Even in Kyoto

I am trying to get caught up on the various things I can't get to in the middle of the semester, but they don't make for particularly interesting blog posts.

So in the meantime, here are photos of Martha keeping me company at home yesterday. She seems to be annoyed at George, so the two of them haven't been cuddling much. Instead, they have some form of joint custody agreement, where George gets some snuggles in the early evening, then Martha snuggles for the early part of the night, then George comes back first thing in the morning.

Anyway, George has been the primary user of the newer cat heating pad, but Martha was so cute sleeping on it yesterday.

I'm so glad to have this view out of the window while I am working. It doesn't photograph well but it gives me something to look at while thinking.



I'm also glad to have the new heating pad in the chair as a cat decoy, because it is helping to keep the cats from constantly crawling all over me all day. Now they only periodically crawl all over.

Cats get themselves into some interesting pretzels sometimes, while napping over the course of the day.



I'm amused by the snow that landed on top of the disco ball especially.



George checking out the snow when I briefly reopened the catio:


The video is more entertaining:


Today I'm back in the office. At least my office also has a window view, although it's limited and not as nice because of being in the building's basement and facing a parking lot. The roads have all been plowed, so we're back to salty winter slop. I need to figure out a better bike chain lube strategy for this winter. When I ride in this stuff, I have to stay diligent about rinsing off my bike after every ride, but that washes the lube off the chain. So maybe it is time to investigate waxing, after all.

I already blogged about yesterday morning. In the afternoon, I cooked up a storm. First, I made a big batch of a creamy tomato-lentil slow cooker soup from the NYT. I didn't have any cream, but we somehow have a whole bunch of cans of coconut milk, so I can report that the soup is pretty good with coconut milk as a substitute. One of the reasons for making the soup was to use up some of the last of this year's garden tomatoes that S brought in to finish ripening. Done. I like the concept of a tomato soup with added protein for rib-sticking power.

Then I finished cooking the ingredients and assembled the Portobello Wellington, and got the Madeira Sauce underway. With those items well in hand, I got to work on some more pumpkin-apple-pecan pie filling. Yum. I mean, just look at it!



(Never mind the dirty dishwater underneath it!) In between cooking tasks, I finally got started on a mending project that has been in the mending pile for at least a year: dealing with sleeve wear on an older bicycling jersey.



From the looks of it, this is just going to be a common wear point for me with wool bicycling jerseys. If this mending experiment is a success, I'll be very pleased. Wool cycling jerseys aren't cheap and I'd much rather keep the ones I have going than have to go shop for more. I have another wool cycling jersey that will be in the repair queue once this one is done.

At around this time, I started to get suspicious that I hadn't seen much of Martha all day. She does seem like the sort of cat who might arbitrarily decide to go curl up somewhere quiet and dark for several hours, but this seemed like longer than usual. Shaking a cat treat bag quickly summoned George, but no Martha. Also unusual. Hmm.

I went around the house and checked all the most logical hiding spots. In doing so, I found several other items I'd lost track of, but still, no Martha.

It was getting close to time to head to a friend's for Thanksgiving. I messaged my friend to say I might be delayed by the hunt for a loose cat.

Shaking the treat bag outdoors failed to summon Martha, either. It was starting to seem like I might be searching for a missing cat for much of Thanksgiving evening.

It occurred to me that one of the more distinct noises the cats associate with me is the opening and closing of the garage door, as I get my bike out to go to work in the morning, and put my bike away when I get home in the evening. I didn't ride my bike yesterday, but with that thought in mind I went ahead and cycled the garage door.

A minute or two later, there was Martha, at the back door. She knows the noise means it's almost suppertime. Whew.

That meant that friends and I could enjoy our vegetarian Thanksgiving feast without added worry.



Here's Martha, later that evening.



I don't think she feels even an ounce of remorse. I'm pretty sure that she escaped off the front porch in the morning when I had the dim-witted idea of opening up the porch door for better ventilation while erging. It was only a few moments later that it occurred to me that the cats could escape if I did that, but clearly Martha had wasted no time.

I had a different sort of misadventure this morning. In the midst of a workout to accumulate more rowing meters, I had the thought that it might be a good idea to lubricate the rowing erg's chain. I had a small bottle of chain oil for that very purpose nearby, so while I was in between pieces, I started to apply the oil.

I failed to pay close attention to some ominous plastic cracking noises until it was far too late, and the bottle's brittle plastic shattered in my hand.

Mineral oil EVERYWHERE!!


THAT was a hassle to clean up, let me tell you.

Other than that, so far today has consisted of going to work to water ants and collect up some student writing to grade. There's some potential for heavy snowfall this afternoon, so I decided I'd rather come home and grade at home than gamble with having to deal with a snowy commute later in the day.

Martha is a little more shy than George is about having her picture taken, but she at least stayed inside the cat carrier where she had been curled up sleeping for long enough for me to get this photo!



I wonder if she's trying to give us a hint.

Meanwhile, on Monday afternoon I took one of the Animal Physiology reptiles to the vet. Here is Geri the Gerrhosaurus major on her way to the vet:





Here we are waiting for the vet to arrive and take a look at a growth on her neck:


Unfortunately, the vet suspects the growth may be cancerous. We will go back next Tuesday for surgery to remove tissue from the surrounding area.



Geri did a wonderful job of being her calm self for almost the entire time we were at the vet. She waited until after the vet drew a blood sample before she flipped the switch from calm, still reptile to squiggly-wiggly squirming running away reptile. She ran right back out of her transport box, to the vet's surprise!

But she behaved herself again for the entire ride back to campus.

The students who care for Geri were grateful to know that she was getting attention from the vet, but are now worried about her cancer diagnosis. I just hope that we can all continue to provide Geri with the best possible life for as long as possible, however the diagnosis turns out. She has been a wonderful animal for the students in Animal Physiology to meet and work with.

Last night after going to bed, I felt something change about my saliva, which is an oddly specific thing to experience. It now has a mildly uncomfortable edge to it. By now it seems that was a very early sign of fighting off some form of infection. I will COVID test the second I get home. Honestly, I'm not too optimistic. I've been in a series of higher-risk environments over the last week or so.

I finally found a few minutes to go through and upload a handful of photos from the regatta and surrounding activities. I'm just going to share two photos, altogether.

Here is our sunrise view from Tuesday morning's practice:


And here is George, perched smugly on top of my pile of rowing kit:


George has figured out how to escape from the Catio. We don't know where he's escaping from, yet. The very good news is that when I called to him on Tuesday evening, he came running over to me, then flopped down right at my feet so I could carry him back indoors. He seems to understand that we are his source of dinner, if nothing else.

It's starting to feel like the middle of the semester.

S and I had originally thought that maybe we'd get out for some sort of boating adventure this past weekend, but that turned out to not be in the cards, so we turned it into a project weekend instead.

One of the projects that has been on the list for a while has been creation of a Catio for George and Martha.

Another project that has been on the list for a while has been to assemble a giant tent that I hauled away from the rowing club some months back, and stowed on our back porch. The rowing club hasn't used the giant tent in any of the 7 years I've been rowing with the club, and it was very bulky and awkward to store. I told the other rowers I would try assembling it to see whether all the parts were still there.

It actually turned out to be pretty easy to assemble the frame:


The covering pieces are a mess: mouse-chewed and reeking of mouse pee.

The frame also looked like it might make for a nice Catio.


But would it fit in the place where we might want a Catio?

Yes, it would.


I want the Catio to have an access door, for a whole bunch of different reasons. So that meant it was time for a trip to the hardware store.

But also, on the list of potential projects for the weekend, S had written down "cherry tree shopping." So first we went way up the road to Faddegon's Nursery, which I have been wanting to visit for forever but have never gone to previously because it is too far away on the wrong side of the airport if you are a person who lives in Albany and bikes everyhwere.

But if we're going out in the car anyway to run errands, we might as well go up to Faddegon's, no?

Anyway, it's the wrong time of year to be buying fruit trees, which meant that they were out of sour cherry trees, but the trees they had left were all on super sale at 50% off.

So S picked out an apricot tree to bring home, giving us flashbacks to that one time in Texas when he bought an apple tree and we crammed it into a friend's already very full car.


By the time we made it home, it was getting late, so I switched over to cooking up a storm while S worked on framing a doorway and rudimentary door. Since we rent, this whole Catio assembly is designed such that we can take it back down again fairly quickly when we need to do so.

The weather was lovely yesterday afternoon when I got home, so of course Martha REALLY wanted to go outside. And then, so did George. He gets really mad when he wants to join in and gets left behind. So I got both of them all leashed up and we went out.



For some reason that tree to the left smelled particularly interesting to both cats.



I've been keeping Martha on a shorter leash for walks, but left George with a longer leash. So far this hasn't caused too many problems. So far.

George had fun pouncing on insects in the grass. By the way, the landlord's maintenance guy must have come by yesterday afternoon, because all of the grape hyacinths have been mowed down. Sigh.



Then our neighbor came outside with his Yorkshire terrier, and with all the excited yapping things became stressful enough that I picked up both cats, one in the crook of either arm, and brought them back inside again. They didn't protest at that point.

Meanwhile, have a look at one of the bumblebees guarding the barberry bush:




I think I'm going to leave work early again today.

Even in less politically challenging times, this time of year is difficult for me. The semester is in full swing and I'm mostly just trying to keep up with the speed of the treadmill so I don't fall off the back. Trying to process current events and think about how I need to respond is exhausting. I'm not in the same position as the many scientists who work for the government who are losing their jobs right now, or as colleagues who are worried about the consequences of the Dear Colleague letter issued by the Department of Education last week for the sake of the courses and curricula they teach. But those items aren't very far removed from me, especially considering my institution's commitments to fostering diversity and working on social justice issues.

Plus, it's still winter, and right now with the current cold snap spring feels very abstract and far away.

So anyway, it's a time to appreciate even the very smallest signs of progress.

1. Here's a fun one. Our dear cats can be a handful when there's just one person around most of the time (I'm often away from home from well before sunrise to well after sunset). So the other morning, I took a toilet paper tube, bent the ends, and put some of the cats' favorite treats inside.





When both ends were folded closed, neither George nor Martha seemed inclined to try and bash or rip their way in, so I eventually unfolded one part and then George was willing to bat the tube around until the tasty pieces of freeze-dried salmon fell out.

Now I just need to come up with even more simple but creative ideas like this one. I did refill the tube with catnip this morning, and I recharged George's flopping fish and put it in a paper bag for him.

2. It has been cold enough this week that I'm back to wearing ski pants for the bike commute. There are a couple of elements to the ski pants that make them less than ideal for bike commuting. One of the elements is the shape of the cuffs, which flare slightly. The shape isn't so severe that the cuffs snag on the chainring, but the grease pattern shows you that this is a potential issue:



So this morning, I installed a second set of snaps on the outside, so the drive side cuff is tapered. Since the rain pants I bought recently are actually designed for bicycling, they come with a similar feature already built in.



Yesterday I also fished out the small, colorful rechargeable emergency bike light I bought in California, and figured out how to affix it to my helmet:



I only wish it had better battery life, as it seems to only last 3-4 hours before needing a recharge.

3. Lastly, the mystery aquatic plants have sprouted tiny stems, mostly in the center near the base of the fake rock:



I am kind of thinking it would be fun to create a Stonehenge-style set of rock structures for the female bettas. I just need to figure out where to get appropriate rocks.

Most of what I did yesterday involved looking at code/scripts for statistical analyses, which is important but not especially photogenic. So, not a whole lot to report on, for manuscript-writing.

Although I can note that Izzy has been extremely cute with this black pipe cleaner he has been chasing all over the house. At one point he got it stuck under the refrigerator. At another point, he dropped it in his water bowl.



Late in the afternoon, Cassie decided it was Kitty Lap Time.



I'm pleased to have won her approval. Just don't tell George and Martha.

She is also such a cute cat.


I need to work on getting all my stuff organized for travel. I'm hoping to ship things back to myself, to try and free up at least a little more space in the car. I have this feeling that it's going to cost as much to ship the hitch rack back to New York, as it cost to buy the hitch rack in the first place.

But in the realm of getting loose ends tidied up, I'm pleased that rowing teammate L and I got all of the boat slings back over to the boathouse, got the wood treated, and put what fire hose we had onto them.



I still don't actually know where one buys or obtains fire hose for this kind of project.

It felt like a surprisingly busy weekend. On Saturday, scrottie and I ran a series of errands in the morning, including visiting multiple garden shops to see if any of them had the correct sort of decorative wrought-iron hook for sytharin's kitchen broom (answer: nope).

I always enjoy ogling plants and garden wares, anyway. This particular shop has an impressive collection of expensive but twee things for sale.



In the afternoon, a couple friends came over and we walked to a nearby park to see if the recent rain had translated to any changes in stream flow through the park. It hadn't, but RAC did spot a stick with a pleasing fungus on it, which is apparently known as "Crystal Brain Fungus."



I've been on a mission to help RAC use up some of the awkward ingredients that have been languishing in her cupboards, so Saturday's dinner was another round of this roasted root vegetable and wheat berry salad. I accidentally overcooked the wheat berries, but even so this salad tastes like wonderful comfort food.

S brought George and Martha back for the weekend as well. The cats haven't all become one magical big happy family yet, but in general they are handling things pretty well. It's amusing how RAC and slydevil's cats never cared for this wool cat cave, but George and Martha both approve of it.



I'm also amused by how Cassie tolerates being held in a way that makes her look like a Nyan Cat.


The weather was finally clear enough on Sunday afternoon for me to get another coat of varnish on Petrichor. I'm pleased to report that the trick of sticking the foam brush in the freezer totally worked.





Then we had a delicious fondue feast for dinner, but I haven't uploaded any photos of that yet.

This morning it was raining again, as forecast, so we got the boat turned back over so it won't fill completely with water. S and I then went shopping for more varnish, as it looks like the ultra-clear pint will run out before all the coats are on. From that we learned that the Svendsen's Bay Marine location in Richmond is more of a boatyard than a store (though they do have a chandlery!), but Whale Point Marine did at least have the more traditionally-hued Pettit Captain's varnish. So I think the outside of the boat will now wind up with more of an amber tint. But that is fine.

Varnish Count:
Interior: 2 of 5 coats
Exterior: 2 of 5 coats