So the other evening here in Frostbite Falls Joyce was stressing over the porch kitties, Cotton in particular. She was afraid they wouldn’t stay warm enough as the temperature dipped into the single digits. A little background: Joyce had fixed up one of the doghouses in the back with a heating pad specially made for cats. It warms up when there is weight on it, a cat for instance, and doesn’t heat up when there isn’t. Cotton had been using it regularly but then one evening Joyce noticed Cotton was just wandering around and not using the doghouse. When she investigated she found a puddle of urine in the middle of the pad. However, when she got that cleaned up Elmo took over the doghouse. Elmo seems to do what he wants and Cotton settles for whatever is left. That may be because Cotton doesn’t have any front claws and Elmo does. Anyway, Joyce rigged up one of her grovite boxes on the front porch with a heating pad in it and Cotton was using that. On the evening in question a small opossum came to sample the cat food she left for Cotton, then decided the bottom tier of the cat condo would be a good place to warm up. That gave Cotton the fantods since his new box was next to the condo. But wait, it gets better. After a little bit the possum decided to try the grovite box. Well, Joyce couldn’t put up with that and I watched from my easy chair as she tried to extricate Mr. Possum by picking up the box and trying to shake him out. The possum wasn’t having any of that though so she gave up. I knew there would be no peace until Cotton could access his box so I got involved. Fortunately the possum’s tail was hanging out of the door to box so it was simply a matter of grabbing the tail and pulling . Out it came and when I put it down, it ran around the condo and under the firewood before finally hotfooting it around the side of the house. Joyce was then able to get Cotton to go in the nice warm box. Later Joyce saw the possum and another larger one, possibly his big brother, dipping into the cat food but that was OK ’cause Cotton was warm and snuggy on his heating pad in his box.
Crockett 34, Horace Mann 4.
Friday the weather was nice and I was able to get some water going on the south end. The cold weather prevented that last week and most of this week. I’m hoping I can help the trees along but there isn’t much I can do about the grass. SA is pretty threadbare in places and that’s nice for the chickens and guineas. They enjoy their dust baths and Joyce says those are good for them but SA is getting more and more pock marked with chicken divots, if I may mix my metaphors.