Before making the trip up to the Dalmatian Rescue kennel, I had plenty of time to fix breakfast and take my long walk. We started our day as usual with a sunrise walk with Dawn. These Fall mornings continue to be delightful. It was brisk and cool this morning with a beautiful sunrise. I thought that Dawn might want to walk a little further today because the weather was so nice. Nope. Her short one mile loop was all she wanted. When I returned to the park for my long walk an hour later, it was still nice and cool. It was a good day for walking.
We could definitely use some rain. The park is starting to look very dry. I haven't seen the water level at the lake so low for quite a while. I noticed today that the White Pelicans have returned for the Winter. Actually, they started returning a few days ago, but they were so far away that I couldn't tell what type of birds they were. Like the State Fair of Texas, the return of the Pelicans is a sure sign that Fall has arrived.
I watched the Landsat 9 launch today on the ULA website. Vandenberg Air Force Base is always so foggy. I've been out there once and it looked about the same as it did today. It's hard to believe that California is dry and prone to forest fires when you are out at Vandenberg. I think that NASA uses Vandenberg whenever it needs to launch a satellite in a polar orbit. The one launch I watched from the base several years ago was also launched in a polar orbit and used to monitor the earth's resources. I doubt that I will be returning to Vandenberg Air Force Base any time soon. It is more expensive to visit than Kennedy Space Center and much harder to obtain access.
My Fall allergies have returned with a vengeance. I'm blowing my nose all the time now. This happens every year and it appears that allergy season is right on schedule. There isn't a lot of time between the end of Spring seasonal allergies and the beginning of Fall allergies. After all these years I'm still not exactly sure what I'm allergic to. It's definitely something in the air.
I got a reminder to take my car in for service tomorrow. The dealership had gotten very good about e-mail reminders. I wonder if they've gotten any better about doing the maintenance? Usually they say the car will be ready the next day and I end up waiting four or five days to get it back again. This is why I always insist on a loaner car.
I added Oliver to the Dalmatian Rescue website this afternoon. I do so little website work these days that I'm starting to forget things. Even simple updates take me longer now. It's hard to believe that I was doing this type of work every single day for many years. I've been retired for long enough now that the world of work just seems like a distant memory. Getting articles published about rockets and astronomy doesn't really seem like work. It's more like a weird hobby. I don't always get paid for the articles I write and few people read them anyway.
I hope there's nothing seriously wrong with my car. Land Rover repairs are always so expensive. The sad thing is that I probably still won't trust the car even after the maintenance work is completed. I doubt that I'll ever have the nerve to drive it out to the observatory.
Sophie is today's Dalmatian of the Day |
Watch of the Day |
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