Day 2690

The only time I go to the mall anymore is when I get a haircut. The place used to seem normal to me, but now it seems increasingly alien. The flowers are much more exotic than the ones I see at the park. The air is not only artificially cold, it is scented. Shoppers seem to dress better here than when they go to work. I don't get how this place works. The mall is usually packed with people, yet most of the high end stores are practically empty.

I've been going to the same stylist for many years.  I think she and I were the only people in the salon today who weren't covered with tattoos. All the young stylists had tattoos. Some of the ink was quite artistic, but a lot of the tattoos were messy and poorly thought out. One of my veterinarians has spent a lot of money trying to remove tattoos that she impulsively got when she was younger. I wonder if some of these people are going to feel the same way later in life. There's nothing wrong with tattoos, but I'm not comfortable wearing my feelings on my skin. My feelings about almost everything have changed radically over the years. Tattoos are far too permanent.

I feel better with a good haircut, but the trip to the mall certainly threw me off schedule. Dot wasn't eating well today. I spent more time than usual trying to make sure she got enough food. I don't know why her appetite and activity level changes from one day to the next, but it sure makes life complicated. I thought we'd finally found a healthy food that Dot really likes, but today she wanted to eat Dash's food when she finally became hungry. She didn't eat much. Absolutely nothing is predictable anymore.

I thought Dot was going to have a great day, because she slept well for the first time in ages. There were no middle of the night accidents last night and everybody got a good night's sleep. Oddly, even though she was well rested, Dot was very shaky on her feet this morning. She improved a bit as the day progressed, but today definitely wasn't as good as yesterday. I wish I knew why things ebb and flux like this, but I probably never will.

I hope Dot feels better tomorrow. I was really starting to feel good that her appetite and enthusiasm were returning. Today was a bit of a setback. We still ate and we still walked, but Dot was obviously feeling tired. Maybe a good night's sleep will help.

Patches is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2662

Around midnight last night I was awakened by the sound of tornado sirens. I went outside and the first thing I saw was the moon. The sky was clear and there was no wind at all. I checked the weather radar on my iPad and there weren't even any clouds in the vicinity. WTF? The sirens finally stopped and I went back to bed. It seemed weird that the city was testing the warning system at midnight, but life is full of weird things these days. About five minutes later the sirens resumed again. This didn't seem like a test.

I turned on the television and there was nothing about the warning sirens at all. As I flipped through the local channels, it quickly became obvious that everything was on autopilot. Most of the stations were just replaying programs they had already run earlier in the day. I turned on the radio and discovered that local radio doesn't even even exist anymore. Everything was just a syndicated satellite feed. By this time I had been listening to the sirens for about an hour and still didn't have a clue what was going on. Local news was non-existent.

I had never heard the tornado sirens go on this long, so I was very curious about what was happening. Were we being nuked? Had the zombie apocalypse begun? I just didn't know. It finally dawned on me to turn on the computer and look at Facebook. Bingo. Facebook was a beehive of activity. Apparently all my Facebook friends are night owls and everybody was talking about the sirens.

There were lots of theories. Had a disgruntled employee set off the sirens set off the sirens as his final revenge after being fired? Had the Russians hacked into the City of Dallas servers? One jokester said that North Korea had launched a nuke in the direction of Dallas and at least ten people seemed to believe him. Finally I found a post from the city's Emergency Management Department saying that there had been a major system malfunction and that everyone should quit calling 911. Ironically, I heard the next morning on the news that the warning system actually had been hacked. Maybe it was the Russians after all.

All this strange activity got me thinking. The world has definitely changed. If this had happened ten or fifteen years ago, you could have turned on the television and listened to a local reporter explain the situation as it was happening. Now, we all get our news on Facebook. The trouble with Facebook is that most of the news is wrong. Even a small local incident that wouldn't even be known outside of Dallas generated a fair share of fake news.

Even though the sirens were loud and blared for over two hours, I was the only one who woke up. Janet and both dogs slept through the whole thing. I hope there's never a real emergency in the middle of the night, because it's going to be hell getting everybody up.

Dot seemed stronger today and was much more active. I was sleepier today for obvious reasons. The produce guy at the grocery store told me that there would be a new shipment of blueberries tomorrow. I didn't believe him. All in all it was a pretty normal Saturday. It just got off to a strange start.

Cooper is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1474

Janet called today and told me that young people with children have discovered the little town where we were thinking of retiring and that housing prices were on the rise. It was bound to happen. In today's world, nothing good stays a secret for very long. Maybe there's a silver lining to this dark cloud however. Younger people love dogs and if the town becomes full of dogs, a veterinarian is sure to follow. Dallas definitely has its flaws, but it is home to some really good veterinarians. I've gotten used to my dogs getting better medical care than I do and I'd hate to give that up.

I guess today was Saturday. It certainly didn't seem any different than any other day. We got off to a slow start, because now that I'm using two Dalmatians as an alarm clock, we generally stay in bed until the dogs are hungry. I would have thought that they would be feeling hungry much earlier, since Janet usually feeds them breakfast before she leaves for work at the crack of dawn. Nope. The lazy dogs seem perfectly content to postpone breakfast until well after the sun comes up.

I actually did some writing work today, since my only other alternative was cleaning the house. Writing is almost always preferable to cleaning. When I finished my articles, I decided to go to the gym. I'd never been on a Saturday before and will probably never go on a Saturday again. This appears to be the one day of the week where the gym is actually busy. I had to change my workout a bit, since some of my favorite machines were in use, and I didn't get to shoot baskets at all, since there was a pick-up game underway on the court. Nevertheless, I managed to burn up a few calories before I returned home to put them on all over again by eating Christmas dinner leftovers.

There really isn't much on TV these days. I channel-hopped after dinner, trying to find something that would pique my interest. I watched a bit of The Longest Yard, hoping to catch the scene with the Citroën SM in it. I've seen this movie again and again, but I always miss the chase scene with my favorite car. I watched a bit of a Terminator movie. I don't know which one. They all seem the same to me. It's still hard for me to believe that the Terminator was actually the governor of California. I watched the NASA Channel for a while. With all the government money that the NASA Channel gets, you'd think these guys would learn how to edit. Nope! They just continue to show raw unedited B-Roll. Where is a new episode of Dr. Who when I really need it?

The dogs are getting restless. I think they're trying to tell me that I've done enough writing for one day. One the other hand, maybe they're just being bad again.

Dot & Petey are today's Dalmatians of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 478

I can always tell when my accountant actually starts working on my taxes, because I get a flurry of calls asking for various missing documents. One of the documents they were asking for today actually was missing. The rest, the accountant already had. I must have just put them in the wrong pocket of the accordion folder with all my receipts. It's getting pretty close to April 15, but I certainly can't fault my accountant for waiting this long to get started. This is the busiest month of the year for accounting firms. If I had this much business during the months of March and April, I would probably just take the rest of the year off.

I did get some legitimate new business today. The annual report job finally came through. Part of my input material was a competitors annual report. "Our business is exactly like theirs," I was told. "We just don't want it to sound like we went out and copied them." I've gotten this kind of direction before. "Make it just the same....but different." Yup, I can do that. I've done it many times before.

I'm glad it's Friday tomorrow. I don't know why, since Saturdays aren't usually that exciting. It's been a long, busy week though, and I'd like to forget about keeping my head above water for a couple of days. Maybe we'll go look at new televisions this weekend. Given the choice between making an annual report sound "just the same...but different" or watching old episodes of Top Gear and Dr. Who, I think being a couch potato for a while doesn't sound half bad.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day