Day 4740

I often have trouble remembering what day it is. It's understandable. I do the same things every day. I get up when Janets says "We'll be walking in twenty minutes." I dress warmly for these early walks and then change back into indoor clothes as soon as we return. I make the bed and then eat my breakfast when Janet and Dawn are finished in the kitchen. I fix my coffee and have a bowl of shredded wheat with fruit. Lately the fruit of choice is strawberries, but I enjoy peaches in the summer. I've tried blackberries, blueberries and raspberries, but didn't like those as much. I've gone through periods when I've fixed myself an omlette, made french toast, or eaten a grapefruit. I even got my special omlette recipe featured in a cookbook once. Now shredded wheat seems to do the trick. They have to be mini-wheats without a sugar coating though. I don't like the old fashioned full sized shredded wheat either.

I usually watch television while I'm eating breakfast. This does little to remind me what day it is. I'm a channel surfer and find all the channels equally bad. Fox is the pillow guy every five minutes. MSNBC is non-stop January 6. CNN is the Ukraine channel. Business is looking up on CNBC. A recession is just around the corner on Fox Business. I only watch the local channels if there is a tornado warning. It's all basically worthless, but it's better than eating in silence.

I try to wait until it warms up a bit before I take my long walk, but usually I get bored and leave right after I check my e-mail for messages. When I was working there were a lot of messages. Now my inbox is mostly spam. Walking is even more boring than watching cable news during breakfast, but I've convinced myself that I'm doing this for my health. I'm sure the long walks do some good, but I'm a long way from becoming a gym rat. I still walk pretty slow and occasionally fat people pass me on the trails. 

To amuse myself I try to keep track of what the local birds and waterfowl are doing. There is a lot of activity. We've got a colony of very noisy green monk parakeets. There are tons of mallards, coots, and ruddy ducks. Occasionally I will see some very colorful wood ducks. A large group of American White Pelicans spend the Winter at the lake along with an even larger group of Double Crested Cormorants. I frequently hear owls but rarely see them. I do see lots of Great Egrets, Cattle Egrets, and Blue Herons. Hawks are pretty common too. I always see the five domestic geese and the three Muscovy ducks near Sunset Bay because they are always looking for handouts from the people who feed them. Of course, now we've got two Bald Eagles as well. Everyone is interested in the eagles.

Monday is Dawn's favorite day because that's when Janet does her grocery shopping. Grocery day is a big deal for  Dawn. She's waiting at the front door at least an hour before Janet returns. For some reason Dawn seems to get great pleasure watching all the groceries being put away. She certainly knows what food is. I think her favorite words are turkey and bacon.

On slow days I recharge batteries. That's what I did today. Phones, laptops, recorders, cameras and much more all rely on batteries. These batteries go dead whether you use the equipment or not. It seems like I'm always recharging or replacing batteries. This is probably why I will never buy an electric car. Batteries are a giant pain. They're expensive, they don't last long enough, and they perform poorly in cold weather. I've had to replace the lawn mower batteries several times because I forgot to bring the battery pack inside during cold weather. These batteries are inside now because the temperature will dip below freezing soon.

Hannah is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day