Problems With Pets

Do you have problems with your pets? I guess you do, because no animal member of the family is perfect. Come to think of it, no human member of the family is perfect either!

Last night, there was a terrible cat fight outside the back door, thumps, bangs, and screeching noises, not to mention a few growls.

Of course, I dashed outside to see what was going on, and broke up the fight by hissing at the two cats involved, one of which was mine.

The other cat took off like a rocket, with mine in hot pursuit. It seems to have left quite a lot of fur behind, so perhaps it won't return in a hurry.

All the neighbourhood cats seem to congregate in my garden, unfortunately for my girl. They seem to like the trees, shrubs, and mulch I have around - makes it an interesting place for them.

Not that I mind them being there, but if they'd leave my cat alone, and stop leaving little piles of poo behind, it would be a lot better!

What To Write About Now?

Do you have a blog or blogs? Are you finding it difficult to keep writing for your blog, or to think about something to say?

I sometimes have that problem,but I've discovered that if I go to the blog, and start the "New Post" section, that something always comes to mind.

Granted, it may not be Pullitzer prize winning material, but something gets written, and that's the main thing, isn't it?

This morning, for example, I've written three posts in three different blogs, updated a lens on Squidoo, and written about three updates on Twitter. Not much really, but I'm pretty pleased with myself.

So if you're having trouble thinking of anything to say, just go to the page, and start writing - usually something appears. It's an old writers tip - if you have writer's block, just write anything at all on the empty page, and soon you'll have a paragraph or two ready to go. Try it and see!

Stress Gets To You Sometimes

Stress really does get to you sometimes. Take last week, for example.

Wednesday my scanner refused to work, and despite continued uninstalls and reinstalls, much talk with technicians, and checking tech support forums, it wouldn't go.

Finally, even my PC spat the dummy, and Windows, which has never had a password, decided it wouldn't start without one. Don't know the solution to that yet, but what I had to do was reload Windows, after formatting "C", and then reload all my programs.

Fortunately, the data was on another drive, but the scanner worked once, then refused to work again. More stress, and I won't tell you the language I used. :-)

Earlier in the week, the barrel of the back door lock fell out when we tried to lock the door, and we were unable to find a replacement. Couldn't repair it, and couldn't lock the back door for a few days. Fortunately, there is an inner door, which we could lock, so there was safety in the house, but that also caused stress.

Saturday morning, we discovered the fishpond in the front garden had sprung a leak - well, there was only a couple of inches of water in the bottom, with some very miserable, stressed-looking goldfish in it, so we assumed that was the problem.

Not at all! After working hard to remove the pond from the ground and checking it, we discovered it was perfect. A mystery, until my partner came up with the idea that a cat had knocked the fountain over, and it had fallen over the edge, therefore all the water had been pumped out. Just as well it had fallen with the inlet high so there was enough water to keep the goldfish alive until we rescued them.

Of course, the pump gave up the ghost after this episode, because they can't be run dry, and it had burned out. More expense, but it's now replaced and we have a working fountain/aerator in the pond again.

That was last week, and I'm hoping that there won't be too much more of that kind of thing happening for a while - Maybe I'm delicate or something, but I can't cope with too much stress! :-)

Some Rain Came !

Surprisingly, it actually rained a couple of days ago!
Not a lot, but the garden really enjoyed it.

In my rainguage, 23.5 mls showed for the 24 hours of April 3rd.
Much more is needed of course, but for a change, there were
actually little puddles in the garden, until the soil could
absorb all the moisture. Trouble is, about 2 inches down, it's
still very dry.

The forecast is for showers over the next couple of days, so
here's hoping for lots more of the wet stuff!

We Badly Need More Rain

The bushfires are over, although for the people who lost relatives, their homes, pets, livelihoods, it isn't over. It probably never will be.

Plants are regenerating in the fire areas, but we badly need some rain, to assist in this process. Southern Australia is still in the grip of the worst drought in living memory, while the North is having floods and cyclones much more frequently than they used to.

Climate change is probably to blame for all of these problems, even though there is still some controversy over whether there is such a thing. What do you think?

More About The Bushfires

Well, the original bushfires were almost three weeks ago, and some of them are still burning! Last Saturday, we were expecting a really bad day, but the firefighters managed to stay in control, and no lives or homes were lost that I'm aware of.

Tomorrow, Tuesday 3rd March, we are expecting really bad conditions again, with high temperatures, and strong winds. The Country Fire Authority are gearing up for a very hard day's work. Hopefully, their expectations of a bad fire day will not be met.

Bushfires

Well, you've all probably heard, by now, about the bushfires in Australia, specifically my state, Victoria.

For information about bushfires, visit Department of Sustainability and Environment

Millions of animals have been killed or maimed by these fires, not to mention the forests and farmland that have been destroyed.

Over a thousand homes were burned, and the death toll is now over 200, and rising. Many people are still missing.

There are some good luck stories coming out of all this - the girl who hid in a wombat burrow as the fire passed, and survived; the ginger cat found in a paddock with his face and all his feet burned, who's owner found him at the Animal Hospital. There are countless stories of survival.

There are also many stories of loss and sorrow, too many to mention here. People have lost everything, some have lost children, partners, wives, husbands. A Canberra family have lost their firefighter father - he was away from home helping fight the fires.

What is totally disgusting about all this, is that many of these fires were deliberately lit by thrill-seeking arsonists. I don't believe in capital punishment, but this is the type of act that could very likely make me reconsider.

What do you think?