Day 4378

24,000 steps today. My feet hurt, but it was a good day to walk. It was very cold this morning, but I have lots of warm coats. On our sunrise walk with Dawn this morning I wore two coats for the first time this season. The double layer of down jackets keeps me warm in almost any type of weather. I used to wear my heavy vintage Eddie Bauer parka on days like these, but these two lightweaght jackets work much better. I wear a snug very lightweight jacket under a looser outer jacket and am never cold. If it's really a chilly day, I'll put on a sweater and wear long underwear as well. The only thing I need now are warmer shoes. The Hoka shoes really help with foot pain, but they aren't built for warmth.

One of the birders at Sunset Bay told me that I'd have a better chance of seeing the eagles if I came in the afternoon. This guy is pretty dedicated. He's out there with his long telephoto lens every single day. I don't think capturing a good photo of an eagle matters that much to me. I've gotten a lot of nice bird pictures over the years. I'm not a birder though. I'm often not even sure what type of bird I photographed until I look it up on Google later. I'm sure I'll see the eagles again at some point, but I probably won't have my camera with me. 

We did end up taking Dawn on her Sunday outing today. There was no reason not to go, especially since Dawn loves the cold. Janet uses this Sunday walk to work on Dawn's training exercises. This is a good thing for me, since I could never keep up with these two otherwise. After our walk, we went for ice cream cones. The ice cream seemed extra cold today, but it was good. It's always funny to watch Dawn eat ice cream. This dog definitely has issues, but she can be very funny.

I can see on my Fedex account that my package has moved to a new warehouse. There was still no attempt at delivery though. Unfortunately the Mesquite warehouse where the package is now has an even worse reputation than the Hutchins warehouse where it was yesterday. I still don't know what is going on, but I don't expect to see this package before Christmas. If some of the comments I'm reading from other customers are true, I may never see it at all. At least I have finally been able to contact the manufacturer and let them know what is going on. Communication is difficult because I think some of the e-mail from the Chinese manufacturer is being intercepted by my hosting company's spam filters. Most people have two layers of spam protection these says. You never even see the spam and malicious mail that your web host or e-mail provider intercepts. Spam still gets through though and the e-mail reader on your computer or phone provides a second layer of protection. With all these filters in place only about a dozen spam messages a day wind up in my in box. Without the spam filters I would be wading through hundreds of spam messages every day.

Our cable set-top box went out today. This used to happen a lot, but service has been fairly reliable for the past year, so I forgot how to reset everything. The U-verse box doesn't interact with our new TV the same way it did with our old TV either. I spent most of my non walking time today trying to bring the U-verse signal back to life.  Eventually I succeeded and I didn't even have to call AT&T. I'm pretty good at solving technical problems. Not so good at anything else lately.

We'll probably visit the rescue Dalmatians again tomorrow. We'll call first and make sure the holiday boarding traffic hasn't started yet. When the kennel fills up, there is no room to play with the Charlie and Oliver. It's hard to believe that Christmas is actually next weekend. I'm not feeling the Christmas spirit yet. Of course that's nothing new. I rarely have any Christmas spirit. I still think Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday.

Ranger is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3356

20,000 steps today. That's what you get when you walk the dog twice, go to the gym, and remove all the water from the roof. I was surprised that Dash even wanted a walk this morning. It was bitterly cold. There was a brisk wind for most of the day and the wind chill made the temperature feel like 20 degrees. I definitely didn't feel like going up on the roof in this kind of weather, but I knew that if I didn't remove the standing water immediately, it would be ice by morning. So far, the roof leak hasn't reappeared, so maybe all my efforts have been worthwhile. Just being outside today was quite a workout. My trip to the gym seemed easy by comparison.

I wasn't surprised that Dash seemed tired today. Walking in freezing weather takes a lot out of you. We probably should have stayed inside but it's hard to convince a dog who loves to smell things in the park that it is too cold. As soon as Dash gets back inside on these cold days, he starts shivering. He never shivers while he is actually walking though. I still haven't figured this out. At any rate, after a short nap under his favorite blanket, Dash was fine. The cold weather certainly didn't hurt his appetite. Dash ate anything within reach today.

I watched the Crew Dragon capsule dock with the International Space Station on NASA TV this morning. The capsule looked so clean and neat inside. It looked a lot more like the interior of a Tesla Model 3 than your typical space capsule. The Russian Soyuz capsule looks like a flying garbage can by comparison. I'm amazed at the progress that Elon Musk has made in the last ten years. It's pretty impressive. I hope he can reach his goal of landing on Mars while I'm still alive.

I didn't have the energy to do any house cleaning after I finished with the roof this afternoon. I didn't finish updating the Dalmatian Rescue website either. I guess I can do those things tomorrow. Today just seemed like a long, continuous workout. Maybe I lost a few a few pounds. It isn't every day that I rack up 20,000 steps on the Fitbit.

I wonder why I've become so fascinated with tracking things. The Fitbit tracks me while I'm walking around and up until yesterday an IOS app called Fabric tracked me when I was driving around. the Fabric company went out of business recently and the app has gone dead. The same thing happened to Moves, another tracking app I used to use. I guess this shows that there isn't much of a market for apps that track your every more. Most people apparently don't want to be tracked.

I wonder whether I should cancel tomorrow's appointment with the plumber? Another arctic cold front is on the way and temperatures are supposed be get down in the teens. I would imagine that if the ground is frozen, it's going to be a lot harder to find that leak in the sewer line. I can't imagine that the plumbers would enjoy working out in the cold either. I'll call in the morning and see what the plumbing company wants to do. This seems like something that could wait until things warm up a bit.

Dash was restless last night and I didn't get a lot of sleep. Hope things improve this evening. I've done enough moving for one day. I need to be still for a while.

Maggie is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day