Day 2078

There's nothing like starting your day washing your hair and discovering that there is a giant cockroach in the shower with you. That ugly little incident kind of set the tone for the day. Later, while I was eating breakfast, I watched the stock market drop over 1000 points within a few minutes of the opening bell. The market did recover a bit, but still ended the day with a loss of 588 points. This is not very auspicious, especially after last week's huge losses. Just as I thought life was returning to normal, Dot wandered into my office while I was working on a writing assignment, quietly dropping a long trail of poop behind her. I thought Dot was fast asleep, but apparently not.

It's easy to clean up dog poop. It's not so simple to clean up the mess that China has made of my investment portfolio. I haven't gone into panic mode yet, but I am frustrated. When China sneezes, we all catch a cold. How did we let ourselves  become so dependent on a Country that isn't even our friend? China buys our debt and we buy their cheaply made products. We have become completely co-dependent. Life was so much better when every American town had a factory and we made all our own stuff. Don't people realize that these factories were what provided the well paying jobs that everyone is clamoring for these days? Not everyone is destined to become a rocket scientist and factory jobs were what created the middle class in America. I've never been a fan of globalization. All it has done is create immensely rich multi-national corporations. I'd gladly return to a world where products were made by my neighbors in my own home town. Sure, everything would cost a little more, but is cheap Chinese made stuff at Walmart really worth all we've lost?

I'm pretty certain that nothing I say about China, or anything else for that matter, will make much of a difference. I don't exert much influence over my clients anymore. I seldom change Janet's mind either. Even Dot and Dash don't listen to me. I do have opinions, but I'm tired of tilting at windmills. It's much easier to just drink my morning coffee, take care of the dog's needs, and mind my own business.

I helped a Luddite friend add a bank account to her Paypal account this morning. This wasn't nearly as easy as it should have been. Every time I did something on my computer, Paypal would call my friend to confirm that it was really her. Of course it wasn't my friend doing the typing, it was me. She'd get a phone call asking for a confirmation number that was actually appearing miles away on my screen. I think we eventually got the account set up, but it would have been a lot easier if she'd just learn how to use her computer. I have a sister who is the same way. She won't use a computer at all and I have to send her letters through the mail. I may occasionally want to travel back in time to the 1950's, but I'm a realist. I do know how to use a computer.

Janet got home late from work, but we decided to walk Dot around the block anyway. It was starting to get dark, but we were hoping that Dot would poop again and we might be able to get a good night's sleep. Dot found something to bark at along the way and that short moment of excitement actually did cause her to poop. I couldn't have asked for more. A day that started with killing a wet cockroach actually ended pretty well.

Hero is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1055

I don't think I'm a spokesperson for Paypal anymore. The Paypal Advantage program that I was helping to promote seems to have disappeared. I looked on the Internet yesterday and all references to the program have vanished. Very few people saw the ads featuring me and a Dalmatian as satisfied Paypal users, but I swear they actually did exist. I saw them myself. Oh, well. And I was hoping to be like William Shatner for Priceline.com. The only other company that has ever used me in their advertising was Wordstar. Remember Wordstar?  I didn't seem to do that company much good either.

My little photo shoot this morning went pretty well, considering that we did the photography at the wrong time of day and the lighting was terrible. It was good practice for me. I need to remember how to deliver good results under bad conditions.

At one point I was seriously considering turning my company into a more retail business, taking family portraits and pet pictures. That little fantasy didn't last long. I quickly learned that professional art directors and graphic designers were much easier to deal with than regular folks. It seemed like the less money people had for photography, the more they wanted in return. Now, I have a simple rule of thumb. If there isn't an accounts receivable department to send the invoice to, don't do the job. I'll occasionally take pictures as a favor, like I did this morning, but I'll never charge for them. It's just too depressing to see what friends actually think you are worth.

The clear skies and bright sunlight might not have been good for photography, but it was perfect for taking the dogs to the dog park. Now that Janet's Land Rover is back in service, the dogs were much better travelers. They seem to like Janet's car better than mine.  They hated the Kia Sorento rent car.  The back seat wasn't deep enough and they kept falling out of the seat every time we went around a corner. Thankfully, everything is back to normal now. Life is good.

Next weekend, the annual Santa Paws photo season returns for another year. Dalmatian Rescue has lined up five different locations this year. I hope I'm up to the challenge. Each year my knees seems to get worse and worse. After kneeling and standing up over and over again for six hours, I always feel like someone needs to scrape me off the floor with a spatula at the end of the day. The only thing more grueling than being the photographer at these events is being Santa. I'm really glad that I don't have to wear a Santa suit and have big dogs sit on my lap all day.

Ginger is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1000

1000 days ago, I became a blogger. I didn’t really have much to say, but I was determined to say it anyway. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I was convinced that if you looked at the ordinary closely enough, it would become extraordinary.

Day after day, I recorded the trivial and the absurd in my life. Even in the beginning I knew that a blog needed pictures. Each evening I showed you a different Dalmatian. They all had spots and looked very similar, but I understood they were completely unique. I knew these dogs. I had photographed each of them and had helped to find them homes.

The watches were different. I didn’t find homes for the watches. They found a home with me. I collected them all. The reason you see a new Dalmatian and a new watch every day is quite simple. I have lots and lots of pictures of both. Since I’m a visual person, I instinctively knew that every watch and dog I showed you told a story. I wasn’t so sure about my days.

On the surface, my life is extremely boring. If you were a fly on the wall, watching my daily routine would be like watching paint dry. At least that’s what I thought at first. I wondered why anyone would even bother to read this blog. Lets face it. Not much happens.

People did begin to read however, and I began to discover that even the most uneventful existence is full of mystery and nuance. The simple act of writing things down has allowed me to see things I normally never noticed. Maybe it wasn’t such a boring life after all. I had built a little business that had survived for almost 25 years without going bankrupt. I had learned to understand what goes on inside the heads of dogs. Perhaps most surprisingly of all, I was still alive.

Without the trail of breadcrumbs the blog now provides me, I probably would have already forgotten that I’ve been interviewed twice by the local news during the past 1000 days. I’ve been featured in ads for Paypal and was even flown out to San Francisco for a big photo shoot featuring two Dalmatians and me. Honeybees built a huge hive in our roof one Summer and threatened to invade the house. Another Summer I shot a video about a goat that became friends with a Great Dane for the National Geographic Channel. You may have seen it. There have been cancer scares, tornado alerts, sick dogs and much more. Through all this, I never missed a day. I posted on the same day I had surgery. I kept posting through power outages and computer failures. Hell, I had a story to tell. It was a good story too. You could even make a good case that I’d been leading a pretty interesting life after all.

The blog has taught me that almost everything you do has implications. The Dalmatian pictures have made people more aware of Dalmatian Rescue and the importance of saving these wonderful dogs. Dot and Dash now have dozens of new friends from all around the world.

Amazingly, the pictures of watches on the blog have actually made me a little money. As a result of my daily watch pictures, I am now considered a watch expert in certain circles and have written more than 300 articles and press releases for major brands like Fortis, Eterna and Versace. Who would have thought?

Tomorrow is the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. On September 10, 2001 I had no idea of what was going to happen the next day. If the blog has taught me one thing, it is this. Even after 1000 consecutive days of posting, I still can’t tell you what is going to happen tomorrow. You’re going to have to just keep reading.

Cleo is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 851

Today was more or less of a lost cause. I wasted an enormous amount of time this morning trying to renew my Skype accounts using Paypal. I've renewed my Skype phone number this way for several years now, but for some reason it didn't work this time. Paypal technical support, which is very good, said there was nothing wrong with my Paypal account. Skype technical support, which is terrible, ate up my morning with their silly live chat system. After explaining my problem over and over again and waiting up to five minutes for a reply in the chat window, the service representative typed that they had no idea what the problems was and they would have to "escalate" my service request. Jeez, Skype is a phone company, or at least kind of a phone company. Why can't you ever talk to someone on the phone at Skype? I guess I didn't need Skype anyway.

I was supposed to photograph two new Dalmatians today, but the weather was bad and the dogs didn't appear to be comfortable posing in a windstorm. In most of the pictures, the dogs ears were blowing backwards like they had stuck their head out the window of a car going sixty miles an hour. I think I'll have to go back and take these pictures again on a nicer day.

I think the really bad weather is North of us in Oklahoma and Kansas. All we have here is a lot of wind and some ominous looking clouds. There were a few light sprinkles while I was getting groceries, but I was still able to give the dogs their evening walk without any of us getting wet. Things don't look so good for our Sunday trip to the dog park however. Everyone says it is going to rain buckets in Dallas tomorrow.

I'm going to try to get some stuff moved to the larger storage warehouse tomorrow. I've got to get things moved before the end of the month when my contract for the smaller warehouse runs out. So far, I've moved virtually nothing. Why do I wait until the last minute for everything? If I hadn't waited until the last day before my Skype accounts expired, I probably wouldn't have had so many problems with them either.

Flash is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 777

One of my European clients paid me using Paypal this morning. I couldn't believe how easy and painless the whole process was. I can still remember the days when I used to get a check in the mail from international clients. I would take the foreign check to my bank where they never knew what to do with it. They usually told me to go downtown to the main bank where there would be someone who could exchange my Deutsche Marks for dollars. The process varied, depending on who I talked to, but it was always a giant hassle. Paypal changed everything. These days, working internationally a snap. The sender just makes a deposit in their own currency and it automatically comes out in dollars on my end.

It still seems amazing to me that it's just as easy to get work from people living thousands of miles away as it is from a neighborhood business down the street. This is one aspect of the online age that I'm pretty happy about. I could do without social media however. It's a giant black hole that sucks up all my time and most of my energy. Life was much easier when I just met people for coffee.

Thanks to Alan from Birding in the Falkland Islands I now know that the lonely bird in yesterday's photo is an American Kestrel. This happens to be the smallest falcon in North America, which is pretty cool. It's nice to have this amazing little bird in the neighborhood. I won't need any help identifying today's picture. Yes, I know it's a squirrel. It's easier to photograph birds than squirrels and other animals. The birds know they can fly away and aren't scared of the dogs. Anything on the ground is fair game though and the dogs make every effort to catch it.

People keep asking me who I'm rooting for in the Superbowl. I don't know. I like Dallas, but they didn't even get in the playoffs. I like Pittsburgh, but they didn't do so well this year either. Towards the end, I was rooting for Denver because I like Tim Tebow. That didn't work out either. I guess I'm just hoping that Budweiser runs a commercial with a Dalmatian in it.

Cooper is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 751

The days are noticeably longer now. Pretty soon, all the sunset photo opportunities that seem perfectly timed with the dog's evening walk will be gone for another season. I'm sure the golden evening skies will be replaced by something equally interesting as the days grow longer, but I'm going to miss these spectacular sunset walks.

One of my European clients has started paying me using Paypal. The fact that it's so easy and safe to make international transactions with Paypal is one more reason I'm starting to use it for almost everything. Getting money from another country used to be a nightmare when I had to use wire transfers. The German banks always wanted information that the American banks didn't even use. Paypal is so much easier.

I almost upgraded my main computer to Lion today, but chickened out at the last minute. Lion seems to work well on my laptop, but I have much more software installed on the main computer. Every single time I've installed a major system upgrade on my desktop, the results have been disastrous. There is always some very expensive application that I use everyday which refuses to work under the new system. Since it's hard to reverse a system upgrade, I usually have to go out and buy all new versions of the software I already have. Typically, I don't like the new versions as well as the old versions, but that's another story. I wish Apple had some sort of app that would search everything on my computer and tell me if I was ready for Lion or not. Snow Leopard is running perfectly now, but I remember that it was a nightmare too in the beginning. One thing is certain. I'm going to have to upgrade to Lion sooner or later. Avid Media Composer 6.0, which I would like to start using, only runs under Lion.

The dead leaves are really stacking up in the back yard now. I'm going to have to break out the leaf blower pretty soon and blow them into big piles so I can bag them up and get rid of them before Spring. There are so many leaves on the ground already, that even if I bag up leaves every weekend, it will still take me until Spring to get the yard cleaned up and ready for a fresh load of St. Augustine sod. It would be so much easier to live on the 17th. floor of a luxury high-rise.

Lucy is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 654

It hard to believe that it's been a full year since my Paypal photo shoot in San Francisco. That's what I was doing a year ago today. Being a spokesperson for Paypal certainly hasn't changed my life much. Very few people I know have even seen the ads. A lot of the people who actually have seen the ads still think that the Dalmatians in the photos are Dot and Dash. I have to explain that they only flew me to San Francisco for the photo shoot, not Dot and Dash. The dogs in the photos are California show dogs who are used to being in photos. They are very nice, but they are not mine.

I had my first physical therapy session today. I learned that I don't have a pinched nerve, or my neck pain would be even worse. What I have is a condition called encapsulated soft tissue. What this means is that some tissue has been caught between the vertebra in my neck and is being pinched. Evidently traction therapy can pull the vertebra apart just enough to release the tissue. I'm a bit sore after the first session, but it all makes sense to me.

When I arrived at the physical therapy offices I was surprised to see that my own doctor was there getting physical therapy himself. I heard him tell a nurse that he was just going to ride the stationary bicycles till the therapist was done with me. My therapist heard this and told someone to go watch him, because he "didn't know when to stop." The therapist turned to me and told me that the doctor was in a lot worse shape than I was. I guess this is good news, but I certainly like a healthy doctor too. At any rate, it looks like several weeks of therapy sessions ought to get me back to normal. I certainly hope so.

Janet's is helping with a big neighborhood Octoberfest tomorrow, so I guess that's where we're eating lunch. Hopefully we'll be getting our new mattress ordered tomorrow as well. It looks like a very busy weekend, since I've still got work that I didn't manage to get completed today. Tomorrow is a brand new month. We need to remember the dogs heartworm pills in the morning.

Thelma is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 605

I look at this blog as a public service. If you read it long enough, you'll come to realize that your own life is far more interesting than mine and feel better about yourself. Janet laughs at me for being Mayor of the Post Office on foursquare. "Can't you find something more interesting to be Mayor of," she says. Well, not really.

There was certainly nothing earth shattering happening today. I paid a few bills, brought some spreadsheet records up to date and finished writing a couple of ad assignments. And yes, I did go to the Post Office. It was hot again today and I had trouble getting the dogs back inside after lunch. Maybe they're suffering from light deprivation, because they love to spend time outside even on the hottest days. I've got to watch how long they're out in the sun though, since Dalmatians sunburn easily.

I never did get the Henry 209 roof patch cement at Home Depot that I promised myself I would take care of today. The writing job this afternoon took longer than I though and there were a couple of emergency web updates as well. I'd better get this chore done tomorrow, because I keep hearing that it might rain this weekend. When the mail arrived, there was another late registration notice from the city for Dot. This happens every year right after she gets her new city tags at her annual exam. Somehow, we're permanently out of sync with the city. I'll need to call them on Monday and explain that the pooch is completely legal and up to date on everything.

I got momentarily excited when UPS delivered a large mystery package addressed to me toward the end of the day. I didn't remember ordering anything. I initially though Paypal might be sending me a free logo jacket or tote bag for being an advertising spokesperson, but the package just turned out to be a spare paper tray for my printer. I must have ordered the thing, but my mind still draws a blank.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 540

What did I learn today? I learned that Ooma, which I always thought was pretty cool, won't work with my Motorola SBG900 gateway. I learned that online merchants are increasingly using their own checkout systems when you choose to pay with Paypal. I learned that my new Colorburst RIP requires a dongle. None of these things are particularly good for me. The Ooma VOIP phone system requires a wired connection to your Internet gateway to work. Boo! I discovered the Paypal problem when I renewed some domains this morning on Network Solutions. Their checkout system automatically tells Paypal to use instant transfer instead of a credit card and then adds insult to injury by adding themselves as a "recurring payment" on your Paypal account. Boo again. And what's the deal about dongles? I thought dongles on software went out of fashion in the nineties. Dongles used to be the bain of my existence when every music creation/editing program on the planet required one. Everyone was in a panic about software piracy back then and developers made it so hard to actually use their software that it was hardly worth the trouble. Luckily, multiple software licensing dongles that use up all your available USB ports are largely a thing of the past. I guess Colorburst still thinks they need one though.

Getting rid of bees is more expensive than I thought it would be. It's going to cost $300 to have the bee guy come out and remove my bees. I guess this is money well spent though. If I can't get up on the roof to remove rain water, I'm going to need some even more expensive roof repairs. Bees aren't my only critter problems either. Just when I'm finally getting the new grass in the back yard established, there is now some sort of nocturnal animal that has been digging large and fairly deep holes in the St. Augustine turf to get at something they want underground. Whatever the animal wants is buried about eight inches under the surface. It's probably a Possum digging for grubs. The grubs aren't good for the grass either, but this isn't the way I would choose to get rid of them.

Our teacher wanted us to bring a dog toy to training class with us tonight. The theory was that playing with the toy in short 30 second bursts during the training exercises would keep the dogs energy up as the weather gets warmer. This theory didn't work very well with Dash. All he wanted to do was play with the toy. It actually took me much longer than the required 30 seconds just to get the toy out of his mouth again so we could return to sitting and healing.

At least Dash is feeling better. I'm kind of worried he might have Crohn's disease though. The symptoms certainly correspond to what's been happening with him lately. We'll find out one way or the other when we go to the vet next Tuesday.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 533

I came across one of my Paypal ads again today. I don't see these things all that often, but they're still floating around out there. I don't think the ads have changed my life much. Oddly, I am spending more on Paypal though. I find myself increasingly using Paypal instead of a credit card to pay for things, mostly out of a vague feeling of loyalty. Maybe that was the whole point of the ads. Go out and find some people who are wasteful spenders, feature them in ads, and then they'll spend even more. I'm still not sure why they picked me, but I do like the company. They're been really helpful to Dalmatian Rescue.

Scooby was neutered this morning and finished up his health checkup, so I picked him up at the vet this afternoon and took him over to The Velvet Snout. I initially thought that this was the most ridiculous name I'd ever heard of for a doggie day care/boarding facility. I'm starting to have second thoughts though. The name immediately rises straight to the top in Google searches. It's easy to remember too. Maybe in this age of Google, oddball names are the best. Before the Internet became ubiquitous, I was convinced that my own name was completely unique. According to Google, it is actually pretty common. There are Sealander architects, Sealander Environmental, Health & Safety companies, Sealander law firms, Sealander Real Estate agents and probably dozens of other companies that I'm not even aware of. Maybe Sealander & Company wasn't quite as original as I thought. Maybe if I called my own company The Velvet Snout twenty years ago, I'd be famous now.

One of the dogs in our training class is on Prozac now, just because he went after another dog about a month ago. I think that's sad. I've never been a big fan of mood altering drugs. Life isn't always pretty. Dogs bite. People get depressed. Life goes on. You've just got to learn to deal with it.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day