I’m not feeling so well right now, had a really bad cold the last few days (several negative covid tests say it’s just a cold, anyway, despite me moaning dramatically about it at home). So this post is going to be fairly short/terse. May was about the same as most Mays are for me, though at least I didn’t have a full breakdown anytime this month like I usually do. It was frustrating to have our vacation canceled, twice, and to be stuck doing unexpected construction, and to have the cat situation grow exponentially, but what can you do? The only way out is through.

Reading and Watching
I was into fast, thrilling reads this month that kept me entertained and that I didn’t have to do a lot of extra thinking to read. I’ve declared The Hacienda my favorite, but over time, that may change to Breathless, which seems to be the one that has stuck with me the most. I did get to see a few movies that had been on my list for awhile, too: Death on the Nile, Nomadland,  and of course the newest Downton Abbey in an early showing at Alamo Drafthouse!

Goals
Only one crossed out this month, my Paint Your Pet night for Nimi, which is both a personal goal for 2022 and part of my 50×50 goals!

House
I already wrote about the bathroom saga, and the only other thing related to the house this month was discovering that our red oak by the porch potentially has oak wilt. We need to get an expert in, and I’m hoping that I’m wrong about the diagnosis. If it’s oak wilt, the whole tree has to go. They don’t survive that fungus and it spreads like crazy. So I hope it’s something different!

Health/Fitness
This continued very poorly this month. I did no exercise at all, not one day of it. I did finally get my CPAP toward the end of the month, but the mask doesn’t fit properly, so I’m sleeping worse than ever. I was supposed to get a refit yesterday, but Sunday came down with a really bad cold with a fever, so I have to reschedule once I’m healthy. I also had to skip the next round of tests for my nephrologist, because I can’t take them when I’m sick. My mental health hasn’t been great, and honestly, as much as I love these kitties, I can’t wait until they’re all off to other locations and no longer in my house!

The Ferals
When I last left off regarding Shai, Hulud, the sibling crew, and their mom, Tippy was off for surgery and the babies were in a playpen in the garage. Since then, Tippy has been returned home to her feeder. I sterilized and cat-proofed my room, then moved Shai and Hulud in here until June 2nd when they go to the shelter for surgery/potential-adoption. (Them being in my room, btw, isn’t helping the sleep situation!!) The siblings – now named Tipsy, Tillie, and Penny – moved to Jason’s room after he sterilized it, and have been working on socializing. It’s slow-going, but they’re actually pretty sweet, just timid.

(Tipsy, Tillie, Penny)

I mentioned in the post at the above link that one of the two girls was a chonk? Turned out, she was all fluff, and was actually the lightest, weight-wise, of the kittens! They all lost weight for the first few days but they’re rebounding, and currently on a medication regimen for the next two weeks. One of them has a home after that, the others need to get on an intake list for the shelter since they can’t go through the foster program. Sigh. (This last part is frustrating because it’s not what the shelter originally told me, but if we can’t get them taken in by the time their meds are finished in two weeks, they’ll go to the humane society instead, because they’re young and more likely to find homes that way. I can’t do this on my own like I did last year, because we really can’t have more cats stay in house!!)

Favorite Photos
Didn’t take a whole lot this month, and most of what I took were kitten reference photos, so I basically have four cat portraits and a lizard for you all in May, ha!

Top: anole on the porch, startled Hulud. Bottom: Angus, Nimi, Shai.

Highlights of May
I barely touched my computer this month so I’m struggling to remember the lighter moments of May, but here are a few good moments:

• the kittens bopping around as if they’re big scary creatures, ha!
• homemade scones with clotted cream, even if I shouldn’t eat either of those things…
• squirrel asleep in the crook of our red oak tree
• watching the skunks in our yard!
• finally getting Laurence’s junior and senior photos printed and onto the wall
• the crazy small-world moment at the Paint Your Pet class
• we are all done with school for all the kids!

Coming up in June
Ambrose will be off to the military soon, and the kittens will be off to the shelter one way or another, and then I’m just going to take some time off to hopefully get my health and fitness back to a better level, and my mental health to baseline…