Frustrations

 Someone lost a kitten while camping way up Quartzville road.

I wish that post had not popped up on my facebook feed.   I did catch a cat way out Quartzville road, seen by a motorist, dead of winter.  Q19, as I dubbed him for Quartzville road mile marker 19, was a super friendly sweet boy, and likely dumped out there by some Sweet Home a hole.  Cats lost or dumped in such a remote area can be found but only if seen by someone or if lost and the location they are lost is known.  Usually not otherwise.  That's a wildernes area, wild and scenic river designation, but in the summer, very very busy and crowded.

Here's the kicker on the post.  The lady who lost him up there has no idea where she was camped.   No mile marker, no photo of the campsite and that's a 30 mile stretch of wild and scenic river area.   

I don't think its a joke, although people do that sometimes, think its funny to get people all worried.   I really think this person has no clue where they camped or had the sense to make sure they knew where they lost the kitten when they left without him.  

Yes its completely foolish to take a kitten camping and let him free roam the area.  It's like saying "so long", hope it doesn't hurt when you're hit by a car or eaten alive by a predator or get lost and can't find your way back to camp and starve to death.   

I tried to get her, in comments after her post about it, to seal down the location by using google maps street view.  Quartzville road is street viewed for 30 miles.  My efforts fell on deaf ears.  I don't think the woman knows how to do that.

I know I can't get involved with looking all along that route.  It's hard for me not to think about it though and press the woman who lost him to try to figure out where she lost him.  There were tons of campers and recreationists all along that river last weekend and the kitten wasn't found which is not a good sign.

It is painful to think of a kitten way way out there on its own.

After repairing another gutter corner yesterday, today I went to the lake.   It was very windy.  I paddled up river but was already tired from yesterday's work.   All of a sudden the river turned bright algae green.   Yuk, I thought.   

You don't want to swim in that!

After hitting the algae bloom, I turned back down river, although then I was paddling against the wind, towards the reservoir.  I really just wanted to find somewhere I could nap at that point.   I was sooooo sleepy.

There were literally thousands upon thousands of fish fry all along the river, near the banks and surface, like there had just been a hatching.   I don't know how to id the fry in the video above.  

Once I was close to the reservoir, I went under the bridge and the wind hit me straight on.  I only had a short ways to go, maybe a quarter mile, but being so sleepy and with a sore shoulder from working arms overhead on the gutter, it was a bit hard.   Despite the wind, there were lots of people at the boat ramp, so I waited on a stone beach, flopped out on the coarse gravel, feet and legs still in the water, being pummeled by wake waves.   Just wanted to nap.

I got home, hungry, thirsty and very sleepy.  I immediately took a nap after changing out of the wet clothes I'd had on at the lake.   I didn't use a blanket when taking a nap and woke up repeatedly very cold.  The AC, aka house refrigerator, was on and it does its job too well, in the rooms.   The temp in the rooms of the house falls well below the temp in the hall, where the thermostat is that regulates how much cold air blows in.  My bedroom and the bathroom are what I call the freeze out zones.    

After I'm wet too long, I usually put on socks for a few hours, to warm up that way.  Nothing like warm feet to be warm all over after being wet a long time.   But....I forgot and woke up from my nap near dark shivering cold.  I turned off the AC and put on socks and that took care of it.

I'm trying to keep my files backed up.  Reason is my PC has slowed to a crawl and freezes often.  Sometimes it freezes and makes a terrible buzzing noise when it does so.  This is when I try to play a video.  I googled the issue and the most likely issue is video card or drivers failing.   Or heat related.  But those issues with video play happen more frequently just after I start it up.  It's cold then.  

But even if it were a video card or driver, that hardly explains the other freeze ups.    I know the CPU fan has been making noise, front fan too.  I clean it but not sure it helps much.  I should be making plans to either try to fix it or replace it.  It's been a nice computer, a rebuilt one, cheap to begin with because of that, and quite old now.  Do I try to fix it?  Spend money buying parts, or save money up and get another rebuilt one on amazon?  I don't know.  I'll check the fan and heat sink prices on newegg I guess, first thing.