Boo!  heh

I find it so hard to believe that some people are afraid of black cats.  Perhaps it's the association with Halloween?  I have heard grown adults tell me that black cats are demons, and they were absolutely serious when they said it.  I wonder where they get that idea? 

It's kind of silly because the whole black cat as a representation of a holiday was specifically created, though not the holiday you think.  What we call Halloween was originally Samhain, a Celtic Harvest Festival a Very, Very long time ago. Samhain was celebrated from sunset October 31st to sunset November 1st.   According to ancient Celtic legend, a Black Cat called Sith - a large black cat with a white spot on his chest, blessed households that left him a saucer of milk.  (the treats we give out today I would imagine).  Those who did not participate were offered dire curses instead of blessings (which would be the trick).

Then in the 9th century, the Western Christian Church merged their All-Saints Day with Samhain resulting in something a little closer to the Halloween that we know today.  But the black cat as a witch's familiar?  Where the black cats get their bad reputation?

Well in the 13th century, Pope Gregory the IX issued "Vox in Rama" that forever glued together the concept of Black Cats and superstition.  Vox in Rama was a papal edict condeming devil worship. All fine and good except in one particular Luciferian cult lore, one of his demons was able to appear as a black cat.  And thus, it began.  Those dang devil worshippers ruin everything.

For some reason of all of the nonsense this cult spouted, this one thing, the image of a black cat was the one thing that stuck in people's mind and suddenly any black cat was instantly dubbed as evil.  Eventually it spread to include any cat, but especially black ones.  

This imagery hung on through the witch trials in Salem, a particularly unfortunate chapter in our history but eventually, by the 1800's people began to shake off this notion and the ignorance surrounding it although sadly, it persisted for, literally, Centuries.  Geez People.

Even now in 2024, the sad truth is that black cats are usually the last to be adopted from shelters.  And I absolutely do not understand.  Brysco and Wyatt, black cats both, are the sweetest, dearest, goofiest cats we've ever had.  I promise you that the scariest thing about either of them, is how much we love them.

This is Brysco by the way in the photo walking behind the Halloween card that my Colorado friend, Jan, sent to me.  I happened to have my camera in my hand and snap!  There you go!   And I promise you there is nothing frightening about Brysco.   As Halloween cats go, he's actually more scaredy cat than scary cat, so you have nothing to fear from this guy.  But we both wish you a Happy Halloween!

Be safe and have fun!

Did you ever see signs like this as you drive through a neighborhood that is at least a little unfamiliar to you.  And then maybe did you then wonder about the view and think about how nice it would be to have a really spectacular view out your own window?  Yeah.  I think a lot of us do that.  And it doesn't even matter if it's a pond, a lake, a river or the ocean.  Water is water. Unless I suppose the water in questions is a water treatment plant. Nobody wants to see that.   

anyway, those houses, the ones with the terrific water views always come at a bigger price tag too.  Sometimes LOTS bigger. I get it.  Most of us have views of our own backyards or the back of the neighbor's house.  I have lived in places where the views were of a parking lot and an alleyway, so I kind of understand the higher cost associated with a better view.

​But sometimes that "water view" is rather broadly interpreted.  You already know that Tim and I enjoy going to model homes and open houses and around here anyway, lots of times the water view is of a "fake lake" in a development which is fine.  Even a manmade lake is pretty and attracts wildlife.  Usually, they have pretty plantings around it and that's lovely.  My objection is that in order to view that pretty lake, you sacrifice some privacy.  I see, not only the lake, but also the backyards of the neighbors on either side AND everyone across the lake. They aren't that big generally so it isn't all that far.  I suppose after awhile, you get used to being on display all the time?

Other times the "water view"  is a real natural body of water but it can only be viewed off the left side of the balcony if you peek between two other houses.  Still counts as a water view and they can and do hike the price because of it.  

I get it.  It's wonderful peaceful beautiful thing to be able to see a body of water right from your own home.  It is listed with the home as an asset right up there with newly renovated kitchen and bathrooms and 3 car garage.

Even though this house that we live in right now wasn't listed as having a water view when we bought it, we actually do have one.  Technically, I suppose, we have two.  Tim claims that if you climb up to the roof (which I am absolutely NOT going to do) there is a great view. Not of the gulf but of the bay which is behind us.  Since I have never (and will never) be on the roof to check it out I can only take Tim's word for it. He has never lied to me so I absolutely believe him just have never seen it myself. 

However!  There is one vantage point in our house where I can see the bay.  If I stand in the shower of our bathroom and look out the window (yes there is a window in our shower) at first I see our backyard:

and of course, part of the family room and the back door (and the sandbags that we aren't quite ready to get rid of yet, just in case) But more importantly, if I look over the back fence, I can see through the car port of the house behind us and there it is, a little snippet of Roberts Bay.

The dead vines on the fence by the way were honeysuckle that were beaten unto death by the storm.  It will heal and return eventually. But we are talking about water views and that is absolutely water and a few boats and a little bit of a waterfront condo but the water part is the important part or so I'm told.   

A wee bit closer?  Sure!

Technically, we have a waterview.  From the shower in our bathroom.  Oddly, probably due to my lack of height, I cannot see the water if I'm just say, standing in front of the bathroom sink.  Nope I can only see it from the shower. I suppose that normally heighted people can see it from anywhere in the bathroom.

The family room, which as you can clearly see, juts farther into the yard, and does NOT share this view.  It must be a line of sight thing. Because since it's closer to the fence, it seems as if you should have a better view of the water. But nope.  

If we took down the fence (or if it fell down or a storm removed it), I can only image that we would have a bigger water view?  Maybe?  Or perhaps it would still just be the little peekaview through the carport just without the fence.

I wonder, should the day ever come that we want to move, could we list the house as having a water view?  Not the roof one, that's a given. The bathroom window one.  I mean, does that count?

On the other hand, I'm not positive that right now with the hurricane season being so recent that mentioning water at all is a good idea.  Yeah, I think for now, we'll just keep this bathroom window peekie to ourselves.

What with hurricanes, sick cats and all the other stuff going on it's been 3 long weeks since I've done a proper Photo Safari Report! Oh My Gracious!  I wonder if I remember how to do this!

Joy and I were determined to find a place to hike yesterday.  All of the local preserves were closed but Oscar Scherer, which is a state Park was opened with limited trail access.  Limited access is better than no access so that was our destination.    We headed out knowing that the odds were very good that we wouldn't get far.  Surprisingly, even thought we did at least a half dozen U-Turns due to water in places it usually isn't, we still managed to hike more than 3 miles and quite a few hours.  Awesome!   This is, therefore the U-Turn Hike.  Makes perfect  sense.

The part of the trail that was clear was great!  And so there we would be walking and talking and shooting whatever appeals to us, as we do, and then we would come around a curve or over a rise and find this before us:

Oh well,  Nothing to be done for it but to turn around and try another offshoot of the trail.  And most of those led to other, better, surprises.

It was a surprisingly good birdie day so get ready for bird photos.  One of these Joy took, (I will identify it) the rest are mine though :

Some botannicals, a few a little different than my usual which is always nice for me at least:

One and only one dragonfly, (no butterflies )

And then there is the bicycle series.  There was a long section of trail that goes along a fence and on the other side of that fence is a bike trail.  At one point, the lighting was just perfect shining through spanish moss and vines hanging from a tree and as the bicycle flashed by I realized what a perfect shot it would have been. So I became determined to capture it.  

Joy showed such amazing patience.  It's about timing.  There is a split second pause between when I depress the shutter and when it actually takes the shot.  It's such a short amount of time, a nano second, that normally it doens't make a bit of different.  But when I'm trying to hit a moving target so to speak, it matters.

It was missed shot after missed shot after missed shot. Dang!  Finally I gave up and said, let's move on. So we did until the nest great tree and foliage/light/bicycle opportunity and then I, once again, snapsnapsnapped and missedmissedmissed.  ARGH!

Eventually it occurred to me t o change my setting to "sport" which, when you depress the shutter, takes 5 rapid fire photos.  Surely then I would almost by accident, get my photo.  Well you would think so wouldn't you.  You would be so very wrong.

But I became ever more determined to get this mythic shot that I had envisioned in my stupid head.  It was a goal. The Grail!  My mission.

Operating on the, eventually if you put enough monkeys in front of enough typewriters you will get the work of shakspeare theory, I continued trying.  When I looked at the results, well let me just say that I have never in  my life deleted so many photos from one session EVER!  Hilarious!  I am so ridiculous!

But here are a few of the shots I did NOT delete.  And not one of them is the photos that was in my mind and imagination.  So sad.

At any rate, that's it for the U-Turn Hike.  Thanks for joining Joy and I on our recent Photo Safari!  One day, maybe you'll come and hike it with us. Cameras optional.

I suppose this is an update on both of the Kittyboys.  They were very patient and mostly tolerant of all the activity involved in prepping for a hurricane such as:  being shoved into carriers (against their will), long (for them) car rides to strange places and then getting accustomed to a strange place only to be wrestled back into carriers (once again very much against their will), long (same length) car rides back home and then getting used to being home again but with no AC and a fur coat they cannot remove.   Oh dear, poor babies.  

But they seem to have muddled through, as you can see.  As the boys have gotten to their full growth (18 months old now) we see that while we used to struggle to tell them apart, it's much easier now.  And it's not just their very different personalities.  Wyatt is much bigger than Brysco.  He is taller, longer, broader across the shoulders, heavier and just feels like a more solid presence.   Brysco on the other hand, is shorter, much lighter, smaller boned and just feels more fragile in general. Don't let that fool you though, he can be a menace if he chooses too :)

Poor little baby Brysco had to have dental surgery recently.  Awwwww :(  We noticed about 3 weeks ago that he didn't have his usual appetite. He became, what we interpreted as, very fussy about his food.  Persnickety, picky, Diva-ish, particular, whatever you would like to call it.  And since cats are reknowned for such behaviour, we didn't think much of it until we realized that he was losing weight. That's a concern.

Most cats, while they certainly can and do snub meals now and again,  will not willingly starve themselves. So we made it a mission to seek out and find food that he would eat.  We tried so many flavours, brands and textures with varying degrees of success.  And then his behaviour began to change.  He slept more, which frankly is hard to measure since cats sleep a lot anyway, but he stopped engaging in play.  Uhoh.  He was always an absolute fool for a butterfly on a string but now suddenly, if presented with said butterfly, he would walk away.  Hmmmmm.

I think I would have been more worried, earlier, but he would have several off days and then one day when he was more like his old silly self. He would eat and play and wrestle with his brother and we'd think, well, whatever it was, he is over it now. Good.  And move on.  But you know how mom's are, we listen to our instincts and my instincts said that something was wrong.  So I made the vet appointment and took him (over his very vocal objections) in.  The vet determined very quickly that he had dental issues which is odd for such a young cat, especially since his brother does not have these problems. Hmmmm.

So the doctor gave us a dental rinse to give him once a day.  He showed us how it was done.  Brysco was not well pleased. Not with the vet or the tech or, considering that I just stood there and observed it happening, not with me either.  But with all good intentions, we went back home, medication in hand and the very first application went extremely poorly.  The second one fared no better.  By the third one, he had taken to hiding under the bed all day and not coming out for anything or anyone. 

 I explained what was going on to him, I begged, I demanded, I cajoled, I pleaded and eventually I cried.  He needed this medication and what the heck was wrong with me that I couldn't get him to take it.   Every time I dragged him out from under the bed to give him his medicine, he fought me, I tried to manhandle him (he is an absolute Houdini by the way when it comes to getting out of towels and blankets as purritos)  We were both absolutely traumatized.

Eventually I called the vet, told them what was going on and explained that no matter how we tried, he wasn't getting the medicine he needed and asked, did they have any other suggestions.  The doctor said stop. it's not doing either of you any good.  Leave him alone. Completely alone. Eventually he will come out from under the bed.  This kind of stress is not good for him. Give it a few days and we will see how it goes.

The vet tech called a few days later to check in.   I reported that he was eating even less but at least he came out from under the bed and stopped running away whenever I came into the room. I suppose that's progress of a sort.  We decided that I should bring him in once again. 

This time the doctor took some blood to test and he talked about what a mess Brysco's mouth was in general. No wonder he isn't eating.  He has some really bad teeth, bad gums, mouth ulcers everywhere.  The poor baby was an absolute mess, dentally.  The doctor said, it may come to doing surgery.  Awwwww :(  

When the test results came back we learned that he had something called, Feline Stomatitis.  Basically it means he has terrible teeth and wrose, he has an allergy or hyper sensitivity to the bacteria that results from such bad teeth.  Everything in his mouth was inflammed, sore, painful, ulcerated (and if untreated, would get even worse).  Sometimes it's related to other cat diseases such as feline leukemia but he tested negative (twice) for all of those.  Other times this disease is particular to certain breeds such as Himalyans, Burmese and Abyssinians.  Well Brysco was a feral kitty. Nobody knows his parents or grandparents, but it seems that there were some fancy arsed ancestors in his past.  And this is the legacy they left behind.  He was kind of born with terrible teeth.

The only thing to be done for it was to remove the bad teeth and do a super good gingivitis cleaning with injections for any infections. It's scary to consider but absolutely necessary.  I felt terrible for him but we knew it was the right thing to do.  The appointment for his surgery was made for, what ultimately turned out to be, the day before Hurricane Milton came to call.  Dang.  The vet changed to appointment to one week out.  Doesn't sound like much but when a kitty is a fragile as Brysco was becoming you begin to worry, Is he going to survive another week?

By the way throughout all of this, other than the hiding under the bed phased, he never once growled, hissed, scratched or bit us.  Even though he was in terrible pain, his nature was just a sweet and loving as ever.  What a little kitty rockstar!

We bought pate and babyfood and those squeezey cat treats that we in this house refer to as LickySticks.  The food I would have to literally hand feed to him. I would put a little on my finger, offer it to him and he would sometimes lick it off.  And on good days, he would eat all or most of the serving.  It was a slow process but encouraging when he ate well.  On bad days he might give it one test lick and then close his eyes and go back to sleep.  It broke my heart.  The LickySticks he would almost always eat and while they are intended as a treat not a meal, apparently if you eat enough of them in one sitting, it can serve as a make shift sort of a meal because he survived and made it through to his surgery day.

He sailed through surgery like a champ, came home a little loopy but every since surgery he has been eating like Joey Chestnut.  It's as if he cannot get enough food. It's not unusual for him to have 3 servings of breakfast.  And I'm happy to give it to him.  He has a way to go to fill up and out.

He is participating more in normal kitty shenanigans now though not as much as before and I have to remind myself that his surgery was just one week ago and it's going to take a bit for him to have his old energy.  But it's wonderful to see him jumping up, wrestling with his brother, checking birds out the window and asking for endless pets.  He is back to waking me up in the morning to remind me to feed the cats, snuggling with us in the night sometimes when he's a little chilly and  playing, just a little bit, like he used to.

His brother by the way, has been so sweet with him.  A little more gentle than normal, very attentive, giving up his own food for Brysco to eat and checking on him all the time. Wyatt is an awesome brother.

That's the good news.  The bad news is that usually, eventually all but his canine teeth will have to be pulled so we need to be on the lookout for his old, "dental related" behaviours and get him back to the vet ASAP if they return.  The vet said, he has never seen a cat NOT need to have all the teeth removed. However, he's also never seen a cat as young as Brysco with this issue so perhaps we can beat this.  That's the plan anyway.

So here is sweet baby Brysco starting to feel a bit like his old self.  If you think of it and you have a minute, please send positive thoughts that from here forward, he just gets better and better :)  We both thank you!

Howdy do to you.  I'm back.  Feels like I've been gone a REALLY long time but in fact it's been only about two weeks ish.  With good reason of course!

Don't know if you've heard but we had a bit of a pesky storm by name of Milton to deal with down here.  It's been a big year for storms in Florida this season.   Tropical Storm Debbie followed by Hurricane Helene who was  very cranky and then a mere two weeks later Milton hit us.  Wow.  I think (I hope) that's it for this season. I think I speak for all Floridians when I say, we are so over it. 

If you've never had the dubious pleasure of experiencing a hurricane let me enlighten you.  It's exhausting.  

The weather guys are great at keeping us updated with every bit of information and knowledge that they have and I love that.  The part that I don't love so much is that sometimes, despite all of their technology and talent and smarts,  they really can't fine tune it too much. So while we all know, sometimes for more than a week, that a storm is coming, we don't know, often until the very last minute, exactly where it's coming to.    And it matters.  It matters very much.

In the case of Milton, we knew that it was supposed to make landfall somewhere between Tampa and Ft Meyers, a distance of more than 130 miles.   If you can avoid being at ground zero for a hurricane (especially one as powerful as Milton) that is always the better choice.  And honestly, you don't have to go that far to be out of the worst of it.  But if you don't know where the doggone thing is going to end up, you don't know where or how far to go!!!

We were evacuated.  I mean, if you choose to stay, they won't throw down with you over it, but when an evacuation order is given, there is a reason, so unless you absolutely have no other option, you do as we did and you pack up  the kittens and associated caboodles and you go.  But go where?  Almost  everybody was going north which means the roads were going to be clogged, sometimes to the point of a highway looking more like a parking lot. Seriously, people have run out of gas trying to drive away from these storms and getting caught up in traffic and then there is no gas to be found anywhere.  A whole other issue.  Anyway, we opted to go south.

It was a decision to wrestle with a bit.  Being on the south side or "dirty side" of a hurricane always means risking flooding.  The wind pushes water on the backside of the storm so creeks become rivers, rivers overflow their banks and the ocean slaps the heck out of anything in it's way.  We ended up sheltering at a friend's house that was, (we fervently hoped) out of a flood zone.  Storm shutters were in place, very wisely,  but that also means not being able to see out so it's like living in a cave for the duration.

We evacuated on a Monday, the storm arrived on Wednesday into Thursday.  The shelter house lost power late Wednesday night after  flickering for hours.   The wind raged, the rain fell  and we patrolled the house with our flashlights through the night, looking for water intrusion.  We had a plan if the house flooded, no worries.  And it was a great plan too. Luckily, the water stayed out and even luckier the power was restored, at the shelter house, within 24 hours.  Yay!

Tim headed back to Venice to see if our House was still standing.  Yes that was a very real concern.  The storm made landfall at Siesta Key which is only 15 miles north of Venice.  It brought sustained winds over 120 miles an hour and a storm surge between 5 and 8 feet!  There were rumours of some neighborhoods (such as ours) being literally under water.  I was so relieved to get Tim's text once he arrived that our house was not only standing, but intact and dry.  Woohoo!  Still at that point, there was no power and no water.

Well, I can deal with no power for a time, but no water is a big nope from me. So we waited until water was restored to return on Saturday.  Despite a ton of  tree debris everywhere, it was so great so see our little house once again.  Tim moved Sandbags so we could get inside and as soon as we brought the kittyboys and all our crap inside, our first move was to open all the windows.  Next up was Tim trying to find - somewhere - some gas to start the generator while I applied myself to the odiferous task of throwing out everything in the fridge and freezer.  Gross.

After that was clean up.  Literally  picking up what Mother Nature threw down.  I've spent at least a few hours every morning since we returned hauling yard rubbish up to the lawn area beside the road for eventual collection.  At this point the pile is over 6 feet high, more than 6 feet wide and it spans the width from one side of the half circle driveway to the other. No idea how far that is....20 feet maybe?  Tim spent a lot of time cutting up things that were just too big to haul as they were.

Without power, there isn't much to do.  Tim attempted to work as much as possible from his cell phone. The generator, which is a godsend, keeps the fridge/freezer on, a few fans, a few lights and allows us to charge our phones. Yay!  But that's about it.  So cleaning is sweeping and cold water washing.  I swept a lot.  Cooking is not really possible.  Sadly, as much as we prepared (and we prepared) the house for the storm, we didn't think to get a new propane tank for the grill so that wasn't happening) So as things began to open, we caught probably one meal a day out somewhere.  Any other meals were "hurricane friendly foods" meaning food that do not require cooking or refrigeration.  Lots of crackers and granola bars.  Grocery Stores around here open very quickly, BUT most of their food has to be thrown out do to risk of contamination.  All meat, all frozen, all dairy including eggs. So it's slim pickins for a few days.

The generator needs to be fed, so every day Tim had to go out and find more gas, somewhere and that became a mission sometimes.  As I said, I worked on cleaning up the yard, sweeping the house aaaannnndddd that's about it.  I filled my days reading. I think I read 4 or perhaps it was 5 books waiting for the power to return.

Which is did late Tuesday night.  That of course did not go as planned.  The lineman repaired the lines early afternoon on Tuesday yayayayay!  Which started a fire!  boooooo!  Which they put out  YAYAYAY!  And cut down the damaged tree - necessary but sad.  And then restored the power which got everybody on our street and the street behind us back up and running EXCEPT our house and the guys behind us.  What??

Turns out that for whatever reason, those two houses ONLY had lines that went underground.  What??  And of course the linemen work on the lines...above ground, not the ones in the ground.  So someone else had to be called.  And they couldn't find "the box"  So there was much tramping around, cutting trees and shrubs, digging and the removal of part of a fence.  But eventually , after many hours and so very much work on their part, our power was restored and life gets sort of back to normal eventually.

And we are so tired.  Like everyone else.  Today I will venture out to the grocery store to replenish the larder.  I absolutely luxuriated in my hot shower this morning after many days of invigorating cold showers.  And tonight I will cook by golly!  Yesterday I caught up on the metric ton of laundry we had accumulated. Now I have a huge pile of ironing on the table patiently waiting.  And I need to vacuum desperately.

I heard somebody say, "that's the price you pay for living in Paradise"  Paradise? Really?  When I think of Paradise, I certainly don't envision life altering storms.   Perhaps that's the price we pay for living on the coast of Florida, I think that was is accurate and fair.  Regardless, I'm back.  We are safe.  The house still stands.  This house, by the way,  is a bit of a wonder to me.  She's small, old (by housing standards around here) with some really old (and other newer) windows and no storm shutters and she looks very unassuming but by gosh, she's got heart!  

So that's the story.  I need groceries and a nap. Not necessarily in that order.

Ya'll are not going to believe this, I mean I don't, why should you?  But this coming Friday, October 4th will be our 8 year blogiversary!  Wow!  Eight Years!

I say OUR anniversary because it really is a partnership.  I write it, you read it and sometimes you even comment on it!  There would be little point in me writing it if nobody was reading it. I mean, I can have all these crazy thoughts and observations, ideas and experiences without ever touching a keyboard.  Those things would still happen and it would not be a Blog. It would just be me living my life the way I always did prior to October 4th 2016 when I first dipped my toe, ever so tentatively into the blogiverse.

My readership has ebbed and flowed over those 8 years.  Some days/weeks/months are better than others, but isn't that the way of life?  Peaks and valleys, highs and lows. Good times and Bad. Amen, Amen.   And readership?  LOL  That's hilarious.  I have a lot of chutzpah referring to it so.  In the beginning I assumed that perhaps some family and a few close friends would be kind and take a little peekie at it out of politeness or kindness and that would be the end of it.   And I could at least say, "I tried" with the "and I failed" a silent addition.

But to my surprise not only did some people I know keep reading it, but people I don't know were reading it!  Wow!  That was unexpected..  And while it was an amazing compliment, it was also an added pressure. Am I writing something worth reading?  Should I change my style? Should I experiment with other topics?  Ultimately I decided that much like Sammy Davis Jr and Popeye, I gotta be me.  The first rule of writing is to be genuine and authentic.  Whether you like what I have to say, what I talk about or how I write it or not,  what I present is always 100% Sam.

Over the years, I occasionally get an email from someone I've never heard of who is an aspiring writer that offers to submit  a few articles on my site. I suppose for the experience and exposure.  The first time it happened I gave it a great deal of thought before I responded with a polite, "No thank you but I wish you good luck!"  I agonized over it. It wasn't just a flippant, nope.  It was a decision that I wrestled with for several days and nights before choosing. 

​ I felt at least a tiny bit of pressure.  I felt as if I had the obligation to allow someone else an opportunity to get their feet wet; to use my blog as a jumping off point, perhaps, for their own.   Ultimately, I realized that my blog is mine. Just me.  And since some people like it and honestly, even if people hate it so much that they avoid it like a plague, at least it's not diluted or miscontrued.  I take full responsiblity because it is my responsibility.

Sometimes I have a lot of material to write about and other times, very little.  A few of my ideas have been good ones, most of them are at least ok but it's easy to admit that a few have been seriously meh.   My apologies for the ones that didn't spark but I suppose that's life too.

I hope that over the years I have maybe occasionally entertained, informed, educated or even truly annoyed some of you. Enough that you still, occasionally, pop in to see what thoughts, events, ideas and questions have been rummaging around in my little punkin' head.

So once again, I thank each and every one of you, because without you, there's really no blog. Happy 8th Blogiversary to us!

Hugs all 'round

PS  Apparently there is another storm on our horizon.  Thus far the experts believe that it'll be just a lot of rain but even rain can knock out power/internet/so forth. Sooo if I'm not around early next week, that is, no doubt, the reason. Take heart, much like MacArthur and Schwarzenegger,  I shall return.