhile.   She's been gone for weeks down south visiting her family members.

Monday is my day with five spots at the OHSS clinic.  I had to switch caregivers late for those spots and am happy I was able to do that so close to them.   A Mill City friend and if we're lucky, a Salem friend and myself are going to breakfast after cat drop off.   I'm super excited about that.  I haven't seen anyone I know in a long time.

According to my weather app, it will rain all night tonight, but then we will have some days without rain.  They won't be warm or nice, but at least its not supposed to rain again until (according to my weather app) next Friday, after tonight.  I checked a different weather app that isn't so positive and says there will be days of rain in the next week.  

Dreary Forecast

 Gloom and rain today.  Really depressing weather situation.  

Next three days I think we're supposed to get 3 to 4 inches of rain.  That's way too much.

If you want my opinion. 

 But my Idaho brother tells me they really really need rain where he lives.

Please, take some of ours.

Anyway, I got shell shocked at the gas station this morning, with the extremely high cost per gallon of gas.   It's been going up at rates I can't believe.  I only bought four gallons.

P's latest war is the problem, the internet says.  I wish someone would take away his war toys.   And costs will likely get worse, as the cost of everything is tied to transport costs.

So I am hunkered in, at home, bound here by the weather coming in, and the high cost of doing anything or going anywhere.   My cats will be sick of me soon.  Ah, just complaining about nothing really.

Sun, I need you.  Badly.

Clean Up Days

 

Gigi likes to take over my lap when I watch TV.  She now tolerates the presence of old Fantasia, who also likes to be on the chair with me.   Fantasia has a constantly flicking very long tail.  Gigi exhibited extreme patience, I thought, with that tail whapping her in the face.

This morning I got one weekend chore out of the way and changed the cat hauler car cabin and engine air filters.  The cabin filter was especially overdo for change but I've put it off, because for some reason, those little thin filters cost a small fortune.

There was an unknown long hair black cat out front of my place when I got home from getting the cabin filter.   Oh no, I thought, not another.  The cat took off instantly when I just looked his way.  Another male, is my guess, out looking to get himself in trouble.

I've been involved in the big clean up, which takes me awhile.  Cleaning 19 traps.  Laundering all those cage covers.  Cleaning up in the garage where the cats were, before surgery.  Cleaning the car inside which is really stinky, after such a large number of cats caught a ride in it clear to Portland.  The 19 cats I took up were largely males, many were very large males.   So you can imagine.

I only have five more appointments this month, which is good, to take it a bit easy.   I start PT for my back end of the month.  I have to have at least six PT appointments before I see the neurosurgeon again.  Strangely, my back seems to be improving after a few weeks doing simple exercises I found on youtube.

I'm really happy about that and hope improvement continues.

Other than that, life goes on.  I read books, catch cats, enjoy my own cats and long for summer.  I lead a simple but busy in spurts life.  I do love helping people solve their cat issues.   But I also enjoy my home life, with my own cats, very very much.

I love youtube.   It's so helpful.   Today doing errands I got honked at twice, after red lights turned to green and I struggled to get the car into first gear.   It's been slipping out of gear, hard to get into first gear---linkage very very loose.  So I get on youtube and discover quick cheap fixes for a loose linkage cable or a broken or missing bushing where it attaches.   Hoping its that simple.  They don't sell the bushings, just a replacement cable so youtubers have all kinds of DIY's for that bushing.  One of them just uses plastic bumper clips.  Plastic screw anchor might work too, with a bit of remodeling.

Lots of Cats

 I made four trips to Sweet Home in the last two days.  

A lady up there got FCCO appointments and then asked me to help trap/transport.

The first evening's catch was 15 cats.  However, she caught 7 of those by hand inside her place.

Good thing too.  Yesterday morning, it was storming.  Pouring.  Got soaked through in a few minutes outside up there.

My raincoat isn't so waterproof anymore, turns out.

I got three more in the morning, then went back up in the evening for the last one.  She had 19 spots.  

Photo heavy post but these posts are for my records mainly.

She got 19 spots and 19 cats are headed to FCCO this morning.

Birthday

 I'm 70 now.  Great, eh?  Officially quite old.

My birthday was completely uneventful as usual.  I had slept a lot the day before, being exhausted from cat round ups galore, so I was up early on birthday.

I needed badly to change the oil in the cat carrier car.   I went to Walmart to get the filter and oil.  I get high mileage 5/30 weight oil.

On the way back I decided to get breakfast at Elmer's.   Sit down style.   I mentioned to the waiter it was my birthday and got a free strawberry crepe!   It would be the only celebration. 

Was really thrilled to get that.

I had so much to do at home.  Trap cleaning, etc.

Laundry.

First the car though, before the rain began again.   Oil change usually takes ten minutes.   I hadn't changed it since last fall and all the issues I had with that backyard mechanic.   He'd screwed this oil filter on and I couldn't get it off.  I tried and tried.  To reach it I had to reach way down behind the radiator and try to turn it from that angle.  Or remove the  mud protectors and try from underneath.  I had to give up in the end.  I'd already drained out the oil, so I put in the new oil without a new filter, which irked my ocd soul.  When I put a new oil filter on, I don't over tighten, so I can always get it off.  A friend in Lebanon said he had the filter wrenches and would get it off next weekend.  

A few years ago, a mechanic told me the key to keeping a high mileage car running was to frequently change fluids.  He was a good mechanic and I try to follow that advice.  Last months, being too busy, bad back, bad weather, have let some things go.

Sometimes I feel nothing is good enough.   

Today its still raining.   I'm not sure what the forecast is for the week.  I need to take traps up to the Sweet Home lady today who has 19 needing fixed.   FCCO trip Thursday with whomever is caught up there.  

My birthday came and went without ado as usual.   Officially another year older.

Summer can't come soon enough.  

Caught!

 I finally caught the young black yard stray, causing issues all over the neighborhood, with his yowling and fighting (mainly with old Fritter).

I spotted him trying to make friends with one of my cats through the cat yard fence this afternoon, so reset the trap I've had out there trying to catch him.  I really didn't think he'd go in.  He hasn't ever expressed interest in the trap or the food in it before.

But this time, I looked out 20 minutes later, and he was in it.

Finally.   At one time, after he showed up in my yard and neighbors yards, I went door to door, trying to find out if someone owns him.  I had no luck, although right when I was asking at one house down the block, another lady I'd talked to, yelled from her car, Is that him you're talking about?   Sure enough, he was frantically trotting down 30th street, but ducked into a backyard.

We now believe he's just another abandoned kitty.   A set of apartments had been vacated for remodel nearby.   Probably he lived there and got left.

Who knows though.

He can get neutered Tuesday.  In the meantime, he'll occupy the now empty holding cage.