2/11/25

this is my first entry into this blog. I wonder if I should make an index, but the chances are, I'll forget about this later, so it shouldn't matter anyway (I did it anyway). Currently I'm working an internship at a tax office, which is pretty stressful. I was working 54 hours a week, but the boss put a stop to that because he couldn't afford the overtime (womp womp). Dealing with the public is the stressful part, I mostly just take calls, answer questions, and arrange appointments, but there's some stuff that gets frustrating that I won't get into here.

Nevermind the work thing, Spring is coming up soon, which is exciting. I'm excited to go foraging this spring, since now I know more about what I should be looking for. I'm hoping to harvest some poke salad while they're still edible and I'm excited for sassafras to start growing again. I've never gone foraging in the spring, so I'll be keeping an eye out for things i've never noticed before. I also may be helping put in a garden where I volunteer, I may have convinced the boss to get chickens, so that's exciting as well.

Something I've been doing lately is trying to feed my pets raw, natural food. Dogs and cats in nature eat raw food, I've read that there are more nutrients availible to them in raw along other things. I don't have the time nor the money to feed them fully raw, so I typically give a homemade mixture as a topping on top of my Dog's dry food. My dog is so much happier with raw food, so my wife asked me to make raw food for the cat as well. The problem is, there's currently a highly mutable strain of the bird flu that tends to one-shot cats. My wife loves that cat, so there's no way I'm risking the cat's life. I've found a brand of raw cat food with no chicken in it, there's still a chance of the bird flu in the small amount of cow organs in the food, but much lower. The brand also has had no recalls recently, so I'm more confident about it. The problem is, the dang cat won't eat the raw food. He loves canned food, so I don't get it. I've made a chicken gizzard broth to put on it, which isn't making the cat eat it either. The current plan is to just give the cat the raw food with no dry food until he gives in and eats it. If that doesn't work, I can cut in some of the boiled gizzard leftovers into the mix as well, since they're mostly non-secreting organs.

I've also purchased a bad of animal feed grade bonemeal for the dog and cat. I'm hoping to balance the phosphorus in my Dog's meat mix to make it more nutricious, and so I can hopefully give her less dry food every day. I have an associate's in ag business, so I know how to balance the meals for animals, but I don't have a scale nor the time, so I've mostly been eyeing it. If I can get my hands on a cheap food scale, I'll try to be more precise and mealprep in advance.

That's all I'll write for now, I'll aim to write here regularly. Have a blessed day.