Friday, February 29, 2008, 21:02
A Pain in the Ribs
When I started coming down with the latest virus on Tuesday, I started coughing. I pretty much coughed for 24 hours straight from Wednesday on into Thursday. And now my ribs are so sore I can hardly breathe, much less move around to do anything.
I had no idea a person's ribs could get so sore from coughing. Even just touching my ribs is painful. It was a dry cough, too. A persistent dry cough as if I had something stuck in my throat. Randy says people have told him that the "bronchitis, coughing, sore throat" virus is really a form of influenza that was not covered by this year's flu shot.
Great. That *really* makes my day.
LeAnn R. Ralph
Wednesday, February 27, 2008, 15:58
Hiding in the Hay
There I was, coming back to the house with the horse buckets Tuesday morning. I was almost to the basement door when a small gray head thrust itself out from beneath the hay covering the new daylilies I planted last year. I received the daylilies as a thank you gift from a lady to whom I had provided advice about kittens.
I can hardly wait to see if the daylilies survived the winter. I certainly hope they did. It has been so cold, but I covered them with a thick layer of hay last fall. The lady raises daylilies and cross pollinates to get different colors.
Anyway, as I approached the house, the small gray head with amber-yellow eyes thrust itself out farther from the hay.
"Katerina!" I said.
(KATERINA?)
"Katerina, what in the world are you doing out here?"
The kitten emerged from the hay. Her tail was fluffed to four times its normal size and the hair was standing up along her back.
"Katerina, are you cold?" I said as I picked up the kitten. As soon as I picked her up, she started to relax. Katerina probably was cold. It was only about 10 degrees Tuesday morning.
I took Katerina in the house and put her upstairs.
I have no idea when Katerina sneaked outside. She must have done it while I was getting water buckets out of the basement for the horses. Which means she was outside for quite a while as I was feeding and watering and picking up horse manure. Thank goodness she stuck her head out of the hay when I came toward the house, otherwise she might have been outside longer yet before I discovered that she was not in the house.
Monday morning Dora sneaked outside on me when I was getting horse buckets. Fortunately, I saw her right away. But for the rest of the day, whenever I opened the door upstairs, Dora was right there, ready to go outside again. (sigh)
When I told Randy about Katerina's escapade, he reiterated that *none* of them are allowed outside. "It's not safe outside for kittens. What if something happens to one of them?" he said.
I am going to have to be particularly vigilant after this when I open the door to carry out horse buckets if Katerina, Henry and Dora happen to be downstairs.
Virus
I'm so happy I could spit. I have snagged my third virus of the season. This one is the one that ends up in bronchitis and a sinus infection. It seems that everywhere I go, people are coughing and sounding like they are on their last legs. That's probably the way they feel, too. I know that's the way I feel. There seems to be an unusual amount of illness around here this year. I'm thinking that the days and days and days of zero or subzero temperatures (we're up to 40 now because it was 0 degrees Fahrenheit Wednesday morning) have not been particularly good for anyone. The weather warmed up for a few days over the weekend, but now this week it is rather cold again. The high temperature on Tuesday iwas about 20 degrees.
LeAnn R. Ralph