..are having issues with old links, the website being one, you need that s. Just plug it into your browser URLS and save it, and you should not have any trouble.
Jane and I are finishing the edit, Betsy is eagerly awaiting same, and we are doing ok—some family illness issues have slowed us (Jane’s side) and we are trying to take care of that while finishing the edit, so be patient with us.
thanks for keeping us informed… and safe.
To all members of the Wavy Navy BCS Support Group: I sent Ben a letter about a week ago with some stamps, asking for an update on what’s happening, whether he was able to start ordering supplies online with his new computer, etc. etc. I’m waiting to hear back from him, but so far, nothing. I hope he’s okay, and further hope he’s been able to reach out to some local assistance.
I donāt think Hanneke & several others who have been helping him out with some food purchases have had a letter from him in the past month.
I’ve heard nothing either, but I’m more of a lurker in BCS Support Group.
And now for your paranoia inducing story of the day:
Last night, something ran across DH when we were in bed — twice. We got up and ripped apart the bed — twice. DH was getting back into bed after the second time, and got bit on the hand (I thought at first it was a stab from one of my sewing needles)! I shook out the sheet, and out dropped a large centipede, which promptly fled to the hard to get to area under the platform bed. I declared chemical war and set off a bug bomb, while we retreated to the living room to try to sleep. The cat was overjoyed that we were available to pay attention to her all night long, which, along with the very painful bite, made sleeping near impossible.
This morning we returned to the smelly bedroom and commenced a thorough search for the centipede, which we did not find. I hope it fled, or is in some remote corner and dying. Meanwhile, the bedroom is now airing out and the cleanest it’s been since we moved in.
I sent BCS a letter halfway through April, and two e-mails 3 & 4 weeks ago whenbAmazon sent me a warning mail about the Jif peanutbutter I ordered fpr him possibly containing Salmonella, but didn’t receive any replies. I haven’t heard from BCS in a long while, and hope he hasn’t been poisoned by the peanutbutter.
At the noment I do npt have tge brainspace to worry about him, I’m too focused on what is going on here: my father is terminally ill with pancreatic cancer, metastatised to his liver. Iāve taken carerās time off (compassionate leave?) and am staying at his house to take care of him until the end, as he wishes to die at home.
He has high hopes of rejoining my mother in Heaven, and is mostly at peace with going to her, though grumbly about being sick.
It is more all-consuming and tiring than I had expected when I started this, three weeks ago, and the doctors still give him āweeks to monthsā, so we just hang in there and I try to keep him as comfortable as possible. He is sleeping a lot, and eating steadily less, and doesnāt have enough energy left to keep himself warm even though itās summer: he needs three blankets and two hot water bottles to sit up for an hour or two, to eat something or talk to visitors, before going back to bed exhausted. Hard to see happening to someone I love.
I know this blog is mostly inactive now, but it is a place I connected with Internet friends, and I just wanted to let those of you know, who felt such a connection too.
I remember you had sent me an e-mail about your father; I am very sorry to hear that he is ill and likely not long for this world. You should take care of yourself and your family first. If you need to vent or be encouraged, we are here.
BCS has had a lot of attention and support from the Wavy Navy for the past year and a half. If he needs more help, I hope he reaches out (not necessarily to us), but if he doesn’t, we can’t do much for him.
Hanneke, we are saddened to learn that your father is so poorly. We empathize with your exhaustion. While my mother was dying of cancer at home, I had a support system. My husband and his parents plus hospice nurses all helped in her last six months. Her cancer metastasized to her bones, her liver, and her brain. The hardest to deal with was the dementia. ReadyGuy and I hope your father goes gently, peacefully. Take care of yourself and take opportunities to get out of your home to socialize with your own friends and colleagues. Just three hours a week can do so much help you remain resilient. A walk in the park or your neighborhood does much to clear your emotions, and a good cry in privacy is as necessary as oxygen.
Oh, this is part of my “daily rounds”, but yes, there hasn’t been much to say.
My father was in terminal colon cancer when my mother, a smoker, died of a sudden coronary. They’d been divorced for years and he’d remarried, but got it into his head that she’d be waiting for him. My Aunt said, “it was like the air going out of a balloon”. He was dead in 2 weeks.
I just sent BCS another card asking him to let us know how he is. I know others of the support group had asked Houston PD to do a wellness check on him previously, and have sent him letters and cards asking after his welfare; perhaps it’s time for another check?
I hesitate to suggest cutting him off from the occasional Amazon shipment if he is still alive and well, but if we don’t know his status, we don’t know if he is living in the apartment any more and/or anything we send is getting porch pirated.
Did you ever really know his true status?
Last night we came home late, and found the cat pawing at something in the darkened room. DH flipped on the lights and found her poking at a large centipede that was trying to climb up the pantry door. Not having anything better to hand, I kicked it hard with my Birkenstocks and managed to crush its midsection, then stomped it after it fell off the door. Revenge is sweet, considering that DH’s hand swelled horribly and the doctor pronounced it infected, with a side helping of tetanus shot and antibiotics.
Heard from BCS — e-mail on his latest has been sent to all interested parties.
“I’m not dead yet!” Mary, Queen of Scots via Monty Python
Chondrite – I never got the update email at pwhthse at cox dot net
I sat on the front porch this morning and listened to the rain march down the road and across the house. It was rather wonderful.
I wonder how often I miss wonderful things simply by not sitting quietly and paying attention.
About my recent life:
(Spoiler; may be boring)
Went to have my eyes checked late last year. They found that the membrane atop the retina had contracted, pulling the retina up from the back of the eye. Surgery, and a comedy of errors with getting rides, but good success. Unfortunately, the vision in that eye went way downhill. This made my job much more difficult.
Meanwhile, Mama’s memory is having significantly larger gaps. She finally consented to having her hip replaced after I left my job. It was outpatient surgery, and she is recovering remarkably for a woman of 50, let alone for one of her 87 years!
On the other hand, I will have to have another surgery or two to replace the lenses in my eyes. Life’s like that; one thamned ding after another….
BTW, my computer ate itself and died, taking many recipes with it. Is there a way I can find the one(s) I posted here?
If you remember the names of the recipes, you ought to be able to search by that.
It only returns page names. Marmalade Cookies is the one I most regret losing.
š I had printed out your Marmalade Cookie recipe because DH likes marmalade. Alas! DH did not like the cookies, so I got rid of the recipe.
Ah, well. Maybe when the lady comes back home.
First recipe I made up out of my own head rather than adapting.
Here it is, with the intro:
Speaking of experiments, hereās one that turned out well:
Marmalade Cookies
1 8 oz block of cream cheese
1 4 oz stick of butter
1 cup sugar
2 cups marmalade
2 cups well chopped nuts
3 cups whole wheat flour
Cream together cheese and butter. Cream in sugar. Thouroughly blend in marmalade and nuts. Stir in flour until smooth. Form into logs and refrigerate. Slice thinly and lay out on greased cookie sheets.
Bake at 325F for 15 ā 25 minutes.
I did a search:
site:https://www.cherryh.com/WaveWithoutAShore/ marmalade
It gets two pages with “marmalade”, and the first is the one you want – it’s from 2020.
Dad was Canadian, so Iwas introduced to such things as Marmalade, & Gooseberry Pie. Seems one is likely to have British connections for either. But I find American Marmalade too sweet, and imported, too expensive.
Paul, marmelade is not that hard to make yourself, like most jams, once you find a site to tell you which fruits need extra pectin (or combining with higher-pectin fruits, like my favorite combo of strawberries, cherries from the orchards all around my parent’s village, and red currants from my garden, possibly with a few crabapple slices for extra setting power). Oranges contain lots of pectin themselves, so no need to combine or add extra.
There are lots of online recipes, from simple to elaborate, and some (like the one linked above) can give some extra explanations on what works and why.
I don’t like my jams too sweet, so I make them with half the usual sugar but added pectin so they still gell properly. Less sugar makes them last less long on the shelf, but in the refrigerator that’s no problem.
Here the supermarkets sell 500 grams packets of “gelling sugar”, to use with 1 kg of fruit, for about double what ordinary sugar costs, which comes to the same price for the end result as you use half as much.
I looked for those on the big US online supermarket site and was astounded by the prices they asked, but did find the pectin separately.
The one time I made marmelade myself it was with ordinary oranges and
white grape juice instead of sugar-water, and my usual gelling sugar, and it turned out quite tasty.
Honestly, I am shocked by the prices for food on Amazon.
I already noticed a year ago, buying some groceries for BCS, that it cost two or three times as much as buying my own groceries here, but lately it looks as if sellers in the US have raised those prices even further.
It looks like people in the US are being wildly overcharged for anything they can get away with, now they can blame the price hikes on oil shortages and the war in Ukraine, Covid and Biden.
Here’s the Dutch least-cheap supermarket (Albert Heijn) price for 500 gr.gelling sugar: 1 euro 69.
Here’s the Amazon price for 500 gr.gelling sugar: 15 dollars!!!
Really, you need much stronger laws against monopolies and monopsonies, and maybe a maximum profit percentage on food, medicines and essentials to prevent these big companies from extorting their customers this way.
From Wikipedia:
Gelling sugar or (British) Jam sugar or (US) Jelly sugar or sugar with pectin is a kind of sugar that is used to produce preserves, and which contains pectin as a gelling agent. It also usually contains citric acid as a preservative, sometimes along with other substances, such as sorbic acid or sodium benzoate
This sounds like a specialist preserving product, and Amazon is offering a European product that I suspect is shipped in very low volume from Europe, thus the high price. Is BCS actually putting up preserves?
If you just want common sugar or cane sugar, look far down the Amazon list for Domino, C&H, or Sugar in the Raw, or Happy Belly, Amazon’s brand. These will be sourced in the US and be much less expensive. I most recently (not very recently) bought Sugar in the Raw, but it was 6 pounds, 2.7 kg. Currently offered is 2 poinds, 907g) for about US$4.
But, the most common US sugar is granulated white sugar, about the same price. Sugar in the Raw may be an acquired taste BCS may or may not like.
(Amazon prices change at seemingly random times in seemingly random directions. It’s not really a discount store any longer. It’s a common pattern in the US: a store enters the market as a discount store, establishes that reputation, and then abandons discounting to make more money.)
(US products in general tend to do something like sell 500g for $2, then 400g [tiny print] for $2, then 300g for $2, then 500g “Over 50% more!!!” for $3. Rinse and repeat. It’s the same over most product: packages don’t actually shrink, just how much product they put in the package. Products also get sometimes literally watered down. You’d probably find common US cheese very bland. Or chocolate. Or “Mixed nuts” means half the weight will be whatever nut is cheapest at the moment.)
Walt, this wasn’t for BCS! He’s back to buying his own groceries online, luckily just before my bandwidth was taken over with caring for my dad. Dad’s funeral (sad but nice) was on the 4th of July, and I’m getting back to my own routines at work and in my own home, which includes checking this blog regularly.
This was just me looking up my usual ingredient for homemade jams & marmelade to point at for Paul, as my verbal descriptions are often less clear.
I did notice it was probably imported and that that figured into the price. But the more noticeable thing for me was that there appears to be no cheap local alternative, while I get the impression that quite a few people who live more rurally do quite a bit of their own preserving.
Thay apparently your own US sugar-, homecooking and preserving-stuff brands do not want to produce something that is this easy to make cheaply and would be so useful to all those home-preserving people.
That not taking this easy option to fulfill an unmet demand is apparently not considered detrimental to their business interests points to quite a captive domestic market, instead of the supposedly free capitalist marketplace with lots of healthy competition.
I’ve read that your anti-trust laws demand that consumers prove that a specific monopoly is bad for consumer prices before enforcement might even be considered; I think this is just one example of a case in point. But who has time, energy, motivation and money to do this for a lot of what is sold through Amazon, and then take on their lawyers?
@Hanneke, I may not do “preserving”, and do live on a 5A (~12.4 hectare) plot, but I do have a 7’x8′ plot I dedicate to growing hardneck garlic (Allium ophioscorodon, Gr: “snake garlic”). Coincidentally, I dug it yesterday and it’s now laid out for curing. My normal harvest is my year’s supply, lately 11-13lb, and I love “the stinking rose”. (This year’s looks to be on the higher side. Last year’s cured during our killer “heat-dome”, didn’t cure properly and hasn’t lasted the year. 8-( )
I’m north of the 45th Parallel, and Mediterranean softneck (A. sativum) doesn’t do well with our winters.
Hanneke,
Please excuse me for misunderstanding you. I’m very sorry to hear about your father. Take care of yourself, please.
I think preserving is pretty rare in the US, by population. We tend to live frantic lives with no time for simple pleasures like preserving, so we grab prepared products instead of making our own. Perhaps all the Covid isolation time at home has changed this.
My cooking is very rusty, and I have never preserved so these suggestions are theoretical. I’ll just wave hands with “economies of scale” that common, mass-produced items are far cheaper than specialist items: it may be more economical to buy pectin to add to common sugar to make your own jelling sugar, but I’m unsure if that is difficult; adding high-pectic ingredients like citrus peels may be an option. I do not know.
The first place I would look with my poor skills is The Joy of Cooking, an American cookbook that does not just list recipes, but also has tutorials on every aspect of cooking. I do not know that preserving is included, but its absense would surprise me.
(As far as I know. our anti-trust laws are the same as when IBM and AT&T were leashed, but the politics and determination to “do something” have changed. Perhaps this is changing, but the recent view has been that any competitor, even one supported by a foreign government, means no monopoly exists. Amazon’s monopoly is not so much products as logistics and delivery, and a dominant web storefront with hard to find complete information and wildly changing prices.)
I would add to Walt’s explanation that “preserving” was something my parents’ generation did because even in LA in the 50’s there were producers, and “fruit stands”, from whom we could get fresh fruit, where it is now wall to wall (literally) houses.
Where I am now, where fresh fruits are still close at hand but on the edge of rapid “development”, some of the local stores I frequent still carry canning supplies in summer. Besides my garlic, I have 6 semi-dwarfed apple trees in my backyard, 2 Gravenstein & 4 Esopus Spitzenberg, and a half-dozen aged pie-cherry trees at the edges of the front yard.
Perhaps apropos your message below about monopolies and concentration of corporate power, which I agree is a big problem here (We HAVE HAD anti-monopoly laws for over a century. They just aren’t enforced! “International competition” is the typical boogey-man.), marmalade should traditionally be made of Seville oranges. I’ve NEVER seen one. I haven’t even seen a Valencia orange since I was a kid. (Likewise a “greengrocer”.) Nowadays they’re all navel oranges, in one bin, in the corner of a supermarket given to fruits & vegetables. Meat & dairy sections are larger.
The one arguable, very arguable all thing considered, advantage to the modern way of providing food is that sort-of-fresh fruits & vegetables are provided all year long via air-transport.
p.s. I was limiting myself to fresh foods in typical super-markets purveying food; all there are these days most places. Processed foods must make up at least as much as fruits, vegetables, dairy, & meat combined. Non-food items make up nearly as much. That’s to say nothing of “super-stores”.
Sadly, I seem to be gel-impaired; I cannot make cranberry sauce set with half the water and twice the sugar called for in the recipe.
Thank you< thank you, thank you! There is so much I don't know, and lots of it is about computers.
For others, Google: recipe “Tommie on” site:cherryh.com
Replace ‘recipe’ with any other word that might be useful, like marmalade.
“Tommie on” snags just your posts (look at the top of one of your posts), and of course, site:cherryh.com restricts the search to just this web site.
Walt, thank you for explaining how to do this.
This is going to be useful, and I didn’t know how.
You’re welcome!
Perhaps I should caution that it’s not perfect. “User on” and “recipe” will find things like, “User on roller blades is a recipe for disaster,” which have nothing to do with food.
The search could also be restricted by adding words commonly only found in recipes, like oz and cup or kg or liter (litre?) “Oz” may or may not match “ounce” (depending on Google), and “g” will match everything.
I have spent this last 4 days down with The Plague; fortunately I am double vaxxed and double boosted, so I have a relatively mild case. OTOH, I’m fairly certain the vector was our weekly gaming group, which put 6 of the 8 attendees down with COVID š Moral of the story is make sure you take all precautions, even if it’s a small gathering of close friends! We made the mistake of thinking it was ok to not wear masks, which was our downfall.
I tried to make POG jelly/jam (Passionfruit, orange, guava), but apparently got a stale batch of pectin, so the result was closer to syrup than jelly. Still tastes good on waffles and ice cream š
I am having to phone in to work; we aren’t set up for remote work because most library work needs to be in person. We are interviewing this week for an entry-level position, and the applicants have been very hit or miss. 2 of the staff and myself are conducting the interviews, and fortunately the 2 that weren’t local were done before I took sick. Phone interviews with our crappy phone system even if it’s just me calling in are difficult, because there are a lot of dropouts and I miss every third sentence and have to ask for a repeat. Not very professional.
Alliance Unbound (The Hinder Stars Book 2) available for pre-order. Publication date almost a year from now (sob) July 18, 2023.
Darn on that delay. Wonder if itās just supply chain delays, or the DAW buy-out?
Not too unusual, really. I have on I ordered last December, for next December.
From the begining of a Publishers Weekly article, the new owner is Chinese owned Astra Publishing House.
Anyone know more?
When the word came out, Astra said they will retain all the Daw people, and DAW will be the Sci-Fi/fantasy imprint for Astra. On FB, CJ seemed positive about the potential.
For the BCS Support Group, I haven’t heard from Ben for over a month now. I will prod him a couple more times, but unless he contacts me/ us, I think we’ve done all we can for him. I do hope he is well and has managed to sort out some of his issues.
To Our Gracious Hostesses, how proceeds the writing? And your own selves? One hopes everything is running smoothly in your lives.
Hi everyone. Ben W. I am back again, still unsure how stable things are, and it’s hard to read the blog now due to my eyesight.
to the Wavy Navy Team, a big thank you. I will have a snail mail letter to Chondrite and Hanneke soon, and I’ve sent an email I hope will go through.
Big News (and thoughts and prayers needed). My teen mom cat is now giving birth. Two tiny kittens, so far so good, at least one more due, maybe more. They are not yet nursing. I’m nervous, hoping for the best. She and both kittens appear fine so far. My other cat is outside the door.
I hope to have better news once she’s all done. I’m waiting, about to fix lunch. I hope the kittens make it. I have KMR kitten milk replacer to make up, but anxious about this. I have at least a couple of oral syringes to feed them if need be.
Hi there, folksā¦ and Hi there, Ben! I hadnāt been able to get into this version of CJās blog (the link kept on bringing up her old, 2012 pre-WordPress blog) for several months, but then I was reminded that this one had a new version of the URL and so am back myself too.
I just skimmed the discussion on marmalade. I too have been on the look out for good quality (“nice and bitter”) Seville marmalade ever since Trader Joeās was unable to carry an utterly delicious (did I mention “nice & bitter”?) version out of Canada. So, Iāve just ordered two tins of the classic, British “Ma Made” marmalade kit (“just add sugar and cook”) which I always saw in the shops when I lived in Scotland. It has Seville oranges as its base. Iām very hopeful that, when I get the time to actually make this, Iāll be back to eating my homemade bread with marmalade & butter again.
TJ’s has been affected by the international logistics kerfuffle, as you might imagine. They’re gradually returning to normal, but I’m not sure they’re 100% yet. Keep checking, and good luck!
If you like sparkling wine, I noticed they just restocked Espiral Vinho Verde, green wine, a light Portuguese wine. 9%? Vinho Verde comes up in several historical novels (Aubrey/Maturin and Sharpe for examples), but the TJ’s clerks tend to notice the more prominent Espiral more. But if you really like bitter, this isn’t the wine for you.
Hi, Ben! Good to see you’re still with us.
Hi, all. Still here. One more cycle of chemo left. Mom turns 98 on 23 September. She’s mostly wheelchair bound because of her slipped disk and scoliosis. She spends most of her awake time reclined in her lift chair. We communicate by emails and my blog because she can’t understand me on her jicky little flip phone. I can’t go over there because that population is a reservoir of antibiotic resistant bugs, which is all I need with my trashed immune system. Also, the COVID isolation unit is over there. I’ve stopped taking the vincristine because it was starting to make my fingers numb and tingly. He’s worried about nerve damage because the odds are high i’ll have to have several more cycles of chemo (this is my second, my first was in 2018) as the lymphoma is chronic. After next round I’ll have had 6 doses of Rituxan, which is supposed to be the best drug to fight this. I’ve been at this since February. At least I haven’t been in the hospital yet, knock wood (I had a heart attack and four hospitalizations in 2018), but I have no energy and no stamina.
It’s raining right now, and the roof drips on the outside window sill and the way the sound bounces it sounds like the ceiling is leaking on the table behind me, but I’m on 3rd floor and there’s a floor above me. Our playa lakes are full for the first time in months. We needed rain, though, but timing is poor. About now the cotton bolls are setting and the fields need to dry out so they can start stripping/harvesting the early crops.
Word to the wise: Those chair mats with the little spikes on one side that are for rugs and carpet? Don’t lay them spike side up on LVP floors and then forget they’re there and walk on them with (both) bare foots. Of course, I’m on blood thinners and bled all over the floor before I could get to the tape in the other room. Thankfully, the floors are LVP and not carpet and a whole lot easier to clean up.
To heck with the little throw rug under my desk. I ordered a chair mat with no spikes and I’ll put it on the bare floor and put the rug someplace else.
WOL, we’re wishing you return to (more) normal soon. My Father-in-Law turned 98 in June and MiL is 93. They moved here to AZ last winter and so spouse and I have been busy caring for them and making sure they have all they need and get to their appointments as needed. I didn’t realize how easy we had it as empty-nesters. At least they have their own home about a half mile from here. Talking politics with them is no fun, and that seems all they are interested in other than doctor’s visits.
WOL & ready4more, nice to hear from both of you. Glad to hear that you are hanging in there, WOL and just one more round of chemo to go through. Iām envious of your rain, weāre in the middle of a long, summer drought here in Massachusetts too and out trees are aching for water.
Wishing CJ a very Happy Birthday! CJ and Jane, I hope all is well with you both, and with the cats, the koi, and health, home, and writing. I have the Alliance Unbound (sequel to Alliance Rising) on pre-order ebook. I hope we’ll get audiobooks for both novels, as audio is increasingly my mode.
Good News! My teen mom cat’s new kittens are 3 weeks old today and little mama and all four babies are doing well. My cat a year older is once again allowed in with mama and babies. Her reaction has mostly been to ignore them. At least that’s better than aggression, but geez.
Dark brown tabby (male?); skinny bugg-ginger (male?); calico girl; black-and-white tuxedo (boy or girl uncertain yet); I’m not yet sure of their genders. The little tuxedo is anxious when picked up and held, got to work on that. He or she looks different enough from my old gentleman tuxie (gone 1-1/4 years ago) that it isn’t really a reminder. The dark brown tabby is advanced and calm and friendly. The ginger and calico are both fine. So the little tux kitten needs some extra TLC to boost that personality. Little mama is a light brown, faintly orange spice brown, still petite at about a year old. At the end of the moth, she will have been here one year, while at the start of November, the big girl (maybe part Maine Coon Cat) will have been here two years. Seriously, she is built with a large frame, so that you might mistake her for a tomcat if you didn’t know.
Currently, there are two outdoor friendly cats, former house cats. One reappeared, a large brown and white tabby longhair who is friendly again, and in the last few months, a ginger cat with orange eyes, who still has a shabby collar in need of replacing; he’s male too. I believe both are the likely papas of my teen girl’s kittens. — A TNR (trap, neuter, return) group was by a month ago, and so, ah, we believe both males are now neutered. Other semi-feral and feral semi-regulars come by. The two friendlies may become indoor-outdoor cats soon.
No luck as yet, I’m still in limbo. My cats haven’t been to the vet: big girl needs annual boosters and former teen mom needs shots and spay/neuter, plus checkup for her kittens. The kittens will need to be adopted out when old enough. They are behind the growth curve, so may stay longer anyway. But at present, no luck. I got contact info from the TNR folks, but only got an auto-reply to my email, so I don’t know if they will be back as the one lady said. For me, no change. Local contacts dried up, too busy and too far out of heir way. I was and am not happy at that. They knew my situation. and didn’t care to help.
I’m hoping to be able to update my ID online and get a mail-in ballot to vote in the midterms. My voter registration is supposed to be valid still, unless state shenanigans have affected that.
Awaiting apt. inspections over the next few days, with no knowing when they’ll be by. So I’ll have to pop the cats into carriers in haste. Good luck with that!
I am, all in all, feeling halfway good about things and halfway pretty scared about the future. Each time I make a little progress, something knocks it down, and long-term progress has been pretty much a non-starter. “Sir, we do’t do that.” I am so frustrated. Have to try again.
I hope everyone’s doing well. I’ve emailed Chondrite and Hanneke for the Wavy Navy to keep them apprised, after I’d been incommunicado a while due to discouragement and frustration. Doing some better now. — I am making lots of typos these days; my vision is very bad, the cataracts are progressing.
Take care, all. The kittens are a joy and so are the cats, indoors (mine) and outdoors (homeless), with the two likely to be part-time “hotel bib guests.”
The kittens don’t have names yet. Nothing has stuck yet. They are beautiful, wonderful. — What a strange hani crew my local bunch would make! — Best Wishes!
hoppy birdy!