Day 2220

I've wondered for years why the city has never bothered to fix our street. The street has been ignored for so long that it has gradually just become a collection of potholes. I really wasn't expecting that it would ever be repaired, but much to my surprise a parade of heavy equipment arrived in the neighborhood late this afternoon. It looks like the shabby street is finally going to be repaved. There must be a master plan for street maintenance in Dallas, but I've never been able to figure out what it was. Some streets seem to be continuously under repair. Others get fixed every five years or so. And then there's our street. I haven't seen a road crew here for twenty five years. It will be interesting to see how long it takes to repave the street. It could be weeks, or it could be months.

Other than watching the road crews unload the huge machines that scrape the old asphalt off the road before it is repaved, there wasn't a lot that happened today. I actually forgot what day it was from time to time, because the day seemed exactly like yesterday. It was clear and cold for the second or third day in a row. Dot got us up right on schedule by pooping in her bed again. I managed to spot Venus, Saturn, Mars, and Jupiter in the pre-dawn sky on our morning walk. When we returned home, I fixed my breakfast smoothie and made some coffee. The breakfast ritual takes quite a while, but I wish it took longer. Day like this can drag on forever.

I started writing another article after breakfast. I probably could have completed two articles today, but why bother. I still need something to do tomorrow. I write to a word count and need at least three hundred words for my editors. When the subject is interesting it is not hard to come up with 600 to 900 words. Today I only managed 360. Not surprisingly, it is often harder to write the shorter articles than the longer ones. Coincidentally, it is also harder to write blog posts on days where nothing happens.

I saw a psychologist on one of the morning TV shows talking about how buying a lottery ticket actually makes most people happier for a short period of time. Almost universally, when you buy a ticket you start thinking about what you would do if you win. Nobody really expects to win, but supposedly thinking about something positive for a day is good for you. So, you really haven't wasted your money on a piece of paper, you've actually bought a little positive attitude instead. No matter what your circumstances, for a very short while your glass is half full. Works for me. Daydreaming is also supposed to be good for you, so I should be in great shape. I daydream all the time.

It is ironic that I have made money by selling all my worst stocks at the end of 2015. If I had held on to these losers, they would have all gone down even further when the market started crashing in January. We had another bad day today with a drop of 364 points. The market has already dropped over 7% this year and the month isn't even over yet. Not good! Bolder people than me are aggressively shorting stocks now. I think the market is too volatile to do something risky like this, but I understand why some people take the risk. It sucks to keep losing money. No wonder people are buying over 100,000 Powerball tickets a minute today. When you can't count on jobs or the economy, you start counting on luck. Hey, maybe I'll win tonight. Or, maybe you'll win. Good luck.

Taylor is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day