dealing with winter and cats and a dream

I have no pretty pictures to post or illustrate so here’s one from Christmas Eve. This iris that was blooming way too early.

Wednesday had a cloudless blue sky in the 40s and the snow and ice melted rapidly. It was mostly gone before it got to below freezing again that night. The streets were already clear and dry so my drive to SHARE Thursday morning, the whole 7 or 8 minutes of it, was cold but uneventful.

My attempt to get the outdoor cats into the shed for our coldest night Tuesday evening was unsuccessful. While they aren’t feral exactly, they are outdoor cats and there’s no way I can make them do anything they won’t do willingly. Only Handsome Boy, Lovey, and Twin showed up. We think maybe someone else feeds Momcat as she doesn’t always show up and roams farther and Ghost had been a no show for several days. Monday I fed them around 3:30, set up the little radiator type heater and then came back about 5 to see if I could get them in the shed for the night. Only Twin showed up when I called them and while he will let me pet him now, he will not tolerate even the thought that I might try and pick him up and the heater wasn’t working anyway so. Tuesday, Robin put her little radiator type heater in there and it turned out it wasn’t the heater after all but the outdoor plug not working. So she plugged the extension cord into the house. I was most concerned about Tuesday night though so when I went to feed them about 4:30 I put their food dishes in the shed with the door open. Handsome Boy came right in and started eating. Lovey and Twin eyed it with suspicion but eventually went in. As soon as I started to close the door they bolted and would not go back in if I was standing anywhere near the door. Twin wouldn’t go back in at all. I moved their food dishes out and back under the porch. They have enclosed shelter under the house and their fur has gotten thick and fluffy. Turned out it didn’t get as cold as first predicted Tuesday night, only down to about 20 or so. I didn’t even try and coax them in Wednesday or Thursday night of below freezing temps. They’re predicting 33˚ for tonight but that’s the last cold night for the foreseeable future.

Haven’t worked on the painting since Tuesday morning. I don’t think it’s finished but sort of stumped on how much more I want to do on the petals because I don’t want to diminish the focus on the pistil and stigma which is the subject of the painting instead of the whole flower. I sort of see the petals as an unfocused background suggesting petals. I had added more yellow but I didn’t like it so then lifted a lot off with a wet brush and a paper towel. I might add some unfocused light orange in the farthest corners. We’ll see. Still thinking about it.

I meant to publish this Wednesday and no time on Thursday. SHARE in the morning, then grocery shopping which I didn’t do on my regular Tuesday, late lunch, walk the dog since she’s been housebound all week, feed the cats (they all showed up, even feral Ghost who was very hungry and so dirty like he’d been hunkered down in a hole or squeezed under something in the dirt; Lovey and Handsome Boy were not happy to see him, expressing their displeasure but he would not be deterred, just taking the abuse as long as he got to eat), and yoga in the evening, dinner, clean up and close up the house, watched an episode of Eureka. I slept until my pill alarm went off this morning at 8:30. I had been having the strangest dream. I dreamed I was waking up but I couldn’t open my eyes and when I could finally force them open the light was so bright I would just close them again but I finally got up trying to see through barely open eyes or keep them closed as I moved around. And I was talking to some people and when I would open my eyes I couldn’t really see anything just shadowy shapes. I wasn’t really concerned about it, I knew it was temporary, that it had happened before and thought I would just go take a nap. And then it started clearing up, flashes of normal vision and then the painful light again but eventually I could see normally, which had segued into a completely different dream when the alarm went off. I’ve had the dream about not being to open my eyes several times over the years. Not the same circumstances but the wanting to wake up but not being able to get my eyes open and when I did manage to open them a bit all I could see was the bright light and it was too much effort to try and keep them open.

We’re finally on a warming trend, starting tomorrow our highs will be in the 60s, lows in the 50s, so I’ll be uncovering everything outside this weekend but the indoor stuff will stay until there’s no chance of another freeze. It is still January after all.