Day 3416

I was wrong about the weather yesterday. We were in the path of a big storm after all. It just arrived a little later than I expected. I can't relax during storms anymore. I keep expecting a leak to appear in the living room, the power to go out, the greenhouse roof to blow away, or a large tree to fall on the house. All these things have happened in the past. I went outside and started the two sump pumps. I moved some of the furniture in the living room. And I tried to go to sleep. It was really all I could do.

The pumps ran all night and they were still pumping water off the roof early this morning. We got a lot of rain but we didn't lose power and the roof didn't leak. I wish I could say that the rain was over but I think we're going to get a repeat performance tonight. By the time I finished breakfast, the last of today's bad weather had moved to the East and I was able to take my morning walk. I saw the pelican flying low over the lake this morning. It was looking for a fish to eat. I'm glad the bird isn't injured, but I'm still puzzled why it didn't join the other pelicans on their annual Spring migration.

I got my phone bill today and was surprised to see that it had gone up. At first I though I had been charged extra for using the phone while I was in Houston, but there are no roaming charges anymore. My bill has been exactly the same for several years now. When I looked for an explanation for the increase I saw a small item in fine print that just said "service changes." I certainly haven't made any changes, so I called customer service to see what was going on. "Oh, AT&T raised your rates," the lady told me. "We grandfathered your plan for as long as we could, but we needed to bring you into line with current rates." I was irritated, but I wasn't really surprised. This was exactly what the storage warehouse people did to me. Why should the phone company be any different.

I'm not a big fan of the subscription economy. I think the whole idea is to get you hooked on something and then continuously raise your rates. Netflix does this. Microsoft does this. It looks like the phone company does it too. The world was much simpler when you could watch TV over the air for free and actually owned the software and entertainment you bought. I'm still using a fifteen year old version of Microsoft Word because I just don't feel like paying over and over again for Office 365.

You'd think I'd be getting a lot more done without a dog to take care of, but actually I'm doing less. I've lost my focus. I'm sure this will change. I'm just not clear what comes next. Walking is good. I've started fixing myself more interesting things for dinner. I'm going to continue photographing plants and animals in the park even though I've already documented everything ten times over. Janet wants to travel. Somehow I don't think going to the post office counts as travel.

Bogart is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day