Water Reserve and New Family Member

Sitting on the hill just above the house is our back up water. It is about 4 x 6 x 5 and holds water routed from the city line. We have a way to drain it for gardening and a way to run it through a filter if we need it during a hurricane or long water outage. It hasn't, until now, been cleaned however. So it was on my "to do" list which is very large. Well we got a windy day with some dark looking clouds and I figured it was time. Wind is bad for painting (crap blows around and sticks to wet paint) and clouds could (?) mean rain (didn't happen). First I drained it, then opened it up and climbed inside with a scrub brush and dish soap. I cleaned it out really well, hosed it down, cleaned the outside, and filled it a little to rinse it out.

Nice and clean. Here I am peering down into it as it is refilling. The dark part is the bottom and the water line. My windblown hair and head are reflections in the couple inches of water. When it filled up I added a cup of clorox and this weekend we will reseal the lid on so no critters get in. I had to pull out a cricket and 3 cockroaches which was less than I expected to find but still yucky. Now it will be ready for use when needed.

Another thing on the "to do" list was to spay Mini, our latest cat friend. We really don't want more cats. I am feeling like a crazy cat lady right now but what can I do? If it is going to hang out and the other cats like it I need to keep visitors away so no fighting/mating breaks out! She is hanging around and is kind of like Princess - one of the smarter ones. Guess she is here to stay!