Frontier Weekend

Last weekend I did a coolant system flush on my wife's car. Interestingly, when we first went to look at the Matrix, I'd taken my scanner along, and the only code that showed up was for low coolant! Didn't give a check engine light or anything, and I'd never seen a code for that before, but there it was!!! Once, during summer, the coolant was low again, and when the temperature would climb, the A/C would stop working. That was the impetuses for doing a flush, it had gotten very warm out on Saturday, and my son and I were out in it, and the A/C wasn't working, and the temperature was up.

Anyway, apparently it has a very small coolant leak somewhere in the system, to the tune of around every 9 months or so, it needs more coolant. I had the thought to do the pepper trick, and might as well do a flush first. After we got home, I popped the hood to let it cool down, and went out in Scruffy to get a bottle of cooling system flush. Got home, and it was cool enough to drain and add the flush. I grabbed a 5 gallon bucket to add the clear water to the system, and try and rinse the system out some.

The bucket had been stored upside down by the barbecue, and for whatever reason, it was just behind where I've got this cactus, the 'Old Man of the Moutains'. After I wrapped everything up and was putting things away, I put the bucket back where it had come from. I just lobbed it back where I'd gotten it, but it landed kind of caddywompus. I grabbed the handle to the lid of the barbecue, and leaned over to right the bucket, but while I was leaned over, the wood handle broke, and I fell on a cactus!!!

All this took place on Saturday. On Sunday night, I was laying on the couch in the front room, and I heard a coyote yipping, very close. I looked out the window, and it was right on the very corner of the yard. It's on!!! I slip on my shoes, and grab a walking stick. I can open the front door quietly, but the security screen always makes some noise. I throw open the screen, and come out raging and yelling again!!! The coyote is quite spooked, and jumps down around 7 feet to the street and off into the canyon!!! It was a rerun of another time!!!

In retrospect, I realized I had a very western frontier weekend, I fell on a cactus, and chased off a coyote!!!

Meet Virginia

This is most interesting. Around seven years ago, our last outdoor cat passed. In the last few weeks, another cat has shown up in our neighborhood, and, not having seen her in around seven years, she looks almost exactly the same!!! I suppose it's completely possible that this one of her descendants. My younger boy did the same move we'd done with the original, gave her some food. She's been back a few times. She's a little spooky, but kind of a people cat once you get up to her. Entirely possible that she's someone's pet, and thus far she's eluded the coyotes. The original we'd named Shenandoah, and for the last six months or so, the John Denver classic, "Country Road" has been on the boy's list, on account of Fallout 76. Since Shenandoah Valley is mentioned in the song, he thought the new one should have some name also from the song. I suggested "Ridge", short for Blue Ridge mountains, also unique and monosyllabic. That didn't stick. He dubbed her Virginia.

Breakfast is Served

I've been doing the Saturday shift at work for about 2 1/2 years now. It's not as easy as it used to be, weekends have gotten busier than they used to be, but it's still OK. Only thing is the shift starts almost 4 hours earlier than during the week, so, depending on the time of year it's either full dark or just getting light when we get there.

This is a little clip from my dash cam when I was pulling in this morning. On the left side, you'll see a coyote skulking off, but you probably can't make out that he's carrying a critter in his mouth!!! I caught it (my head apparently turns better than my cam) by eye and took it to be a rabbit. I've seen both rabbits and coyotes in the parking lot before, so I guess that's just what my mind filled in.

My co-worker in the white Benz had his phone in hand, and was able to get this picture!!! No, I'm pretty sure that's a cat. Poor kitty!!!

It's the circle of life...

Night of the Coyotes

Did I ever post here that my son got himself a pet chicken??? I don't know that I have, but he's had her since before his last birthday (actually, he bought her as a chick and she was pretty well full grown by then) and I may have a picture of her in that post.


Anyway, I made this Rage Comic up about the true story of how coyotes came calling one night & how I felt about our encounter afterwards. I've submitted it to that site, but I never even see my submissions on the voting pages, so who knows. I have a feeling the image may come out too small to easily read here, try clicking on it to see it larger!!! Better yet, hold your ctrl key and roll your scroll wheel up.