Big Rescue Event in Raymond or Cat in the Tree Hoopla

This is Sammy. Sammy is the new Butterscotch and white kitten who greets us every morning when Elaine and I walk. She has a home, but is overly friendly and likes the ritual of being petted and getting a small handout of dry cat food every morning. We’ve met her owner and luckily, he doesn’t object to our ritual. In the past, we had one woman who starved the cat she had and tried to get us arrested for helping the poor animal out. Anyway, as we were walking past Sammy’s house 3 days ago, we heard a kitty in distress. When we finally looked up, we realized that Sammy was up a tree and was afraid to come down. We called and encouraged her to come down, but she was too freaked out. I knocked on Sammy’s owner’s door and he told us she had already spent a day in the tree before we found her. Not knowing what else to do, I called the mayor’s office, even though it was Saturday. The sheriff’s department came on line and I told the lady on the phone our predicament. I asked her to contact Animal Control and she did. So I drove to Sammy’s house and showed the two officers who came out where the cat was. They tried and tried for a couple of hours, but no luck.  Sammy was not coming down. I gave up for the day and went home.  The next morning, Elaine said she didn’t want to walk by the cat again since it was going on the third day and didn’t want to hear her cries of distress. So we walked another way. Unknown to us, the Animal Control officer contacted the fire department and they came over to see about the cat. A number of people were coming out of their houses to see what the commotion was about. The police were there, and a few other rescue vehicles. They decided to use the fire hose to knock the cat out of the tree. By this time, some of the neighbors set their lawn chairs in the yard and continued to watch with refreshments in hand.  Well, it took 3 tanker fulls of water for them to be successful. The more they sprayed, the higher up the cat went. Finally, Sammy fell out of the tree. There was supposed to be a guy at the bottom of the tree holding a small trampoline to catch the kitty, but when the cat came down, he panicked and ran away.Why, I don’t know, but that was what I was told by the spectators. Sammy hit the ground running and took off, away from the crowd. I guess she gave up one of her nine lives, but she survived. The next day, when Elaine and I went by Sammy’s house, she came out to greet us. I checked her all over, but she had no injuries. I was amazed. So I gave her a handful of kitty chow, smiled, and moved on.

One-Way on Elm

About a month ago, the county decided to make one block of Elm Street one way in Raymond. First they put up a sign saying one-way, but the towns people kept driving past the sign and not noticing it. The next day, another one-way sign was put up on the other side of the road. No one paid any attention. So the next day, they put up a barrier. This got some attention, but it wasn’t the right kind of attention. The morning after they added the barrier, I noticed that someone had hit it. The next morning, it had completely collapsed. Another morning, someone had thrown it up onto the grass. Needless to say, it was very amusing to watch. However, it wasn’t amusing to the people who finally received a ticket from our local police force. Johnny Law just calmly waited a block down from the site and waited for cars to appear. It was like shooting fish in a barrel.

Mary's Basket III

This is the third basket for the folks in Alabama. They wanted a duplicate of one of my sample baskets. Much to my delight, they look quite similar. The basket is made with the fern stitch, and the coins came from a dress that I bought at Good Will.

Tuesday Morning’s Gift

Woke up this morning to a temperature of only 25 degrees. None the less, Elaine and I took our daily walk with puffy coats, ear muffs, gloves, and a scarf. As usual, Palestine Street was windy and cold and we were glad to turn on Elm Street where the wind was calm. We fed our usual feral cats and headed toward Gillespie Circle. As we approached, there were flocks and flocks of Black Birds, Robins, and Pine Siskins. It looked like the Robins and the Pine Siskins had just arrived from their migration. They moved in waves as we made our way around the block, undulating from trees to ground and then back to trees. Their voices filled the air and it was exhilarating to watch and listen to their chorus. We stopped more than once to just take it all in. Living in a small town like Raymond gives us the privilege to experience nature on an amazing scale. Who’d a thought.

Mary’s Basket II

This is the second basket of the five commissioned. The stitching on the lower sides of the basket is the Wheat Stitch. On the upper part is the Fern Stitch. The lid also contains the Wheat and the Fern Stitch as well.  The base of the basket is made from Cherry wood.

I found this recipe in Well Being Magazine. I’ve made it 3 times, and it gets better and better each time. However, I have modified it to suit my taste. After carefully looking at the photo, I saw corn, but there is no corn in the ingredients below. So I added the corn and also some black beans as well. Instead of using the green stuff on top, I added sour cream. This recipe tastes even better the day after.

Southwestern Lasagna

Ingredients

1 pound 95% lean ground sirloin (ground turkey is better)

1 teaspoon minced garlic

1 (16-ounce) jar salsa (I only added 1/3 since the salsa was medium hot)

1 1/4 cups enchilada sauce

Salt and pepper to taste (optional) (the enchilada sauce was salty enough)

1 cup fat-free cottage cheese

1 large egg white, beaten

6 (6-inch) flour tortillas, cut into thirds

1 cup shredded reduced-fat Monterey Jack cheese

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. 2. In large nonstick skillet coated with nonstick cooking spray, brown beef and garlic over medium heat about 8 minutes or until meat is done. Drain excess fat. Add salsa, enchilada sauce, and salt and pepper (if using). Bring mixture to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer 10 minutes. 3. In small bowl, combine the cottage cheese and egg white. Coat a13x9x2-inch baking dish with nonstick cooking spray. 4. Spread thin layer of meat sauce in the dish. Layer with half the tortillas, all of the cottage cheese mixture, half the remaining meat mixture, and half the cheese. Repeat layers, omitting the cottage cheese layer and ending with the meat sauce. Sprinkle the remaining cheese on top and bake for 25–30 minutes or until bubbly. Let stand for 5 minutes before cutting.

Ruth’s Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Cook the ground turkey and garlic till done. Add salsa and enchilada sauce.
Bring to a boil. Cook 5 minutes.

Combine cottage cheese and egg white in a bowl.

In a glass baking dish, spread some of the meat sauce on the bottom. Put some of the cut flour tortillas down next. Then spread some of the cottage cheese on top. More tortillas, more meat sauce, more cottage cheese. On the final layer spread the rest of the meat sauce. Cover with cheese.

Bake 25-30 minutes. Let stand for 5 minutes before cutting.

At Long Last

It’s been eight years since I moved back to Mississippi and during that time, Bill and I renovated the entire house, all except for the kitchen. Finally, this past August, he and I agreed to take on the kitchen. We finally finished it right before Thanksgiving. Well, we still need to install a hood over the stove, put in some mood lighting, and thresholds, but it is mostly complete and I have breathed a sigh of relief. My house has now returned from chaos.

Renovating a 125-year-old house certainly had its challenges. One of the side effects we discovered is that when you make major changes to an old house, you wake up the ghost who made his appearance at different times during the renovations. The kitchen was the worst. Lloyd (the ghost), kept turning on the TV during the days I was working in the kitchen. The first time he did it, it made me jump out of my skin because the volume was on high. After that though, the more he turned on the TV, the less response he got from me. I just got used to it. Some ghosts aren’t scarey. In fact, Lloyd has been known to have a sense of humor. I figure we can co-exist.

There was a drop ceiling in the kitchen that we wanted to remove. To our surprise, there were 3 layers of ceiling under the tiles. And although you can only see Bill in the photos, I worked right along side him the whole way. Somebody had to take the photos.

My favorite part of the kitchen is the upper shelving we extended all around the room that holds my bird collection.  There is a section for chickens, ducks, song birds, raptors, shore birds, and pelicans. A life time collection is now on display. Hooray!