Day 2116

We started the new month with a new schedule. We go to our physical therapy sessions in the mornings now. Mornings are good because Dot is less likely to poop in the car. On the other hand, mornings are not so good because there isn't much time to get ready. By the time we took the dogs on their morning walk, ate breakfast, took a shower, and got the car ready, it was time to go. Dot definitely didn't like riding in the Evoque. I tried my best to make a comfortable flat surface, but her bed still had a bit of a tilt to it and Dot managed to get stuck. I had to stop a couple of times along the way, but eventually we made it to our destination.

Even though Dot wasn't happy about her ride, she did amazingly well in the treadmill today. She was strong enough that we were able to increase the speed and do a small amount of interval training for the first time in several months. No accidents in the house today either. Actually, we have had very few accidents this entire week. I'm not sure we can attribute this pleasant turn of events to the Melatonin we've started giving her before bedtime, but it's the only change I can think of.

Work was surprisingly busy today. I got two new website projects that will keep me busy for a while. I'm not sure how excited I am though. One of the projects is kind of a pro bono deal that I won't make any money on. The other project has such a low budget that it's hardly worth talking about. That's the state of web design these days. Take it or leave it.

There was another tragic school shooting today. Once again the shooter was a young male. Hasn't anyone figured it out yet? Terrorist shootings. Gang related shootings. School shootings. They all have one thing in common. These crimes are almost universally committed by young men. Instead of endless agonizing about mental health and gun law issues, just ban young men from having guns. Period. Make the penalties for possessing a gun so severe that no young man would even want to go near one. So, how would you enforce such a ban? You couldn't. You probably can't enforce any other solution either. That's the problem of living in a free society. The obvious solutions are impossible to implement without destroying the free society we all claim to love. Do we want safety or freedom? Eventually, we have to decide.

I got a call from the Land Rover dealer today telling me that they are working on my car. Does this mean it will be done soon? Not necessarily. I've gotten these sorts of calls before and then waited a week or more before the car was actually finished. I don't really care how long it takes, but I'm guessing that Dot would really like to have things wrapped up before next week's physical therapy session. She hates the Evoque.

There's already another update to the buggy IOS 9 on my phone. I'm downloading it now. The current system is causing all sorts of problems with my WiFi network, but you have to be connected to WiFi to download the new system. This may take a while.

Tori is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2115

I was glad the yellow warning light came on again when I was driving to the dealership this morning. At least the repair guys won't think my suspension problem is something I imagined. Who knows how long the repairs will take. It always seems to take much longer than I anticipate. This is probably why Land Rover has always been pretty generous with their loaner cars. If you've got a free loaner car, you're not going to complain as much about how long the repairs are taking.

Since I like to complain, I'll complain a bit about the Evoque anyway. The car is more expensive than the larger LR2 or the appealing new Discovery model. It has a small 4 cylinder engine and terrible visibility. The rear seats don't fold flat and the engine shuts off when you stop at a light. The stop and go engine is supposed to be a feature, but it is a giant annoyance to me. I never really believe the engine is going to start again when the light turns green. I hope they are able to fix my suspension quickly. I'm not looking forward to driving the Evoque for the entire month of October.

It was a nice warm day, so the dogs wanted to sun themselves in the backyard after lunch. Instead of lying in the grass, Dot now likes to lie in the Monkey Grass beds next to the greenhouse. This is killing the Liriope plants, but I don't have the heart to make Dot move. I did a little gardening while I was watching the dogs. It's always been difficult to grow the type of plants I want, but surprisingly easy to grow weeds. If I don't pull the weeds, they crowd out the good plants. As I was pulling weeds, I noticed that clumps of them made a pretty good makeshift broom. I used the clumps of weeds to brush away a dense mass of spiderwebs on the back windows. I thought this was pretty clever, since clearing away the spiderwebs with a regular broom typically ruins the broom. The webs stuck to the clumps of weeds like a charm and them I just threw them away.

I've been having trouble with my phone ever since I upgraded to IOS 9. A lot of the apps I use don't recognize the WiFi network anymore and use cellular data instead. I looked on the Internet and a lot of other people are having the same problem. Apple needs to fix this quickly. As soon as people start realizing that they've inadvertently maxed out their data plans by using cellular data when they thought they were using WiFi. My watch is having trouble getting the temperature from my phone as well. Makes me wonder about the wisdom of upgrading my laptop to the new El Capitan system. What could possible go wrong?

I still haven't figured out how to get Dot in the Evoque for tomorrow's physical therapy appointment. That will be my after breakfast project, unless a new writing job accidentally falls in my lap.

Thelma is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2114

At the rate I'm going, I could probably continue this narrative as a series of Tweets. 140 characters a day would be plenty. Today, I picked up some more Levothyroxine for Dash and went to the gym. That was about it. I read an article recently that said if you want to stay busy in your fifties and sixties, you need to spend your forties building a strong network of contacts and relationships. Oops, my bad. I was still kind of social in my late thirties, but by the time I turned forty, I had already started avoiding people. I stayed busy for a long, long time because almost everybody I knew eventually became a client. The fatal flaw in this plan was that I never knew that many people in the first place and had no desire to meet more. Now, it's become one of those Humpty Dumpty situations. All the king's horses and all the king's men...you know the story.

If I wanted to make contacts, I definitely should have picked a different gym. I'm usually the youngest person working out. The people here are ancient.  I picked this cardiovascular and fitness center because the facilities were fabulous, but forgot that it is run by a major hospital. Most of the members seem to be recovering from heart surgery or cancer and almost everybody has a nurse or personal trainer. Needless to say, I usually have the basketball court all to myself. Usually, I like this somewhat unique situation, but on days where I'm feeling isolated, exercising with a bunch of geezers doesn't really help.

I'm not sure that I even have the capacity to get out and about anymore. Even when I'm at the gym or running small errands, I worry about Dot. After all the time I've spent with her, I'd feel terrible if she ended up spending her final hours alone and scared. Dot knows that I am her legs and she depends on me. I don't know how much time she has left, but I want her remaining days to be happy ones, right up to the very last day. This is why I kind of liked it when work kept me chained to the computer. Dot was always nearby. The work kept me busy. And the money the work generated allowed me to buy enough technology toys that I never had to think about my dwindling circle of friends.

I passed a bookstore on my way to the gym and briefly thought about stopping and picking up some more books to read. That would be too spontaneous though. I'll probably pass this same bookstore three or four times before I actually stop and look for a book. I've passed the new breakfast restaurant a couple of times too, but still haven't gone in and ordered breakfast.

I need to remember to take my car to the dealership tomorrow morning. I'm pretty sure that the suspension problem is real, since the yellow warning light has come on several times now. The car still handles well, but the squeaking noise is kind of ominous. I hope this is a warranty item. Anything that isn't covered by warranty at the Land Rover dealer usually ends up being very expensive. I hope they don't give me an Evoque for a loaner car. It's too hard to load Dot into the small Evoque when we go to our physical therapy sessions. If I'm lucky, they'll give me one of the last remaining LR2s in their loaner fleet.  I learned a long time ago that they'll never lend you a Range Rover.

It's too bad the Pope isn't still around. The messages of hope on TV have already been replaced by politicians accusing each other of being liars. By the time the election actually rolls around, I suspect that everybody will hate all of them.

Sweat Pea is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1346

When I went to my doctor's appointment today, my blood pressure was low. I wonder what that's all about? My blood pressure has been on the high side for as long as I can remember. Low blood pressure would definitely be a new wrinkle. My test today was to determine how elastic my arteries were and whether they were filled with plaque. I think I did OK on this test. The images on the screen were mostly blue anyway. I've had these tests before. Blue is usually good and red is bad.

Dot thinks she is better now and wants to resume her regular life. When I got Dash ready to go on his morning walk, Dot stood right by the front door and started slapping her leash with her paw. She was determined not to be left behind again. Since it's always hard to reason with a Dalmatian, I took both dogs on a shorter, non-strenuous walk. The walk seemed to put the dogs in a better mood, and the rest of the day was quite peaceful.

My new nanny cam quit working today. Par for the course, I guess. The camera works fine when I'm actually in the room with it, but the signal drops out as soon as I leave the house. This severely limits the usefulness of the gizmo. There was a cryptic message on the company website that said they were experiencing server problems. I'm just guessing, but the server appears to be in Sweden. Maybe that's part of the problem.

Land Rover still hasn't finished repairing the Defender 90. When I took the car in, they told me they'd have it fixed in two days. When Land Rover says two days though, they really mean two weeks. I suspect the car will be ready at the end of next week. I'm actually in no hurry to get the Defender back. The air conditioning work great on the Evoque loaner car, even though nothing else seems very reliable.

I'm really glad that Dot's condition is improving. Life seems to be returning to normal. It looks like I'm up to date on website updates and all the pending articles in my queue have been written and submitted. I even remembered to take the garbage out to the curb for tomorrow's trash pickup. Now, I just need to decide what to have for breakfast tomorrow.

Lance is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1344

If you didn't know any better, you'd probably think I operated a pet taxi service. The day was spent carting Dot and Dash back and forth to various vet appointments. I'm happy to report that Dot's condition continues to improve. She's moving around fairly well now, and although the Rimadyl she's currently taking to reduce inflammation in her leg might be partially responsible for her seemingly overnight recovery, it does appear that she suffered no serious damage last weekend. All Dot's vital signs looked good at her annual physical today. If I can keep her calm for a few more days while her leg continues to heal, I think she'll be walking normally again.

When I got Dot back home again, it was time to take Dash to the vet.  Nothing was really wrong with Dash this time. He just needed his bi-weekly antigen shot. There's one more vet appointment with Dot tomorrow, and then it's time for me to go back to the doctor again. A new ultrasound test one of my doctors wanted me to take got approved by insurance today, and I made an appointment to get the test done on Thursday.

The touch screen display quit working on the Evoque loaner car this afternoon. Now, when you touch the on-screen buttons, nothing happens. I can't believe that so many things are broken on a car with only 6,000 miles on the odometer. Of course there is always a chance that the odometer is broken too. I may be driving an older car than I think. I'm definitely never going to buy one of these things. The entire car is just a giant electrical problem waiting to happen.

Even though I was continually driving around, running errands, getting prescriptions filled, and taking dogs to the vet, I still managed to get quite a bit done today. The web-servers that were down for repairs yesterday were running normally again, so I was able to upload quite a bit of new material to client websites. There was a rush article that needed to be written in a hurry, as well as some pictures that still needed to be edited in Photoshop. I may have forgotten one or two things, but I think I did pretty well for a Monday.

I didn't have time to go to the gym today, which meant I didn't have time to stop at the grocery store on the way home either. Although there was nothing to eat for dinner in the refrigerator, there was plenty of soup in the cupboard. Janet loves soup. No matter how forgetful I am about grocery shopping, there is always plenty of soup to eat.

I'm hopeful that Dot's condition will continue to improve and that after tomorrow's vet appointment, life will return to some semblance of normality. If two dogs leave me with a feeling that I have a full plate, I wonder how people with small children and busy lives manage at all. Maybe they all have nannies.

Blackjack is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1338

I took the Defender in for service this morning and ended up driving home in a new Range Rover Evoque. I'm kind of glad the dealer gave me a loaner with hail damage because I'm always nervous of getting a ding in these loaner cars. This one was so full of dings that I've got nothing to worry about. The Evoque seems to get a lot of good press, but I'd never buy one. It's too small, too low to the ground, and has terrible viability. I don't know who they're marketing this car to. It's not an off-road vehicle. It's not a family SUV. And it's not really pretty enough to be a sports car. I sure hope they don't make the new Defender look anything like these things.

This was another day where I had to schedule everything around a series of brief but intense rainstorms. The dogs managed to get both their walks, but just barely. Both times, there was a downpour within minutes of returning to the house.  When the sun came out right after lunch, I used the opportunity to clear the water off the roof. That was pretty dumb, because two hours later, it was raining again.

I was a little nervous about taking Dot to her acupuncture session today. Now that Dash has decided he's scared of rain too, I kept wondering if a sudden thunderclap might trigger another seizure. All was fine though. Although the sky was dark and ominous looking, it didn't rain at all while Dot and I were away. When I checked in on Dash using the nanny cam, he was sleeping on the bed, just like he always does.

In case you think I do nothing buy cater to the needs of spoiled dogs, there was other work to do as well. I finished several new articles, answered some client questions about online forms, and paid a pile of new bills that arrived in the mail today. When I entered the payments in my accounting software, they didn't balance. This happens a lot these days. No matter how careful I am, I inevitably make an erroneous entry and end up having to check everything a second time. This seems to be an unfortunate by-product of growing older. Even the simplest things seem to take an excruciatingly long time. The same thing happens when I'm writing. There are typos galore.

Hopefully the weather will be better tomorrow, because I've got a photo shoot scheduled. It's just some industrial photography that will ultimately wind up on a website, but it's still a nice break from sitting in a small room and writing with two dogs under my desk that think the sky is falling. I need to charge all my camera batteries and make sure the equipment is in working order before I go to bed tonight. The photography side of my business is not immune to my forgetfulness.

Elliott is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1182

It looks like my car is going to be in the shop for a long time. How do I know? Well, the Land Rover dealer called this morning and offered to exchange my Toyota loaner car for a brand new Evoque. I took them up on their offer, of course. The Evoque is closer to a space age Jetsons car than anything I've ever driven. The entire roof is glass. It is a small car with a huge moon roof. There are no ignition or door keys whatsoever. You just put a small gizmo about the size of an iPod nano in your pocket and the car senses you. As you approach, the doors unlock and you just push a button on the dash and the car starts. Your seat automatically adjusts to the best driving position and off you go.

Hey, what could possibly go wrong?  I could just imagine going somewhere in this car and then being unable to get home again because the little gizmo in your pocket broke and you couldn't get the doors to open. I don't know how well this particular Land Rover would do off road either. It's pretty low to the ground. My simple, completely mechanical, all aluminum Defender is still basically the better car.

Dot rested well last night and was able to stand on all fours again this morning. She's still pretty shaky, but she appears much better than she did last night. When I went to make a vet appointment for her, I discovered that her regular vet is on vacation. I made an appointment with another vet for tomorrow and kept her resting most of the day. The only time she wasn't resting was when some landscaping people came over to give me an estimate on re-doing the back yard. Even though I kept Dot penned in my office, she got so upset at the strangers in her yard that she pooped all over the office floor. What a mess. I had tried to get her to go before the landscaping people arrived, but she was so stubborn about not getting her regular walk, that she refused to do anything.

There was very little writing going on today. I spent most of my time updating websites and getting the rest of my March invoices out. I had to attach past due notices to several of the invoices. That's never a good sign. I bet the mechanic working on my Defender and the landscaper looking at my yard today are both doing better than I am. It's hard to live without a car and it's irritating to live with a mud pit in your back yard. I'm probably not the only one who would pay whatever it takes to alleviate these sorts of problems. Unfortunately, the problems I solve in my own business aren't nearly as essential as having a car that runs. I'm learning that people can go a long time without changing their websites at all.

Tyson is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day