I am sorry it’s been so long since I have posted anything here. It had been a fairly uneventful summer and we had just been enjoying the new solarium and taking it easy after all the hard work getting it set up. I truly love the yard right now and it feels like my own little sanctuary lately.

Because in the last couple weeks this perfect storm of expense and stressful drama has hit fast and furious. It started with my property taxes (which in CT includes both cars and the house as well as my business tax, AND the homeowners insurance and both car insurances were all due at the same time while I am still paying off the construction project and okay – we handled that – with little to no room to spare.

A week later my car did the weirdest thing and had to be flat-bedded to my mechanic shop and unfortunately he is a man down due to medical reasons and his shop is totally swamped and booked weeks in advance so he has had my car 2 weeks on Monday and he has still not had time to even look at it so we are not completely sure what the problem is but we think it may be a faulty transmission control module. Fortunately I have a second car that I can commandeer as needed and boy have we needed it this week!

One of my beloved, fairly senior kitties went off his food a week ago and initially I just tried to get him something “fancier” and supplement with a high calorie nutritional gel but he was not interested in the least and started dropping weight – FAST! So we got him into the vet who said he was also very dehydrated. They kept him two nights trying to get him stable and ran a bunch of tests and even with all of that, they still are unsure what is causing his electrolytes to be so far out of whack. They ruled out a couple things but cannot say for sure what is wrong or what is going on just yet. But mysteries are expensive = he came home yesterday after racking up an $1800 vet bill and now we have to give him 4 different meds as well as 100 mil of subcutaneous saline twice a day. Needless to say, I am worried sick about him and I feel like I am torturing him when he already doesn’t feel well. 🙁 I am perfectly content torturing you guys, but I love animals so this has been really hard on me. There was one last test that they ran Saturday before we picked him up that they are getting results back on Monday so I am holding my breath and hoping that he will improve soon and that the test result will give them a solid hunch as to what we should do next, but I am also afraid that it will be time to say goodbye to him soon. So… yeah this week kinda sucks on multiple levels.

On a happier note my favorite concert buddy (who uses they/them pronouns) is starting their first semester of college tomorrow as an art major! And of course that involved Aunt Suze doing a fair bit of “back to school” shopping (including a nice new Microsoft laptop) in the week after the taxes / insurance but leading up to the cat and car drama, so um yeah this has been a REALLY expensive freaking month!! But it is very exciting indeed and I am cheering them on as they embark on this new journey!

Phew! Yeah definitely a lot going on but I had a few really nice sessions recently – none of which I could take pics during but I did manage a few selfies the other day that I thought I would share with you now. Sorry if I sound a bit complain-y here – I know we all have challenges but sheesh sometimes it feels like I get a whole lot of them all at the same damn time, but that’s life right? 🙂

I remind myself that it hasn’t been all doom and gloom – I got to go to 2 amazing concerts with my east coast niece. She took me to see P!nk at Citifield and 3 days later I took her and my 4 year old great nephew to see the Goo goo Dolls and OAR on the lawn at Bethel Woods. It was his first concert ever and it was a lot of fun playing in the grass with him. We also did some kayaking along with my ever supportive slave hubby.

I also want to give a huge shout out to the sweetheart that anonymously sent me this lovely leather gardening tool belt! This was not an inexpensive trinket so I really wish I knew who to thank. 🙂

I hope all is going well for you or at least well enough that you can still smile through it. Hugs!!

Okay… roll the selfies!