Category: Food
So yesterday was a bad costly day
Some background for those new here. We take care of three cats, two also mooch / are fed by the neighbors also. One is our house cat Odie, then there is Tupac who is an inside / outside cat, and then there is Smokey an outside feral female who hangs out with Tupac and she will come into the family room to eat but won’t stay. Even though Tupac eats most of his food at our home, spends most of his day inside with us, if it is a nice night a lot of nights he likes to spend outside some or all of the night. If it is cold or raining he stays inside. Even though others feed them, it always seems to fall to Ron and me who takes Tupac to the vet and pay the bills, even though it seems the others have a lot more money. Maybe that is why. When Ron told the neighbor woman today who we see feeding them the costs, well she did not offer to help.
We have been noticing Tupac was getting thinner and thinner and thinner. Last year when we took him in for his shots and deworming he was also thin, but then once dewormed started to gain weight. But like I said, we noticed that he was losing weight fast. The last week or longer, he has spent more and more time inside. Then last Wednesday morning he threw up a lot of green bile looking liquid. Well sometimes he catches local rabbits or squirrels, other small game and eats it. So we worry he will get something. Or he will eat something that will make him sick that someone left out or an anti-cat person who wanted to poison the cats. His stomach made sounds all the night before and that day. But Thursday morning I found clear liquid throw up in the kitchen. Friday morning I found the same thing in the hallway. He had been staying in all week, which was not normal, as I already said. Again he was not eating or even drinking. Ron talked to one of the other people feeding them and she said Tupac quit eating last week also. I got him to drink a little water.
When Ron got up Friday morning I told him we should call the vet’s office. We had been talking about it, and knowing it was Friday I did not want to pay the costs of an emergency weekend visit, and Tupac was getting more thin and not eating or drinking. But as we had no appointment the vet’s office said we could bring him in, drop him off and they would see him when they could. That cost us $110.00 alone. But the worst was to come. Turned out our worst fears were not the problem, which meant Tupac was not going to die of feline leukemia or need surgery we couldn’t afford. But … it turns out he had an infection in his ear, maybe from a fight where he got scratched. The vet cleaned all that and gave him something for it. But … It seems his thyroid is seriously jacked up, running really too high. The test reads normal at 4 and Tupac was 12. He will need daily medication. The vet gave us two weeks of pills and we need to contact an online animal pharmacy for a medicated cream to rub on his ear which takes the place of the pills. We have never been able to get a cat to take a pill. This morning Ron tried to get Tupac to eat and take the pill. He refused both.
But then the hammer dropped. The total vet bill came to $530.00 and that was before we order the cream she gave us a prescription for. That is going to be more expensive than the pills the vet warned us. We had only $270.00 in both bank accounts until Ron gets his monthly Social Security late in the month. I transferred money from savings. So with Ron’s medication in January needing to be fully paid, something in February that needed to be paid, and the cat’s vet bill I had taken out of savings so far this year a total of $1,140.00 with no clue how to put it back if medicine and medical bills don’t slow down. I guess my new glasses will have to wait until fall, if not until next year.
What had made the day even worse for me and upset me was that I had spent all week catching up with comments and others blogs. Seriously when I went to bed Thursday evening I had everything caught up. Friday morning due to Ron having made a large roast, potatoes, corn, and gravy supper meal there were a lot of dishes and kitchen mess. So while we waited to hear from the vet, I helped Ron clean up and do dishes. Then in the morning while doing dishes Ron asked me to make a tomato red sauce. I had to use tomato puree instead of sauce as Ron got the wrong stuff. It made a nice sweet basil sauce. Ron made his wonderful meatballs. But by the time I got the sauce done, the bread ready to bake, the plates, strainers, and serving things set up I was wiped out. I had the water ready for the spaghetti but I couldn’t stay standing up even with all the break through medications. I was done, so Ron took over.
What this did blog wise was make me basically miss an entire day and by the time I opened up the bell notifications just before going to bed, I had lost some of the older comments and posts. Well there is another day. As always if you leave a comment and I have not responded to it in a few days send me another. I am not sure how much I can do today because I am already suffering badly sitting in my chair. I suffered through making eggs for breakfast because Ron loves how I make eggs over medium, cooked whites, runny yellow yoke. So now you’re caught up. Hugs. Scottie
Don’t forget what tRump broke, and Biden had to rebuild.
Let’s talk about Biden, ports, aid, and time….
Let’s talk about IPC, food, and time….
They Gunned Down Starving Civilians
Israeli Forces Open Fire Claiming Hungry Palestinians Made Them Feel “Unsafe”
Texas opts out of 2024 free summer school lunch program
I fail to understand republicans anymore. They have all the money in the world to waste on stunts like operation lone star which sent Texas State Police to the border to search vehicles already searched by the border patrol. They are wasting 2.5 million every week on that stunt alone. They so far have found nothing. But it looks good, looks tough on border crime right? How many millions to take over a park, run reams and reams of razor wire on land and in the water, wire that has been found illegal, yet they keep doing it. What they are not willing to do is feed kids! They are willing to let poor kids go hungry and starve. There is no money for feeding them they claim. Or is it that they don’t want to feed the poor non-white kids? Is the skin tone of the parents or kids what the issue is? Or is it that hungry kids can be forced to work cheaply, even illegally for people. I know what a hungry child will do for food, god save their souls. One church leader said if the government would stop helping poor people it would force them to join churches and turn to the lord for help. Great reasoning there. Starve them until they join the gang. It seems to be epidemic in red states, and I am really tired of it. Feed the kids damn it, or admit you are unfit to run a government. Hugs. Scottie
Millions of Texas children would have been able to use this service, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
TEXAS, USA — For some children in the U.S., school lunchtime might be the only meal they eat all day.
To help combat this issue, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is offering its first-ever free summer school lunch program for participants across the country.
This year, 35 states are joining the Summer Electronic Benefit Transfer program – but Texas is not one of them.
According to the Texas Health and Human Services Commission, the state would not have enough time to organize the program before summertime begins.
Now, the USDA says approximately 3.8 million children in Texas will miss out on the chance for $120 worth of food, per person, from grocery stores, farmers markets and other locations.
Approximately 21 million children across the country will receive a total of $2.5 billion benefits, in areas including Hawaii, New York, Guam, American Samoa, the Osage Nation and more.
Children 18 years old or younger are eligible to join the program free of charge, with a specific emphasis on low-income families.
Each month, families will receive $40 per child, available on a pre-paid card and the government plans to cover half of the administrative fees for participating schools.
According to the USDA, the program can help lower food insecurity among children by 33%, or one-third. Children utilizing the program are said to have higher access to whole grain, dairy, fruits and vegetables, with an emphasis on healthier living.
Last summer, Austin ISD and the Central Texas Food Bank partnered to provide more than 5,000 free meals to children under 18 years old through a separate program.
Ma was an elementary school teacher assigned in the mid-60s, at the start of her career, to one of the poorest schools in Rochester, NY. She quickly learned many of her majority Black students were so poor their families could not afford both breakfast & lunch, but were embarrassed about it, so would send the kids to school with a bag lunch, but on an empty stomach. The kids ended up eating their lunches on the way to school and had nothing for the rest of the day, often falling asleep in the afternoons.
Ma had an extra toaster that was a wedding present, and brought it in, insisting every student in her class got a 1/2 piece of peanut butter toast to start the day, no matter how much breakfast they claimed to have eaten. Her kids stopped eating their lunches on their way to school. Test scores skyrocketed. Her principal called her in to ask how she’d done it. “I fed them,” was all she replied.
Far too many teachers do things like this. With their own money. On their own time. I’m not saying it wasn’t good that they did it, but it shouldn’t be necessary. We underpay workers and they are doing the best that they could. What kind of monster wants to keep hungry children from eating. CHILDREN. Sometimes I wished I believed in heaven and hell. All those teachers like your mom. (She sounds great but she’s also one of thousands who also went above and beyond.) They would be queens in an afterlife and all the selfish bastards would be tortured for all eternity.
What kind of monster wants to keep hungry children from eating.
The kind of monster who doesn’t care whether these children grow up healthy and hopes they live short, miserable lives and it’s a big bonus if they don’t reproduce.
IOW, Republicans.
And the same people always screaming “what about the children?” They don’t care about children. If they did they ‘d fund public schools.
But if you feed them, and test scores improve, who will want to fill all those minimum wage positions? They’ll have to cut back on Social Security and put all the lazy seniors to work! /s
I always had bulk amounts of granola bars and cup-of-soups available in my classroom, and my school’s food program was very active in providing breakfast, lunch and snacks to ALL students. I often brought in fresh watermelon, pineapple, and cherry tomatoes. So many kids had never eaten a fresh cherry tomato. I made a lot of converts!
(Edit to add: I worked with a fundie who was so grateful to his father-in-law for unexpectedly bringing him some cold pizza on a day he’d forgotten his lunch box…he just knew God had sent him. I asked, “Did your father-in-law also bring food for all the kids who didn’t have lunch and won’t have dinner?” He just looked at me.)
Rethugs are all about the cruelty. They get their rocks off abusing the powerless. I truly wish I could believe there was a Hell for them to rot/burn in, but alas, I cannot.
Christians spreading goodness around the world.
They’re never too young to pull themselves up by the boot straps.
I’m waiting for them to start saying school is a privilege, not a right.
Hey, they’re loosening child labour laws so the little shits can earn their own lunch money!!
A school lunch in Austin costs like $4
Governor Wheels has spent $148 M busing people all over the US
That is 37M school lunches.
Multiple other red states have refused to accept federal grants meant to feed those lazy unemployed children.
And after Republicans went to all the trouble of lowering the working age, so they could get jobs. Little ingrates. Serves them right. If they were really hungry, they’d get jobs.
I just can’t accept ….. By Randy
“Looking Back, on the memory of, the dance we shared, ‘neath the stars above….” One of my favorite songs. 
Today I spent some time looking back and there were some tears, and there were some smiles, and there were some surprises that found me shaking my head in wonder all as I “thumbed through” a blog I wrote some ten years ago. In truth, it comprised some of the most creative and out-reaching time of my life, as short as that duration was. But, it also opened my heart, chipping off the armored crust that I’d built to keep me safe.
Today I reread a post I wrote about being invited to what should be a very nice thing: Christmas Dinner. I was miserable. (https://wordsthateffect.blogspot.com/2013/12/the-lonely-walker.html) 
What surprised me was that I still remember that pain. I don’t remember specifics of the day, I remember how much it hurt to be cast away as inconvenient only to be so magnanimously called back like a dog once again let into the house. I felt obligated to go, I felt obligated to forgive the hurt I felt, and I felt obligated to be the good guest who buries the hurt and the abandonment I felt even though I was an adult and shouldn’t be so easily hurt. 
I was the bad dog, let back into the house, and quite frankly I was “just fine” outside. Just fine, thank you very much. … …
There is a song written by the group Imagine Dragons, called “Believer”. I’ll not speak for the artist, but it always hurt, this song. For me, it spoke about how the singer was made a believer, was made what he was told he was no matter how he fought against it. Imagine the power we have over people that we can develop their very self image!
But, that song also gave me hope as I realized that if we have the power to negatively impact the very way someone sees themselves, we also have the power to positively impact their life. We can make them a believer of something truly grand for their life.
I left blogging because, as I mentioned, it forced me to open my heart and dang that hurt. I had to watch the greatest ugliness to find a way to demonstrate that it was not reasonable or godly to be so hateful, and often that ugliness was voted for by people I loved. I wrote posts about people being abused. I wrote posts about young people listening to others demean them and those like them. I wrote about hopes lost, lives lost, tears shed, and dark times. It frightens me as I look over those past blogs more than a decade old that things have not seriously changed, though I do think that more people understand that we are all different, each of us unique and special and worthy of love. As we come upon another presidential race 
I hope people will consider the world they want to create, the legacy we hope to pass down to our younger generation, because that is the defining aspect of the voting process.
Canadian Doctor Shot By IDF Describes Gaza’s Devastated Medical System | Dr Tarek Loubani | TMR
Please watch this video. It is so important to understand just what Israel is doing to hospitals, medical providers, and how they just don’t see any Palestinian or their supporters as humans, as people. To the Israelis, they are all something to be wiped out, to be terrorized to nonexistence. Hugs. Scottie
Scottie's Playtime 