This and That

Just a few random thoughts.

Blogger does not let me upload pictures so my yarnalong contribution has to be postponed.

Today dawned a bit stress laden but got better. Del had his one year post-op check up and these always cause me a bit of anxiety. I try not to let the cancer dominate my life and thoughts but somehow it is always at the back of my mind and when these doctor appointments come around I get a bit stressed. But all is well, his PSA is as good as undetectable, the doctor is happy and so are we.

Miss K. is in one of her 'I don't want to eat cat food' phases again. She did however eat some cooked chicken. I always worry about her when she does not want to eat. We have switched her from the cat food she no longer wanted to an assortment of cat food of different brands and flavors and she has been eating well. I guess the heat does not help either. But other than that she is lively and does not seem to not be feeling well.

We managed to save over 400 KWh last month compared to last year, just by using the A/C for only short periods of time to cool the house down when it gets too warm. Unfortunately the savings in money were not quite corresponding since the price for electricity has gone up since last year.

With our last utilities bill came a pamphlet about our water. Yuck, is all I can say about that. We get city water and the pamphlet tells us where it comes from, how contaminated it is and what problems they had recently (something that they always tell us after the problem had been solved). I had noticed recently that our water filters for the water we drink only last for one month instead of two and that the water smells bad, especially in Summer. Now they tell us that they will add a mixture of chlorine and ammonia to the water for disinfection. The water is supposedly safe for cooking, drinking and bathing, but when you use it in your aquarium it will kill the fish, nice. So, from now on I will use filtered water for cooking as well. We were thinking about getting a faucet mounted filter, but that would be a bit of a waste since I don't need filtered water for cleaning and washing dishes and as quickly as the filters need to be replaced, it would put a little strain on the household budget.You'd think that with all of today's technology it should not be a problem to provide clean drinking water to a city in the USA, but ......

The weather is still brutally hot and last night we had a thunderstorm that did somedamage to my garden, but nothing too bad. We have started work on another section of our property to hopefully turn it into more veggie garden next year. I picked my first cucumbers today, now it is time to make some yogurt for some tzatziki to go with our grilled zucchini. It is that time of year now when we eat zucchini with every meal. :-) I also found a whopper of a zucchini that my sneaky plants were able to hide from me, that bad boy is going to become curry for tomorrow's dinner. I took a picture, but alas, blogger still is not cooperating. Sigh.