Ten Things of Thankful - Week 22, 2017

This is a small muted orange sunset photo
with man in silhouette standing on a high
hill with his arms upraised. Text printed
on it in tall capital letters says "It costs
$0.00 to be grateful for what you have."*

As some of you have probably noticed, I've been away from the blogsphere for the past few days, taking a little break to deal with Internet issues, and a kitty who is having a bad time with his asthma. I wasn't feeling great either, the wet weather makes me really achy, so I decided to just lay low. I asked Sophie to write this post for me, but as you can see in the photo below, she found the lack of opposable thumbs made using the keyboard a little difficult, and the only item she could come up with was being thankful for warm laps to curl up in. I wasn't sure that was one I should use. ;-) However, I am always thankful for this little kitty that is surely one of the sweetest, most gentle creatures God ever made. <3

 

This is a photo of Sophie, the 13 year old matriarch of our kitty
clan. She is a very small Maine Coon cat with long thick fur in
various shades of cream, gray, brown and black. She has beautiful
facial markings and light green eyes. Sophie is sitting on my gray
 desk chair at the table at the dark oak table. She is staring intently
at my Surface tablet standing on the table in front of her.*

Toby, our male Maine Coon kitty, made a return visit to the veterinary clinic this afternoon to check on his breathing and was given a stronger dosage of his medication to help with the lung inflammation that triggers his asthma attacks. I am thankful that he is resting more comfortably now, and is keeping me company while I write. I am also thankful that he loves cream cheese, making it easy to administer a broken tablet of medication in a tiny bit of food that he quickly gobbles up.  The other furkids are now wrestling to decide who gets to nap inside the open cat carrier on the floor. :-)

 

After a second visit to ATT on Saturday afternoon, followed by a call to tech support on Sunday, and a visit from a technician today, I am thankful that we now have our Internet issues resolved. I would be a bit happier if each of their employees knew the same information, and that it was accurate. Living in a rural area gives us limited options, but we did end up with full unlimited access for all of our devices and streaming, something I am very happy about. :-)

 

I am thankful for not having to work outside of home, which made is so much more difficult to accommodate trips to the vet, visits from repair technicians, etc. since we live thirty minutes from the city where I used to work and where my husband works. I am also thankful that our vet clinic is only five miles away, and our veterinary staff are friendly and caring. They love my extra-furry cats. :-)

 

I am thankful for the tremendous amount of rain we've had so far this season. We actually have green weeds flourishing instead of dry brown ones! :-)  Friday night we had the most beautiful stormy sky ever, as it occurred just as the sun was setting. Here are a couple photos Papa Bear took, no filters were used, the colors truly were this vibrant... breathtaking!

 

This is a photo taken Friday night from our back deck of a storm
moving in from the North just as the sun is setting. Flat rangeland
 fills most of the bottom half of the photo. It is brown with patches
  of green prairie grass and sage, and the tiny farm buildings of our
 neighbors can barely be on the horizon line. To the left is an oilfield
 pump jack sitting on a small gravel lot. The top half of the photo is
covered with a huge thundercloud in shades ranging from light gray to
 dark blue, on the right half of the photo one can see a dark downpour
of water coming from the cloud, while the left half has small streaks
 of rain coming down in front of a brilliant pink and yellow sunset.*

 

This photo is of the same storm scene but facing Northwest. The
pump  jack is centered and enlarged, and the entire sky is filled
with brilliant sunset colors. The heavy dark blue thundercloud
looms overhead across the very top of the picture.*

I am thankful for the feral kitty that continues to show up on our deck each evening for a dish of good food and grows more tame with each passing day. Yesterday Papa Bear was outside doing some yard work with the noisy weedeater and she (?) was undeterred, sitting in the tall grass less than fifteen feet from him, waiting for me to come out with her bowl. We can't approach her yet, but she makes eye contact, and keeps our furkids very entertained as they watch her from their cat tree in the window (although Gracie vocalizes some concerns about having to share their food with her.) LOL

I am so thankful that my older sister reminded me about my younger sister's 30th wedding anniversary this week. We chipped in on a gift they will enjoy. Apparently my calendar notifications aren't working, and I would have forgotten all about it!

Papa Bear's birthday is coming up Wednesday, and I am thankful that he is so easy to please when it comes to gifts and celebrating. He's been showing me photos of German Chocolate Cakes online these past couple weeks, his very favorite, hoping that I'm getting the hint he'd really like me to make one for his birthday.  :-)

Returning to the TToT linkup today, I was delighted to find so many folks linking up posts this week! Now I have the pleasure of settling in to begin reading each post, and commenting. If I don't get to yours today, I will tomorrow. I am so thankful for your sharing and for the way that reading everyone's gratitude post makes my heart happy!

Blessings to you this week. Keep your eye out for reasons to be thankful, and remember to be a blessing to someone else!


This is a click-button to the TToT
link-up. It is photo of one of our
 beautiful Texas sunsets with blue
 still peeking through the clouds;
 yellow, orange and pink bands
around the remaining sliver of
bright sun, and a wide band of black
earth below it on which I've written
Ten Things of Thankful.*



* Descriptions of the included photos are being provided for those who may be unable to view the illustrations.