End of the World. Beginning of a new one. The Life of Amberwolf.

Cooling thoughts, efficiencies, and yard stuff:


So far, despite the early months' significant overheating, it's actually cooler than usual so far this month, by several degrees. I havent seen much in the way of 110F+ temps so far this month, and nothing near 120F. Average temps seem lower too.

I'ts not much, since it's still usually just under 110F highs, but we've had a number of days like today and yesterday that are less than 105F.

Was even cool enough yesterday to go up on the roof in the late afternoon and re-cover the roof A/C unit with styrofoam cooler sections (glued together with expanding sprayfoam), around 3" thick in overlapping layers, which keeps the direct sun off of all the sections where air flows from the house up thru the A/C unit and ducting, and then back down into the house. That keeps that air cooler, making the system more efficient, especially since my brother has to keep the circulation fan system on all the time, instead of just while the A/C is actually running/cooling (meaning, the house air gets heated while passing thru the ducts in the attic (whcih isn't insulated against outside temperatures like the house is), as well as the A/C unit itself, and thus the A/C is less efficient, having to re-cool the air more often).

Was still too hot to go up into the attic and finish "boxing" the ducts themselves with the styrofoam (it's about half done from months ago).

Next up, gonna put a "block" of old computer fans up in the gables to pull air thru the attic; I think I have enough of them that are speed-controlled by a temperature sensor in the fan so it won't run all the time, just when it gets warm up there. That should lower the attic temperature a little, which will help the A/C work better.



The trees are growing well, including the little transplated sproutlings, a few of which are almost as big as I am now. At least half of the yard is now in shade most of the day, though there's still a large area in the middle of the yard in back and front that's poorly shaded or unshaded; near the house it's fairly complete.

Those trees near the house in back are all big enough that their branches can be intertwined to make arches to walk under and denser shade, and some are beginning to cover sections of roof edge, which helps to cool the house itself.

There's a mulberry on the center of the west end of the house that is barely taller than the house, and not very dense yet, which I've been guiding all the branches to parallel or spread over the house walls (because the previous neighbor didn't want any trees of any kind, inclding any branches from mine, over their yard--they wanted pure dirt and no shade no grass no plants, so they'd have nothing to take care of. :roll: New neighbor hasn't been here long enough to decide, I think, but has at least been watering the two front yard trees, that the previous neighbor had cut down to almost stubs of the big shade trees they had been under the neighbors previous to them).

Lantana about half-covers teh west walls, too.

Ther'es a little foot-high mulberry at the south corner of the west end, and a shoulder-high eucalyptus at the north corner, but both are slow-growing (the mulberry because it only gets direct sunlight for a few hours in the middle of the day, and the eucalyptus becuse of that and it's just a slow-growing type of tree).


I added some overhead pull-down shades from the edge of the roof to just below the top of the fence, for the north corner of the west house end (where my bedroom is), to shade teh walls and window A/C unit from the afternoon/evening sun when it's hottest.




There's one tree pair in the center of the backyard that's been slowly growing for years; the mulberry had been doing well but a couple years ago, either Teddy or Yogi did a number on it, chewing mostly thru it's main trunk when it was about twice the size of my thumb. Didn't kill it, but it stunted it until this spring when it really began to recover, and now it's taller than I am, but hasn't spread out yet (is just a few vertical "trunks"). I decided not to cut any of hte trunks in case any of htem failed, so there'd still be others to continue the tree. Eventually they'll all grow together anyway, once each gets big enough around (probably a few years from now). There's also a "eucalyptus" a foot or so away from it, that grows with it but more slowly, and between the two of them tehy'll eventually provide a lot of shade in the middle of the yard.

Some feet away to east and west are mulberries that are almost my size now, that will make more shade.


A much bigger mulberry is some feet north of that cetner pair, taller than the house, but not yet very densely branched/leaved. At it's base are smaller mulberries I'd intended to transplant last year, but events kept me from doing that until they were deeply rooted enough to be inseparable from the big tree--so I'm just leaving them there to grow along with the big one, as they are a lot denser-branched/leaved than it is, so eventually they'll add significantly to the shading of the yard when they catch up to the bigger one.


At goodwill, for a couple bucks, I found a "BOSS" watering spike, with a 2-foot-long steel tube with tip that has exit holes for the water, and gardenhose-threaded input and a chamber that can be filled with whatever concentrated liquid or soluble solid to inject up to a couple feet deep in the ground.

This makes watering stuff with deep roots more efficient than watering the surface (where much of the water just evaporates, or feeds grass on the surface), and I can see a difference in growth rates, too, after a few weeks of using the spike on the trees (and some of the isolated lantana bushes that are hard to keep watered otherwise).

It also lets me inject fertilizer or compost tea or whatever down deep where the roots are. And it lets me kill ant colonies, which have kept springing up near the street sides of the yards the whole time I've been here (nearly 20 years), as I figure they're living under the streets themselves. I wouldn't mind the ants but when they extend colonies into the yard, they attack the dogs when the dogs disturb one, and sometimes they find their way into the house by the thousands. Some are little normal ants, but some are half-inch-long with a heck of a bite. Havent' had any fire ants in a few years, thankfully.




For the lantana surrounding the front yard, I have drip waterer tubing I use once a week, routed among it's bases. This also adds additional water to the trees at the yard edges.


Been using the expanding foam stuff to attach styrofoam sheets to the inside of the shed roofs, which helps keep teh sheds and their contents a little cooler. On the walls i'm using bits of coroplast at teh corners of four sheets, with a drywall screw thru the coroplast into the metal shed wall, as that's cheaper than the expanding foam, and works fine on the vertical surfaces. (sort of works on the roof, but leaves a potential water leak at every screw hole).
 
Probably, but I haven't been there since early 1985 (it was cooler in cellars then, so it probably still is).

Here in Phoenix, just a short distance underground, a few feet, it's MUCH cooler. Even a few inches down in the yard it's defiitely cooler, when I've tested by sticking probes down into the soil in direct sunlight. A few feet down it's generally below 70F.

If I had the time and resources (money) to do it, I'd exploit that for cooling, by building a piping and reservoir tank system under the yard, several feet down, and circulate a nontoxic water-based fluid thru that and an heat exchanger in the house (and sheds) to keep them all at a more constant (lower) temperature.



Regarding brain temperatures, I know what you mean. I have to keep it cool to sleep; the cooler it is the better; if it's down around 60-65F my nightmares can almost go away completely...above 80F and they are pretty bad. Unfortunately I can't afford the power to keep it below about 75F most of the time. My favorite time of year weatherwise is when it's cold at night, a couple months or so in winter, and I can use a box fan in the window to push or pull the cold air into the bedroom. (or whole house), and bring the temps way down.



Weather right now is very humid, and hot, though not as hot as a week and a half/two weeks ago, by at least 10F (even if it feels like it with the humdity). The rain has been significant, around an inch so far the last week; it's helpful for plants and cooling and budget; havent had to water anything for the whole week so far.
 
Still humid and hot, but the rain is probably gone for the season, it's sunnier, and the temperatures have started to go back to the 110-115F+ range.

Still "10-20% chance" of rain, but not in the general valley area--outside of it, 50-100 miles away from me, it's definitely been raining here and there. I can see teh towering clouds, sometimes filled with lightning visible at midday, ringing the valley most of the day.


Had to being watering certain stuff every day again; things that are in the direct sunlight much of the day.


But the grass and such is all growing really well after the rain, plus the high humidity and the partial cloudiness (keeping the sun from drying out the ground as much).
 
Been sunny and hot since the above, until last night. Big powerful windstorm that tore down powerlines, trees, flipped cars !!! , tore up roofs and some buildings, etc. Power was out here for around 10 hours, until just before dawn. (so couldn't post this till now).

In my area there were a number of downed trees and crashes, but nothing like what some people reported in other areas. At my house some wierd things, like the crazybike2 is parked under the biggest mulberry almost right up against the north wall fo the house, with a bunch of pallet wood leaning against it, and the bike itself is leaning toward the house. The storem somehow forced the bike to lean the other way, away form the house, but all of the wood is still leaning against it just like it had been (at a slightly steeper angle now.

The held-down-by-bricks heavy mats, carpet, and styrofoam layers that insulate the roof of the third shed, that the trike gets parked in, and has an insulated awning, were all torn off of it and thrown into a nearby tree and across the roof of another shed. The awning itself, which is jsut a light steel frame with styrofoam spray-foam-glued together and to the frame, was undamaged and unmoved.

The aquarium I use to put the sun-tea containers in (so they heat to about 160F for hours and make better tea) was flipped off that shed roof, bounced against another one (from the dent in it), and smashed against the ground...so it's pretty trashed.

The awning under teh trees at the back porch, which is just a steel frame with some retractable window shades (mounted at the roof edge) pulled over it, had the frame broken apart and thrown to the ground against the house, with the shades just flopped against the house (not damaged).

The yard-light pole is torn from the botom mounting (middle still there) against the orange tree, and tilted to the south.

Bunch of other unsurprising small stuff, but also surprisingly lot sof lightweight stuff (plastic yard chairs, etc) were untouched, not even moved at all. Nothing on the frotn porch or yard was moved at all.

Stack of styrofoam lids under the big mulberry on a table under the first shed, just feet from crazybike2, were not moved at all; I wouldn't expect them to even be in the yard!

heavy sliding metal doors to the last shed to the north were torn off the shed and left leaning against it.


Thunderstorm afterward was intense, lights flickered at work many times but never lost power. The house lost power from the windstorm just about immediately; was at least a couple of hours before I got home.

Yogi hid against the security door to Mouse and Raine's room (it's there to keep Mouse the cat from doing stupid things), while Kirin was so soaked in rain I think she spent most of her time outside for some reason. She was out by the gate when I came home, running in circles like "where is he when is he coming home" over and over, and was really happy when I rode up, and she went isnide to go get Yogi but he wasn't coming out for anything, so she came back.

More later...gotta go to work.
 
On my way to work this morning, I got to see more of the destruction, stuff I couldn't see in the dark and rain last night.

Just in the couple miles' ride to work, there were actually a couple of streetlights down. One torn completely down, laying next to the road, and another tilted at it's base, either the concrete broken or some of teh bolts, and hanging out over the road. Road was blocked off, probably in case it fell the rest of the way, so nobody would get squished.

Bunch of trees, some small mostly big ones. Street behind my workplace is blocked off completely by a big conifer of some type. The parking lot behind the string of stores, with warehouse docks, trash dumpsters, etc., happens to have an entrance on either side of where the tree fell, so all day there was roaring traffic back there, from people frustrated with the tree in the road, and upset about it enough to drive thru the parking lot as if it were a freeway. There were a couple of collisions, one between two cars that couldn't manage to pass each other, and one that scraped a dumpster trying to pass someone else. None of them stuck around; dunno how they dealt with the damage.

UPS guy picking stuff up from us almost got hit by someone in a truck going way too fast thru there.

Chunks of roofing from tiles to shingles, to sheet metal, to pieces of layered stuff that looked like commercial storefront type roofing, with insulation (painted underneath), sheet metal, and a white foamed-rubber-looking coating on the other side. Some of these pieces were the size of a car. I expect they came from shops around the metrocenter area, but don't know which ones. They were scattered around in parking lots I passed, and some in the streets themselves.


With all of this damage, I was suprised to not see any broken windows, or signage.



Last night, it was too muggy and warm to sleep, but needing to get up in the morning for work I had to do something about it. I was too tired to do waht I wanted to, which was to get the giant 12V battery built out of the EIG NMC cells, and run the Harbor Freight 3kw inverter from that, to power the small window A/C unit. I figured I'd probably make some stupid mistake and set teh battery afire, so I decided to leave well enough alone there.

INstead, I dug out a 48V 0.7A server fan, which sounds like a small jet engine but it moves a LOT of air. Ran that off of my old CrazyBike2 14s EIG battery, which being 20Ah was easily able to power it for the about 8 hours from the time I got home and set it up, to the time the power finally came back on just efore dawn.

I placed it with a bunch of ice packs out of the deep freeze at the head of the bed, with a pillow a distance in front of it to dampen some of the noise (the rest of the noise would help me sleep), and to push the air around down on the bed more instead of just over the top of it.

Worked pretty well; enough to let me doze off and on mostly as usual for the rest of the night, though dreams were weirder/worse than usual (happens when I'm hot).


So I guess part of what I need to get done this next week, when I'll be on "vacation" from work, is to go ahead and build that 12v battery, and test if the A/C will work on the inverter with it. I'll need it for the dog's new Mk V trailer anyway, once that's finished (which hopefully I'll also get finished next week).
 
Another big storm in progress...though it's mostly past by now.

https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=81147&p=1401782#p1401782
 
Still haven't built that massively-parallel 12v battery. :/

Did get the insulation put back on top of the trike shed, though. Took a few hours, mostly because the heat with no breeze at all meant I could only work for short periods before going in and cooling off.

This time I tied it down, including screwing boards down at the ends across the top of the insulation to the shed roof itself, so hopefully it won't be able to blow off again, though if the storm is intense enough it could still happen (or tear off the shed roof).

Someday I'll get the insulation *inside* the shed roof completed, but until then the stuff on top has to do the job.

Really wish I had time/energy/materials/etc to finish insulating roof and walls and doors, and then cut a hole at the back under the tree at the west end, to put the little window A/C unit in. Then I could do more of the trike work in the cooled shed, and possibly accomplish more on it. (would still have to do the welding outside the shed).

Was thinking about making a heavy curtain around the outer edge of the awning area, which I could draw closed to work on the trike while on it's side, etc., then close the shed doors (to keep the cooled air in) and open up the curtains so I could do welding, grinding, etc., without moving the trike (which might be impossible depending on what I'm doing with it at the time), and then close the curtain and open the shed doors to cool the area again.


The insulation isn't just to keep the summer heat out (or winter cold), it's also to help insulate the noise of grinding/etc so I can do that work even late at night or early in the morning without bothering the neighbors. If I could work basically any time, it would increase the work I get done on stuff, because sometimes I simply can't do stuff (sick, or exhausted, or shaky, etc) at the times everyone else would normally be up and about. Cant' do it in the house, of course (might start a fire with the sparks, even if I took everything out of the back room to do it, there's still the fake-wood floor, made of flammable materials).



I also got the "spare" aquarium up on top of the shed once I was done with that, to do the solar cooking / tea /etc with. This one is a lot heavier, maybe 4-5x the weight of the other one, so it was quite a challenge to get up there. Didn't weigh it but I'd guess it is close to 100lbs. It's made of glass that's close to 1/2" thick, and is about the same size as a "40 breeder" type aquarium.

It's more complex than one of those, though, as it has the typical "box" shape, but it has a divider panel about 1/3 of the way from one end, which goes down to almsot but not qutie the bottom. About 2" from the bottom it joins a black ABS sheet parallel to the bottom, extending all the way across the remaining 2/3 of the tank. Then there's three 2" PVC pipes with horizontal cuts in them every couple inches, that stick out of holes in that sheet, almost all the way to the top of the tank. This is a sump tank, normally kept underneath the main tank, so sponge filters go over those pipes to filter out bulk waste and house bacteria to reprocess some of the ammonia/etc to less harmful stuff.

In my use, it's on it's side, and I can put the tea bottles between the pipes, using them to hold the bottles vertical. (the bottles get so hot that the plastic shrinks, and the flat bottoms become rounded so they wont' stand up on their own anymore).

Then the more open third of the tank can be used for the crockpot ceramic portion, or any other big pot, for solar slow-cooking. (the old tank couldn't quite fit the big pots).

The old tank would reach up to 150-160F+ on a hot day. The new one has thicker glass to hold in heat better, but it doesn't ahve the sliding-glass doors the old one did that made it easy to use for this.

Since there's no lid, or door in my case, I had to make one. It has to be glass, so light/heat goes into it, as this is the side that faces south. But I didn't have a single piece that would be large enough for this, so I used one larger bit that used to be the glass shelf out of one of the old refrigerators I had before the fire, and one smalle rthat used to be a divider in a different tank I don't have. Between the two, slightly overlapping, they're enough to cover the front (formerly top) of the tank.

Added foam tape aorund the face/edge of the tank, then held the glass panels against hte face and used clear packing tape and some very thick and wide vinyl tape in layers to make a hinge at the top edge.

Used more foam tape to secure magnets to the edges to keep it from flopping around and breaking in winds.

I didnt' have time or energy to tie it down to the shed yet, but need to do that so it can't get picked up and thrown off by the winds in any really big storms. (don't have any others to replace it with, except a 90-gallon size that I intend to use for the solar water heater project if I ever get back to it).


We'll see what temperatures things reach inside this coming weekend when I can monitor it in the afternoon.
 
The hottest temperature is around 135F or so; stays taht way for a few hours in the midday and afternoon. Not really hot, maybe needs a better "seal" around the "door" so it doesn't leak the hot air out.

But...much more exciting news is there are two new "puppies" in the house, along with Kirin and Yogi.

PeanutButter and Jelly are several months old, bigger than Tiny but smaller than either Yogi or Kirin (for now) and I've been watching them grow up in steps as their pet parents brougth them into where I work for training, grooming, and just to come socialize. But their situation changed, and so PB & J needed a new home. Since I know them at least a little, I volunteered to take them on.


It's sometimes a challenge adding new dogs to a "pack", and this is one of those times, partly because these are puppies with little socialization outside their original human family, and partly because Kirin and Jelly are both strong "me-me" personalities.

PeanutButter has some issues with some humans, but seems to be ok with Kirin and Yogi as long as everything is calm.

To try to mitigate possible anxiety or fear issues, and stress from change, I got pheremone collars for both Yogi and Kirin (since it had worked really well on Yogi before, and the plugin-diffuser works for his fireworks/thunder fear), and a couple of refills for the diffusers I have, and got those going the day before.

First we went out with Kirin and Yogi on leashes and harnesses to greet them at the street, so that any territoriality wouldn't apply, and they could greet each other as normally as possible.

PeanutButter has some social issues with humans, but since he was wearing a muzzle (just in case) anyway, I just went up to him and scratched under his chin and chest, and after a short while he decided I was his new best friend though still shy.

We all went into the house, to talk and let the dogs calm down and chill out, and see how things would go.
 
I am still feeding them in two different areas, because they *are* puppies, and think all food is for them (gonna take a bit to work that out of them and make them just sit and stare pitifully at food that isn't theirs :lol: ). But no barrier between them, just me being there to teach them not to go after anything that isn't in their own bowl.


It's kind of funny watching Kirin while these two play, because Kirin plays with Yogi by being rough and bashing into him, but when either of these does that to her, she gives them the stinkeye as if they did something horrible. :lol: She sort of wants to play with them, but doesn't yet know what to do about it.

She did try to play stick tug-o-war, but when they get their mouths too close to her she lets go and clomps around in a circle, which is her way of showing confusion, frustration, etc. If she's got the stick and they come running up to grab it, she first seems to want to play then she gets this wide-eyed look like "what the heck are you doing?". She won't grab a stick they've already got, not yet anyway.

Yogi isn't interested in playing while they're around, but it's also still too hot for him--he likes it when it's in the low 70s or colder, then he gets sproingy. So maybe by that weather, they'll all play together--that's weeks away at best, for late nights, and months for daytime weather. Right now he's still more like "get off my lawn". ;) But he's getting a little more tolerant, which is pretty good for the first few days with them, after a couple of years of just dealing with Kirin (who he mostly enjoys the company of, but has his moments even with her, usually when she's too rough playing, cuz he *is* getting older.

Since the puppies aren't even 3/4 of a single year yet, they have a lot of catching up to do. :)


This is early today in the bedroom, after the puppies dragged the blankets off the bed and around the room to make nests in. Kirin is off to the left, PeanutButter in front of the piano, Yogi in the hallway, and sprawled mostly off the end of the bed is Jelly (who when laying down acts like a big bag of jelly).
 

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I didnt' have the camera at hand this time, so no video, but all four of them were playing together before breakfast today, so I think it's fair to say they're integrating well enough. Yogi is still a "ggrumpy old man" sometimes, but he's like that with Kirin, too, when she walks on him if he's laying in a path, or otherwise is closer than he'd like.

The two new ones, being puppies, ran around like crazy in a long course around the trees and bushes over the whole backyard, for several minutes, and Kirin would chase for a few dozen yards every so often, then stand there looking like "why are they still going? pantpantpantpant", and Yogi would wait for them all to pass him then he'd trot along for a few feet and stop, wait for them to pass again, and trot along, etc.

ONce they had the extreme crazies out they all stopped at the "watering hole" (the lobster-styled kiddie pool), then Jelly started roughhousing with Peanutbutter, and after a bit Kirin joined in once she found an opening that didn't get her run over by them. Yogi trotted past a few times, and Peanutbutter side-bumped him, and Yogi ducked his head and bow-played a bit, but didn't really get into the roughhousing, cuz his hips don't hold up that well to that sort of thing, or his left knee. He doesn't like it when Kirin pushes him over so he sits on his butt to play and paw at her, but the puppies are too rough and havent' learned to work with him like Kirin has.

No disagreements though, evne during collisions, though at first Kirin looked like she thought she was going to have to play mother and keep PB & J from being too rough with each other...but she didn't really want to step in there, and kept looking at me like "what should I do? They're CRAZY!" (when of course she herself would play with Yogi like that if he let her, and did do that when she first came here).

So they got their morning exercise and are now all crashed around the house, Kirin next to my legs here as I type, of course.

Their favorite spot has become the doggy landing strip, the path thru the kitchen to the backroom/backyard from the rest of the house.

Sometimes they look like they tried to make it thru a field of sleep mines, and set them off one after the other. :lol:
 
Forgot to update...but there wasnt' any destruction, though Yogi and Kirin were completely worn out by the time we got back home.

Anyway....All the dogs have adapted to each other pretty completely at this point.

Kirin is still jealous of any attention she isn't getting, but that's normal.

Jelly is better about just charging up to me and taking over as attention hog, but PeanutButter isn't. If I ignore him he'll eventually sit and wait, but he still tries to get between me and everybody else first.

Neither one of them notices they're stepping on each other or either of the others (or me), which is problematic sometimes, especially in the dark, because they sometimes step on Kirin or Yogi in spots that hurt with so much weight on them, and that causes a little grumpy snapping or growling or barking, though nothing worse than that yet. (hopefully never). Been trying to teach them to go around anything that's not just floor, but it's slow going.



I finally found a good enough sale on a security door for the front to get one (was going to build one, but hadn't yet found all the materials. Mounting it was a challenge, because of the thick insulation that was added after the fire on both outside and inside of the house; the bolts that come with it aren't long enough to go thru that and into the actual wall material, so had to make up some hardware to deal with that. Also the doorway was wider than the frame of the new security door; I guess they widened it a couple inches when doing the remodel/rebuild after the fire (cuz the original security door was the same size as this one, and it bolted directly to the wall on the outside of the doorway).

The door isn't to keep people out, it's actually to keep the dogs in, since now it's cool enough to leave it open much of the time, rather than running the A/C. While Yogi and Kirin won't try to get past any kind of barrier, even just a wire gate placed across the doorway, but the puppies are a different story, and have not yet learned this, and either could easily push past any regular barrier and get out, either getting lost or hit by cars chasing the neighborhood cats.

The security door will prevent that (though I still need to add a bottom rail, and a latch on the bottom, since all four dogs can just barely be able to all get up to the door, and if they all leaned on it at once, they might be able to bend it (cuz that's almost 500lbs of dog right now, and more as the puppies grow).




It's been rainy off and on; the last few days cool but mostly sunny, but had poured rain down a lot in the previous days--we actually got record rain at one point. So much that at one intersection, SB Cruiser was up to the cargo deck in water.....



Crosspost from here:
https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=81147&p=1418506#p1418506

Been drizzling and then raining off and on all day today, until around sunset. Now the sky is clear for the moment, but there's more storm stuff coming towards us that may or may not pass over us tonight.

Wasn't all that wet at work, but streets were still very wet and puddly as I got towards home, and right around my block (and probably south of it) it's little lakes everywhere that doesn't have drainage (including my yards).

Jelly was soaking wet when I got home, laying there apparently sleeping with her nose in the gap between the gate and fence, waking up excitedly with her "rusty squeaking" as I turned into the driveway and stopped in front of the gate.

None of the dogs since the fire except Tiny have done anything like that, but Jelly seems to have really decided I'm her peepulz (though honestly she likes most people that will pay any attention to her). (Kirin is a little put out that I pay any attention to anybody but her, but she isn't aggressive about it).
 
More doggy pics, including one of Kirin exhausted next to me on the couch, after a bunch of puppiness just finally wore her out. And one of Mouse the cat, in "kitty prison" (actually just behind her safety door on my brother's bedroom, that keeps everything / eveyrone safe from Mouse, and keeps her safe from Kirin and PB & J.
 

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Lots more doggie pics:
 

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Mmm...been awhile.

Winter come and gone, now windy springy weather:

Today...20-25MPH is the "steady" wind, with 30-40MPH gusts. Is making it tough to do any of the stuff I had planned for the coolness of today (20 degrees less than yesterday!).

I had been trying to do some yard work (with all the sun and warmth the last couple months and the rain before that, well, stuff grows). Wind kept whippping stuff in my face; couldn't handle it after a short time.

Then I tried cleaning out a shed of some light bulky stuff I can recycle, but the wind is tossing stuff around so much it's too difficult to keep track of and catch the flyaways. :/

Peanutbutter did try to help catch things, until a cardboard box (that Jelly was running in terror from as it whirled thru the air) smacked him right in the face when he looked up just in time to stick his head right into it as it reached him. :/ After that he hid inside for a while, with Yogi (who isn't friends with the wind blowing tree limbs around), while Jelly just stayed away from open areas where stuff could blow around, and Kirin ignored all of it and just stuck with me until I went inside for lunch.

Now they're all napping; Jelly in the bathroom between toilet and tub (her usual spot), and Peanutbutter blockign the hallway, Kirin right beside me (as usual) on the bed, and Yogi blocking the doorway snoring away.

After lunch, I have stuff I have to do on the trike (rewiring the rightside motor), but I did something to my back (SI joint?) a while ago, and soemthing (weahter change?) is making ti (and the rest of my joints) something past "owie" on the scale. Since the work needed requires tipping the trike on it's side, and then back up, after taking a 40-ish (more?) pound motor wheel off and putting it back on after the wiring work, I may have to put this off again.
 
Spring gone, now summer and hot, dogs like to stay inside most of the time, though Jelly is almost always waiting at the gate to greet me when I get home.

Some pics, including of Peanutbutter's new "bed"--he's taken to sleeping in the bathtub, now that it's hot outside (77F in here all the time, though).

And one of the (broken) trike with the growing trees in the backyard behind it, and shading it overhead. Eventually I'll have just about complete canopy of tree shade overhead in the backyard, though that might be another couple years. Front yard is pretty close.
 

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crossposted from here
https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=88371&start=200#p1478955

Fourth of July was very noisy here, is still going on (almost midnight), though not as bad as some years, there's been huge loud mortar types being shot off, that terrify Yogi (even Kirin was scared this time, but Peanut Butter and Jelly don't even seem to realize anything unusual is going on).

ATM it's just small stuff that the dogs apparently cant' hear over the three loud fans I have going in the bedroom, and the computer playing videos, to mask out all that stuff. So they've all gone to sleep a little while ago, except for Kirin, who keeps waking up to check on everybody (she thinks shes' the den mother), including me.

The pheremone diffusers do help, but Yogi was still pretty scared, and hid under my legs most of the night so far (though he's asleep on the floor right next to the bed where I am ATM).


Added:
Went on till after 2am, but died down and stopped all but the occasional distant stuff, was able to actually get Yogi and Kirin to come outside for potties (they didnt' go after dinner, just before all the noise started). Then we all went back to bed except Jelly and PeanutButter, who kept having playtime in the livingroom according to Raine. (I couldn't hear it cuz I left all the loud fans running so Yogi and Kirin would sleep thru the night even if noises started back up, cuz I had to work the next day and already was hours short of sleep time).


The good news is that the super-thunder-earthquake makers down the street got cut short right as they started up; people yelling at each other I guess they got mad and left or whatever. Anyway, so didn't have to live thru that crap at least.
 
There's been kids going thru the alley for months teasing the dogs to get them to bark and jump at the north fence, with until lately no problems.

I'd previously put up some fence-privacy-cloth found at goodwill, but people kept cutting some of the stuff I used to secure it to the top rail of the fence (zipties first, which I thought were just breaking, then old house wiring, then steel fence wire). Didn't cut *all* of them, just random ones here and there. :/

The east fence, along the street, has big lantana bushes on the other side of the fence, between fence and sidewalk, that keep people from doing this sort of thing.

But the north fence, along the alley, only has a few on the inside of the fence, in the yard, because the dogs have kept breaking them over the years so they mostly don't get a chance to grow. I can't grow lantana on the outside of the fence in the alley...and I can't make a solid wall instead of a fence (not enough of any one kind of material, not enough money to buy enough). I'd prefer to build a 6-foot (or higher) block wall, if I had the money to spend on the materials, but that's out of the budget for the forseeable future.


So at least as a temporary (possibly permanent if it works) solution, today I spent stringing two old hundred-foot steel tieout "trolley" cables from the east fence to the northwest shed, around the shed, and then south to the wooden "wall" between the next most southern shed and the wooden fence between me and my west neighbor, to block off dog access to the whole alley fence.

These cables are wrapped around the line of trees around 10-12 feet from the alley fence, and some metal poles I put in teh ground every several feet along that line. The cables are there to both secure that metal shelving to, and to tension the poles so they remain upright.

Then I layered the shelving, which is various depths of 4-foot-wide old rusty and bent-up retail shelving of various brands, front edge to back edge, overlapping, along the cables between the sheds, and then from the northwest shed to the east fence. It's presently just ziptied to each other and hte cables and the metal poles, but this stiffens it quite a lot. Then the tops of the system that are near trees are tied to the trees with old damaged-insulation housewiring (that can't be used for it's original purpose).


Too dark for good pics, so I will get some as soon as I can and post them.

If it does what I mean it to, then I'll weld sections of the shelving together, and then use clamps to secure them to the poles/cables. And then I'll look for some clearance outdoor paint at lowes/etc, since I don't want to look at a wall of red all the time. ;) Preferably greens, several of them, so I can kinda make it look more natural to fit in with the yard, and if I get enough paint I'll do the "outside" of it too.

I'd still like to extend the fence up a foot or more, but have to locate the materials for that first. Basically need more chainlink; I already have some upright post metal I can weld to the existing uprights, then move the top rail tubes up, and then use the very small amount of spare chainlink I have, once separated into strips of a foot (or more) in width, plus whatever I can get (if I can afford it), to fill the space between the existing chainlink and the raised toprail. Then use steel wire to tie the new links to the old (or actually disassemble the links and weave them back together as a taller link fence, which is unlikely to happen). Then maybe people cant reach the ties for the privacy stuff and itll stay in place.
 
Last night abruptly turned from normal to beyond scary, when Kirin didn't want any extra noms a few hours after dinnertime, and shortly started dry heaving occasionally. Within the halfhour of the start of the problem her belly had swollen up; and just knew it was "bloat", which can be fatal if not immediately treated.

I called Jacque at the rescue, who sent her daughter (cuz she just lives down the street and would take MUCH less time) and we got her to the emergency vet, who were waiting there with a gurney but Kirin was still able to walk, and we went in and they saw her immediately; this was probably over an hour and a half after onset, at a guess.

While waiting in the room for xrays and the like, my anxious nausea passed my limit and I left dinner (and everything else for the last week, I think) in the vet's restroom. I came back to teh waiting room to the vet explaining the xray, and the surgical treatment, etc.

I gave Kirin hugs before I went home since the surgery would be hours and my ride there couldn't stay all night, and I still had to get home to the rest of the dogs; I almost couldn't leave but I couldn't have gone in there with her anyway.. . :(

While there, and on the way home I let my boss know what was going on, and that I would'nt be able to work Saturday and probably Sunday, and who could do the job I do if they're available; he said not to worry about it and just take care of Kirin. (one reason working at a pet store is better than a lot of other places)

Got home and all the dogs were all over me, especially Yogi cuz he's lost a few fuzzy friends already, and he wants to know where Kirin is, but all I can do is hug him and squish him and reassure him, while Peanutbutter and Jelly do their best to get between us.

Talked to Raine about the results and whatnot, then because I couldn't possibly sleep, but couldn't think about anything else but Kirin, I played with teh guitars and stuff, and a couple hours later I heard from Jacque that Kirin was still in surgery. Kept playing, and another while later heard she was out and doing well, with much better bloodwork than dogs with bloat usually have, and no apparent problems. Sometime after that, I passed out, apparently with my hand on the keys making notes according to Raine. I was probably out an hour or so before I woke up enough to realize i'd passed out, and turned stuff off and rolled over to actually sleep some.

Tossed and turned and dozed and woke for maybe 3 hours before I got a message from Jacque that Kirin had gone out for a potty walk successfully, and everything still seems fine, but that the vets would prefer Kirin not have visitors yet so she can stay quiet for now. :( I really really want to go see her, though.

At that point i got up to feed the poor starving Yogi, Peanutbutter, and Jelly, and let Raine know about Kirin, and talked for a little while. After that, i finally slept for real for a few hours; Yogi finally had enough of waiting and came to see what was wrong, and to "ask" me again where Kirin is, so I got up to go out with these three, played for a while, and left a message for Jacque to find out Kirin's status, and now waiting anxiously to hear back.
 
Kirin is now home from the surgery at the vet, and snuggled up next to me like usual, though she hates the "lampshade" cone to prevent her from licking her stitches.

She's dozing right now, with the tramodol she's taking for pain meds (though I could only get half a dose down her before she detected them in the yogurt, pezzed them out, and refused any more).

Restricted diet (chicken and rice, cooking on the stove now, yogurt, etc) for at least a few days, and keeping an eye out for complications (not very likely given how quickly the bloat was caught; they didn't find any problems once the twisting was fixed), low activity, etc.

She goes back to the vet in about 3 days to get the staples removed and a checkup.

My anxiety is still a little high, but it's much better than it's been since last night. (seems like days ago...)
 

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Kirin is more normal today, though she still tuckers out real fast just for a pottywalk. Is eating chicken and rice in small amounts periodically, and little bits of water and a few ice cubes at a time. So far just peed normally, but she doesnt' have anything to poop out yet.

The other dogs have to keep being shooed away from sniffing her shaved areas, so I've stll got the bedroom gated with me and Kirin in there.

I'm still wiped out cuz I'm only getting a bit of sleep here and there whenever Kirin dozes off long enough for me to as well.
 
Kirin is almost back to normal; she's still eating just boiled chicken and rice, and not yet pooping regularly, but it comes out right when it does come out. ;)

She wants to play with the puppies, but I can't let her yet; she's going to get her staples out and be checked up on tomorrow morning. After that, we'll see what she's allowed to do, make sure she doesn't hurt herself.

But she does like to nap with them (she still naps a lot more than usual, but that will probably be true till she finishes healing up, and that will probably be a while).



And Yogi decided to hang out in the trike for a while the other night, which irritated Kirin to no end, cuz Kirin is certain that it belongs to her. ;)
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Yogi likes to sleep stretched out sometimes...though Jelly was behind him pushing him away from teh cabinet this time:
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And Jelly often sleeps like someone just tossed her carcass across the room....
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Kirin got her staples out today, everything seems to be ok so far, but *now* she is interested in sniffing and licking the area (wasn't before), so have to use the cone again (had stopped before because she realy really hates it, makes her fearful and so uncertain that she usually just stands or lays in one place and won't move while it's on).

The bitter spray around the area keeps the other dogs from bugging her, but it dosent' work on Kirin herself--it's just seasoning to her. :/
 
Wow...cant' believe I didn't post here for over a year!

Well, here's a random doggie-pic dump, in lieu of a real post:
 

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