Pandemic Eating

I hear often about how much eating folks are doing while isolating at home. It is all over Facebook and my bank account. If I pass the fridge I almost always open it. If I am busy outside, this happens less. I have developed a cracker addiction. It started when I was in the hospital last month and the only thing that was fit to eat was the cheese and crackers. When I got out, I had my daughter pick me up two boxes. Oh dear they went fast. Plain old saltines, store brand even, but right now they are hitting the spot. I don’t know what the spot is or why it needs crackers, but in lieu of all things salty and crunchy, I am devouring crackers. The ones I fed the chickens were the non-salted ones I bought by mistake. 

When I was living in Victoria, parked in my friend’s driveway, I didn’t cook much for myself unless a friend was coming over. I ate out a lot or more often, ate little snacks all day and no proper meals. Terrible habits for a diabetic. Now that I am here on the farm, no fast food in sight, we are cooking for ourselves here all the time. My daughter and her partner cook some of the nights, and I cook the other nights and once a week or less, we have separate suppers, which I think is very important for our own sanity. Sometimes we eat our lunches together and on occasion I will cook a brunch for us all. We do not share meals with the other family households on the farm property though as we are trying to keep our social distances as much as we can. Newborn baby at one house and two elderly parents at the other. And still I eat crackers...

Nash does not seem affected in any way by the pandemic. For him, the changing outside environment has been his life and we have come here enough I am certain he feels like I do, that it is a second home. He loves looking out the many windows at the activity. Chickens, goats, cats, dogs, birds, bees, bugs and all. He was a bit restless during the last full moon but that is to be expected from cats. It shone so bright it lit up the whole field we are in. 

The warmer days of spring have arrived and we are in shorts and sandals weathers in the afternoons. The mornings are still chilly but by noon it is warm enough. I must change 3-4 times a day with the rise and fall of temperatures. 

My biggest drama of the day was when my water backed up. It was my grey water tank. I am able to empty my grey water on the farm as it is just wash water and dishes, etc. I use biodegradable cleaners and soaps. My daughter’s partner has been bringing me water every day or two in five gallon jugs, usually one or two at a time. I lost track of how much water I had been through and did not pull the plunger on my grey water to let it go and it backed up into the bathtub by about six inches. I do not use the bathtub as a bathtub but rather use it as a closet as there are no real ones in my RV. My clothing hang on a rod above the bathtub. In the bathtub I keep my clothes basket with dirty clothing, a Rubbermaid with my paper products in it (toilet paper, paper towel, tissues), a big bag of cat food in a paper bag, and a few odds and ends. Well the clothing in the basket was filthy, having soaked for a couple days in old dirty dishwater. Ugh. I had to empty the whole tub and try not to let any of the messy crap in the tub touch all of the clothing hanging directly above it. So now I have left the plunger on the grey water tank open, so there will be no further buildup of water. The black water gets pumped out and the guy was here just last week to do that for us both. RV life off the grid is fun...

I have been busy this week painting a few things. First it was a bunch of Easter rocks for my daughter’s little nephew to find. Then I painted a little stand for my daughter to use in her garden when potting plants and seedlings. It is painted light purple like the stripe on my RV. It was leftover paint. I also painted her little round metal table. It was painted once before in Edmonton, but got worn and rusty so I gave it new life again with some leftover dark purple spray paint I have from when I did my wheel rims. My bumper and step into the RV are also the same dark purple. I think they look great! 

It is such a nice day out today, I think I will go see what the chickens are up to, bring a book and read in the sun for awhile. I may or may not read to the chickens. It depends on whether they like Stephen King. Chickens can be finicky.