The official beginning of spring. Equal parts day and night . . . and it actually began with some very spring-like days.
Though, we are under no illusion that this will last.
A perfect day in the Deschutes River Canyon
In the high desert there is this time between the end of winter and the beginning of spring.
The mountains are still capped with snow, but the days get shirt-sleeve warm. The lakes hold on to winter’s ice and streams have yet to swell with runoff. The conditions are ideal for a picnic in the canyon.
Wetting a line in the Crooked River
A couple trips to the rivers in late March, ahead of last minute ice storms are always in our plan. We set up the camp chairs along the stream and bask in spring sunshine.
Now that … is basking.
The melt is coming. The mornings are still frosty and there will be some rainy days.
Couldn’t ask for a better day
For the next week or two we’ll take advantage of this typical Central Oregon start to spring.
The snow continued to pile up the first part of the week, so we stuck close to home. It was a good time to get caught up on our reading and in the process offer lap time for the cats.
Sharing the patio door
Some time in the spring of 2007, a neighbor in the 33rd street culdesac where we lived, abandoned a pregnant cat.
Now, we’d been fooled once by a bloated orange tom (a homeless male cat who looked pregnant, so of course we took him in) but we knew what we were getting into, or at least we thought we knew.
The cat, Mittens, a polydactyl (extra toes) cat immediately was re-named Greta, and we got to witness a birth cycle. Four kittens survived.
Matriarch Greta and kids …
Clark
Lewis
Boo
Unfortunately, one of our kitten crew was a budding escape artist . While moving to Sandy she managed to slip past our confines. The other three, Lewis, Clark, and Boo have always lived indoors.
Boo and Clark chowing down cat greens
We’re are dog people and enjoy a canine’s company in the house or car. That said, there is nothing like a cat purring in your lap which can soothe the mind.
Boo got his huge front paws from his mom
Until recently, Lewis was really the only lap cat out of the lot. Boo would regularly climb up on JQ and literally hug her around the neck. After receiving his due, he would move on.
Gretta and Clark were tolerant of my existence at best, but would hang out with JQ and the dogs.
The boys, Boo and Lewis peering through a foggy window
Sixteen years have passed and two males are all that are left of our cat clan. Boo and Lewis have turned into talkative old geezers.
A year ago, we started treating Boo for Hyperthyroidism . . . the same malady that took his mother. Boo’s medicine, or rather it’s delivery system is more advanced than Greta’s, however it still has limits and I think we’re reaching his.
Napping champion
In their advancing age, a warm place to nap has become critical, something I can understand.
Usually after a bit of chin scratching you can return back to reading or scrolling and a warm knot of fur will lay calmly in your lap.
Recently Boo’s naps have included what can only be attributed to dreams.
These manifest as growls and small spasms that run through his body. I wonder what memories a cat carries to cause such fits.
Are cat dreams shaped by actual experience or can a they conjure up an alternate reality in their sleep? I don’t expect an answer.
Days are warming and as spring approaches, we’ll be spending less time at home. The brothers will adjust to different napping sites, but will continue to vocalize their dissatisfaction. It’s just another cycle of life.
Don’t mean to complain about the weather . . . but . . .
Again this week we’ve been under mostly gray skies with a few inches of snow flurries thrown in.
One of the consequences of a wetter than normal winter is rivers are at or above capacity. Streams we frequent are running at April levels.
Un-fishable water is usually a product of run-off and right when ODFW opens the Upper Deschutes River as an alternative.
It’s really not all that deep
These dreary days mean we’ll fill the blog with more domestic tasks.
Oh there was activity, just mostly indoors and with fewer photos captured.
Not fishing doesn’t mean not thinking about fishing. Limited stream access just means more sitting at the desk spin’in feathers.
I even posted some of the patterns on Instagram. Winter is the season to refill boxes with patterns depleted last summer.
Books occupy another segment of daily activities. What an Inter-library loan can’t find, Hoopla and Kindle can.
Ken Forkish, owner of Ken’s Artisan Bakery In Portland, Oregon has written several books on bread. Evolutions in Bread and Flour Water Salt Yeast make for great reading.
There is always an eclectic mix of titles stacked on the living room table. This week that pile contained an inordinate number of cookbooks.
The other activity associated with dreary weather is cooking and we’ve done quite a lot of that. Soup Sunday returned this year and we’ve sampled and canned a couple of good recipes. JQ tweaked her chocolate pound cake recipe to perfection and fourth time seems to be the charm on finding a truly good chocolate chip cookie.
We didn’t get out much but that will change with the season. For now we’ll start a new book and wait for the real thaw.
The inevitable process of aging is not something we dwell on . . . what’s the point?
However, there are moments in this ‘getting older’ journey that are much less pleasant, one of which is the inevitable colonoscopy. If you know, you know and if you don’t, you’ll find out soon enough.
That is what occupied during our week. And it really did involve most of the week. For a forty minute routine procedure you give up the better part of three days in prep. Prep is the unpleasant portion of the process.
I’ll spare you the details. The bottom line is the week was taken up with medical procedures, rather than any ‘fun’ activities. It ended with a clean bill of health . . . so there is that.
We’ll be back with a post next week with something a little bit more interesting.
Recently Boo’s naps have included what can only be attributed to dreams.
