We have been dealing with pretty brutal temperatures lately. The other morning when I went out to feed it was 12°. That afternoon the temperature got up to 68°. By 8:00 PM, we were back down to 19°. All the kitties are doing well. I have not caught Slip. Both he and Goblin vanished after the last ice storm. I hope they both will return soon.

last week early in the morning, my doorbell rang. When I opened the door, I saw one of my neighbors who has recently moved in. She wanted to know if I fed stray cats? I told her that I rescue, I also added that if a stray cat shows up at the table, I don’t turn them away. Turns out her daughters eight month old kitten during the move into the new home got out of the house and they can’t find her anywhere. She showed me a picture of this tuxedo cutie. My heart sank when I saw the photo. I had seen this kitten a few days prior across the highway. How this kitten got across this highway without getting squished is beyond me.

I told her that I’d send her kitten and told her where. But I also told her that the railroad has been taking their passenger trains out on the weekends  The train track is across the highway. With all the noises from the train and the whistle blowing to show people, near railroad crossings that they’re coming. I told her I’m sure her kitty is probably somewhere else by now

I did offer to let her borrow one of my traps so she could set them out in her backyard in case kitty comes home. Oh, so far, kitty has not been seen. I think two part of the reason that the kitty isn’t coming home is because my other neighbors, which is the house between the two of us, they take horrible care of their dogs and leave them outside on chains at least 10 hours a day. It’s constant barking, even when the people are home, they just seem to ignore these dogs, which makes me nuts. So I’m sure if the kitty is close she’s terrified to even show her self because she could get eaten. These dogs are not friendly by any way shape or form. I will keep my eye out for this kitten, and I told her if I do see her and I can get close to her I will let her know.

Speaking of dogs, Kota continues to have his challenges.I would say in the last two weeks I’ve maybe gotten two hours of sleep at night. I always know when he’s going to have a bad night because he won’t come in and sleep on the bed with me. In the morning, when I go to check on him, he is always on his couch, but his sides are just saturated because he’s been licking himself all night. I keep looking for patterns as to what might prop this type of action on his part. I don’t see anything that makes any sense showing up. I’m getting to the point where I really feel like his days are numbered and he just now turned five years old. I can’t shake the feeling . But I’ve had a lot of German Shepherd’s in my life and I’ve never had one displaying so many different types of health issues at once. It’s quite maddening and frustrating and I know that he is also in pain. He is taking the medication on a daily basis. He is still eating and he’s staying steady at 95 pounds. Thankfully, he’s not as lethargic has he’s been in the past, and I finally found a dog ball that actually was made in the United States so when he sees this ball outside, he wants to play. My signal to know that his quality of life is really suffering will be the day that he ignores this ball and stops eating.

My well pump has been fixed  It’s so nice to have water back inside the house and have pressure along with it. The pump is so nice I can barely hear it. Unlike the last pump which was quite noisy, because as it turned out, it was on its way out.

Today we are supposed to have pretty nice weather  I need to go outside and finish cleaning up the last debris from the storm. We are supposed to get another storm on Wednesday. We did get snow on the weekend but about an inch and a half stuck, everything else melted. I know winter is not done with  us yet  l

Hope all of you are safe, happy and healthy.