Day 4893

The mountain of construction materials in the front yard is now mostly up on the roof. Quite a lot got done today. The main roof is finished except for the metal flashing that goes around the fascia. The roofers still need to finish the carport, but they assure me that they can do this tomorrow morning. The translucent fiberglass covering over the atrium will be replaced as well. Our new roof may get it's first test tonight. It was supposed to remain clear all week, but a surprise thunderstorm has cropped up over Amarillo and it appears to be headed our way. I wish the roof was completely finished before it is tested by weather, but I learned long ago that I have no control over the weather. Actually we've been pretty lucky to have had two warm sunny days in  row.

I went up on the roof to inspect things for the first time this evening and everything looks a lot better. There are no low spots I can see that would cause ponding. The TPO Membrane seems tough and resilient. With any luck, this roof should drain normally now. I'm going to be real disappointed if there is still standing water after the first big rain. We'll see what happens. There's no way to determine how well the roof is going to perform until it gets wet.

I like to think of myself as a low key person who doesn't get bothered by anything. I'll have to admit though that this roof replacement has stressed me out. I didn't sleep well last night. Usually I fall asleep instantly. The work has been extremely noisy and there have been times when I though the house was falling apart. I think replacing all the rotted wood has given the house a lot more structural stability, but it won't reverse the interior damage that has already been done. There are still cracks and stains in the ceiling all over the place. One thing at a time I guess. Once we are confident that the roof no longer leaks, we can start repairing the damaged sheetrock and give the house a new coat of paint. 

We took Dawn on her early walk at the normal time. The roofers start working early, but Janet and I start our day even earlier. When the roofers arrived this morning, I was already eating my breakfast of shredded wheat and fruit. I stayed around the house longer than usual today because Janet wasn't going to return home until about 2 PM. I still didn't feel comfortable leaving Dawn alone with the roofers making so much noise on the roof. Today was even noisier than usual because the roofers were running a large portable generator right outside my office window. The electric welding  machine that fused the TPO segments together must have required 240 volts because they used our outdoor electric outlets for all their other tools.

When Janet returned home I took my long walk. Since it was mid-afternoon by this time, I almost immediately began to feel hot. I have a feeling that our mild Spring is just about over. It's been way too wet this Spring, but I think I prefer the rain to a long string of 100 degree days. Today I passed a group of photographers surrounding a tree. I asked what was going on and one guy said there were baby eagles in the tree. The nest looked too small for eagles, but what do I know. Eventually a guy on a bicycle showed up and told everyone that we were actually looking at baby Red Shouldered Hawks.

Tomorrow is going to be busy. The roofers are supposed to finish their work in the morning. I bet it's going to take them all day. I have an appointment to get a haircut tomorrow. I always like to get a haircut before I take a trip. I'll spend part of the day packing. I haven't even started yet. The weather doesn't look great for Sunday's launch, but I'm going to try to remain optimistic. It's got to be better than my last trip to Florida.

Skippy is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4421

We picked up a new dog at our vet on the way to the kennel today. Peanut is a six month old male owner surrender. He was a little thin, but very healthy and well cared for. I never make judgements about why someone would give up their dog, but it does puzzle me when a dog this nice turns up in the rescue program. Peanut came with a big box of blankets and dog toys, along with a list of what tricks and commands he knew. Peanut knew quite a bit and totally charmed Janet and I, along with the entire kennel staff. We spent quite a while playing with him today because we suspected that this might be the last time we see him. Young dogs like this get adopted incredibly quickly. Don't worry. Charlie and Oliver didn't get left out. We spent a lot of time playing with them as well.

The weather was nice today, but the cold front keeps moving closer and closer. The bad weather isn't supposed to arrive until Wednesday but I can already feel a change in the air. I'm trying to take advantage of the nice weather while I can. I took my long walk early this morning so we'd have plenty of time to visit the kennel. On the way home I finally spotted the eagles nest, along with both eagles. I was totally surprised at where the eagles built the nest. I had always suspected that it was hidden deep in a thick wooded area away from human contact. Nope. These two eagles built their nest right next to a busy road in plain sight of everyone. It's only a few miles from our house. I don't know why I never noticed this before. I drive right by the nest every time I go to the post office. I've heard that the eagles have actually built two nests. I have no idea whether the nest I saw today was the new one or the old one. It was definitely occupied though. The female was sitting in the nest and the male was guarding it from a nearby tree.

The closer the winter storm comes, the more apprehensive I become. Everyone remembers the big fiasco last winter when big chunks of the entire state lost power for days. The cold is bad enough, but this storm comes with freezing rain. Ice storms are the worst because they knock down trees and power lines. I remember a few ice storms where we had to go stay in a hotel for a few days because the power company wasn't making restoring power to our neighborhood a priority. This was back when Janet was still working so we could all go to Janet's office during the day and warm up. Don't have that luxury anymore. I'd be nervous taking Dawn to a hotel anyway. She freaks out about doing anything new. Hopefully, the storm won't be as bad as it already is in my mind. We'll probably be OK. Most things aren't nearly as bad as they are in my mind.

Janet has cataract surgery tomorrow, so I'm the designated driver for a while. I hope the surgery goes smoothly and is as trouble free as most people say it is. I'm next on the list for this same procedure. I'll probably delay my surgery until next year, but I can already tell that I'm going to need it. I've made my living using my eyes for a long time and the thought of a doctor doing anything to them makes me cringe. They say you are back to normal remarkably quickly though. At any rate, I'll be paying close attention to what happens with Janet's procedure.

I took a camera back to the park late in the day to get a picture of the eagles in their nest. Not surprisingly, they were gone. If they went to this much trouble to build the huge nest, they'll probably be back though. I'll keep watching for them. Maybe I'll even have a camera with me. The birds are interesting, but dogs are still much easier to photograph.

Cooper is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4298

I got the car back. It runs fine, but it seemed to run fine before I took it in for the scheduled service. I assume that the mechanics did everything on the lengthy receipt I received, but when I leave the dealership it always feels like I just paid for the world's most expensive carwash. The car never seems any different than it did before. I won't be going back to the dealership any time soon. The prices they charge are ridiculous and they don't even try to be competitive.

As I was leaving, the young service advisor implored me to give him a good rating on the survey I knew would be coming. "My job depends on this," he told me. "I know," I told him. "All your predecessors have told me the same thing." I didn't tell him that none of his predecessors were still working at the dealership. I'll give the guy a good score, even though he basically knew nothing. It wasn't his fault that the dealership charged insanely high prices. It's too bad that the survey doesn't rank the dealership itself instead of a low level employee who had no control over anything.

When I returned home, there was a bill from the plumber in the mailbox. This bill was quite high as well but I didn't feel quite as bad about it. The two plumbers had spent the better part of a day trying to retrofit a 2021 restaurant faucet to a quirky 1950's mid-century modern GE kitchen unit. These two large bills pretty much insure that I won't be going anywhere in October. I'm tapped out and the month hasn't even started yet.

I took my long walk early today because I thought I was supposed to pick my car up at 10 AM. As it turned out, the car wasn't ready until very late in the day, but it was still nice to be walking while the weather was cool. While I was walking I saw park department mowers approaching the meadow behind our house. This was good news. The grass has grown very tall in the meadow and it's full of sticky pollen. Every time we return home from Dawn's sunrise walk we have to get wet rags and clean Dawn's legs and paws. They always let the grass grow longer in the Fall so that it has time to re-seed. I'm pretty sure that this native grass will be back next Spring.

I forgot to mark Cooper as adopted on the Dalmatian Rescue website when I was updating things yesterday. I took care of that this afternoon while I was waiting for the call to pick up my car. It still surprises me that my website development skills have seemingly evaporated. I used to be so good at this stuff. I guess the old adage "use it or lose it" still applies. When you do something every day you're going to be a lot better at it than when you do the same thing once a month.

My Fall allergies are back with a vengeance. I'm always blowing my nose and wiping my watering eyes while I walk. It seems like every year the space between when the Spring allergies end and the Fall allergies begin grows shorter and shorter. I'll be so glad when all the Covid fears are over. I'm always checking Google to make sure my allergy symptoms aren't a sign of Covid instead. I've had seasonal allergies for so long that I ought to know the difference. Unfortunately you don't hear much about seasonal allergies in the news and we are constantly bombarded with Covid news. 

It looks like we are finally going to get some rain tonight. All three weather apps on my phone show a band of rain headed towards us. The yard is dry and we really do need the rain, but all I can think of is roof leaks.

Thelma is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3590

I'm never going to become a space journalist if I don't take advantage of every opportunity. With this in mind, I decided to apply for credentials to attend an upcoming Space X launch in early December. I don't think I'll ever be a natural traveler, but they don't launch rockets in Dallas. If I want to watch a launch or even look at the stars on a clear, dark night, I'm going to have to go somewhere else. I think I can afford another trip by December, so we'll see what happens. Space X is always doing interesting things, so maybe there's a story in this as well.

It looks like I did a good job of applying the silicon coating yesterday. When I went up on the roof this afternoon to inspect my work, I was pleased to see that the coating had cured properly and was ready for the rain we are expecting tonight. All the damaged areas are covered, but I wish I had applied a little more of the product to sections of the roof where I know water accumulates. I have a lot of the silicon material left, so I can always go back later and apply more if needed. I'm always a little cautious with this stuff. I wasn't sure how long it would take the silicon to dry completely and I didn't want a big sticky mess when the rain arrived.

The weather was perfect again today. It's too bad the price we pay for Fall weather is often a cold front preceded by a line of severe storms. Fall is definitely the rainy season here in Dallas. The front that will be arriving early tomorrow morning isn't expected to produce severe weather, but it will bring a lot of rain. We'll see how my roof patches hold up. I'm optimistic at this point. I carefully walked the roof this afternoon and couldn't find any torn spots where water might enter.

While I was filling out my application for press credentials today, I thought I'd send a few query letters to magazines as well. I hate to see anything go to waste, so I'm trying to repurpose the article I wrote about traveling to McDonald Observatory. Hey, it was a good article. I just didn't look through any telescopes. If I get accepted by NASA to go back to Kennedy Space Center, I'm going to see if I can get access to the nearby Space X Starship assembly facility as well. Starship is definitely an interesting story.

While I'm waiting to hear from NASA, Sky and Telescope, and the folks at McDonald Observatory, I can always look at butterflies. There seem to be an unusual number of Monarchs in the area right now. The Fall migration is underway and I see the butterflies everywhere these days. I never noticed that Spring migration this year, but that's understandable. I had my hands full dealing with Dash's many health issues at the time.

I thought that the bulky trash trucks were going to arrive today, but my big pile of tree branches is still sitting out at the curb. I guess I could have trimmed a few more trees, but there's always November. I've probably done enough damage to the yard for one month.

Freckles is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3446

June 1st will always be the day that Dot died. It was two years ago today. What a long journey. It was initially difficult for Dash to adjust to being the only dog. He was just starting to regain his confidence when he began getting sick as well. It seemed like everything we went through with Dot toward the end of her life, we repeated with Dash. At least both dogs had long, healthy lives before they began to decline. Weekends were fun for the dogs. They both loved to go to dog parks and we visited them all. Our cars were basically just dog taxis. There were rescue events to attend, indoor and outdoor dog parks to visit, evenings at dog friendly restaurants, and a weekly training class that we attended regularly for many years. For every sad memory there is a corresponding happy memory. I hope that over time, only the happy memories remain.

It was almost 90 degrees when I woke up this morning and is only 70 degrees now. Today's weather has been a roller coaster. It was hot and sunny on my morning walk and by the time I was ready to take my evening walk there were storm clouds on the horizon and I could hear distant thunder. I probably put too much faith in the weather radar, because I almost got drenched. It was weird to see the storm approaching and people still renting kayaks on the lake. Some folks began paddling for shore as soon as they saw lightning, but others seemed oblivious. I was almost home before the rain started to fall, but when I looked back toward the lake, I could still see half a dozen kayaks and stand up paddle boards out in the water. There were still a few families barbecuing on the shoreline as well. What were they thinking.

Earlier today I was wondering what a lot of dog walkers were thinking. Don't they know the dangers of heat stroke? I could tell that some of the dogs were too hot. Joggers are the worst. Most of them just don't want to stop to give their dog a rest. If you've got to walk your dog in hot weather, be sure to take some water along. If the dog wants to rest, let them. Heat stroke is very real.

This evening was much better dog walking weather. All you had to worry about was getting struck by lightning. I never walked Dot and Dash on a day like today. Neither dog did well in the heat and both were storm phobic. Dot was terrified of storms and once managed to rip out a nail while trying to run back inside after hearing a particularly loud thunderclap. We were one of the first customers for Thundershirts. Strangely, these garments actually seemed to work. Dot wore hers often.

Peaches are finally available almost everywhere now. Have I mentioned that I like peaches? I bought a dozen nice looking ones today. Unlike a lot of produce, peaches still seem to be seasonal and most of them are grown in the United States. Strawberries and blueberries are imported from all over the place, but I've still got to wait for summer to find peaches.

It's still raining, but the pumps on the roof are working. I just need to remember to turn them off before I go to bed tonight. I wonder if the storms will continue tomorrow? The thermostat says no but my phone says yes. It's silly to speculate at this point. It's all going to change by morning anyway.

Charlie is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3416

I was wrong about the weather yesterday. We were in the path of a big storm after all. It just arrived a little later than I expected. I can't relax during storms anymore. I keep expecting a leak to appear in the living room, the power to go out, the greenhouse roof to blow away, or a large tree to fall on the house. All these things have happened in the past. I went outside and started the two sump pumps. I moved some of the furniture in the living room. And I tried to go to sleep. It was really all I could do.

The pumps ran all night and they were still pumping water off the roof early this morning. We got a lot of rain but we didn't lose power and the roof didn't leak. I wish I could say that the rain was over but I think we're going to get a repeat performance tonight. By the time I finished breakfast, the last of today's bad weather had moved to the East and I was able to take my morning walk. I saw the pelican flying low over the lake this morning. It was looking for a fish to eat. I'm glad the bird isn't injured, but I'm still puzzled why it didn't join the other pelicans on their annual Spring migration.

I got my phone bill today and was surprised to see that it had gone up. At first I though I had been charged extra for using the phone while I was in Houston, but there are no roaming charges anymore. My bill has been exactly the same for several years now. When I looked for an explanation for the increase I saw a small item in fine print that just said "service changes." I certainly haven't made any changes, so I called customer service to see what was going on. "Oh, AT&T raised your rates," the lady told me. "We grandfathered your plan for as long as we could, but we needed to bring you into line with current rates." I was irritated, but I wasn't really surprised. This was exactly what the storage warehouse people did to me. Why should the phone company be any different.

I'm not a big fan of the subscription economy. I think the whole idea is to get you hooked on something and then continuously raise your rates. Netflix does this. Microsoft does this. It looks like the phone company does it too. The world was much simpler when you could watch TV over the air for free and actually owned the software and entertainment you bought. I'm still using a fifteen year old version of Microsoft Word because I just don't feel like paying over and over again for Office 365.

You'd think I'd be getting a lot more done without a dog to take care of, but actually I'm doing less. I've lost my focus. I'm sure this will change. I'm just not clear what comes next. Walking is good. I've started fixing myself more interesting things for dinner. I'm going to continue photographing plants and animals in the park even though I've already documented everything ten times over. Janet wants to travel. Somehow I don't think going to the post office counts as travel.

Bogart is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2858

It doesn't look like I'll have to take the refrigerator apart this weekend after all. The temperature is holding steady. I have no idea why the temperature is getting cooler again, but I'll take it. I think we're probably good until the repairmen shows up Monday afternoon.

Dash let us sleep in until about seven-thirty this morning. He ate a good breakfast and then took a surprisingly long walk. This improvement is as much of a mystery as the refrigerator, but I'm happy to see our guy in good spirits again. I know he isn't entirely happy about the protective gear he has to wear. It's helping though. He doesn't lift one of his rear legs very well when he walks and he had ground down several of his nails all the way to the quick. Two of them were even starting to bleed. The protective boots keep his paws safe and the nails are starting to grow back again. I hope the knee brace is equally effective. Dash walks a little stiffly wearing the brace, but I think this is what is supposed to happen. By restricting his range of motion a bit, his knee will have a chance to heal.

I guess fresh peaches are finally out of season. I've been enjoying them in my morning smoothie, but they're getting harder to find at the grocery store. Peaches are more expensive now and are starting to taste mushy. I guess peaches are harder to grow in a greenhouse. Strawberries and blueberries are available all year long. I know there is a season for those berries as well, but it doesn't seem to matter.  You can almost always find good strawberries.

I upgraded the newer iPad to IOS 11. I kind of hope that I don't like the new operating system. If I do, I will be forced to get a new phone. My old phone can't be upgraded anymore and is stuck forever at IOS 10.3.3. My old original iPad is stuck way back at IOS 5.1.1. Apple used to be much better at making sure that their software worked with older products. Like most manufacturers, they've discovered that planned obsolescence is much more profitable. Computers are one of the few tools that become obsolete even when they are still working perfectly. I still have some hand tools that my Dad got from his father. A good hammer will last for a hundred years. A good computer probably won't last for five.

When I was recording some purchases in Quickbooks this afternoon, I noticed an entry from 12/10/17. That hasn't even happened yet. It took me quite a while to figure out where this entry actually belonged. We've all gotten so used to spellcheck that we become complacent and don't think we make mistakes anymore. I'm amazed at how many mistakes I make. I'm a typo factory these days. I wonder how many other undiscovered errors are hidden away in Quickbooks, Word, and Excel? I've even gotten the day count wrong on the blog and I don't have a clue where the error is.

A storm is headed our way. We really need the rain, but I'm always apprehensive about bad weather. I've been watching the storm approach on the weather radar and hope that nothing bad happens. I think the cold front and accompanying rain are supposed to arrive around 2 AM. Maybe we'll just sleep through it. That would certainly be better than having Dash freak out when he hears thunder. I don't want any more large branches falling on the roof either. Let's not even think about a power outage.

The good thing about the rain is that it's supposed to be clear and much cooler by morning. That would be nice. A clear Fall morning is exactly what I need.

Lance is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2137

It's weird to see rain again. It's been dry for almost two months here in Dallas and I'd almost forgotten all the little rituals we go through whenever it rains. It's always been difficult to get the dogs to go outside and pee when it rains. Now, it's even hard to find a comfortable place for them in the house. Dot's primary dog bed has a clear view of the windows, so she can easily see any approaching storm. Since she can't hear very well anymore, I could just turn her around so she was facing a wall if it weren't for the fact that Dash is scared of storms too and likes to huddle up with Dot. I had a hard time today finding a place where both dogs felt comfortable and I still haven't been able to get Dot to go outside and poop.

One hidden benefit of Dot's new morning therapy schedule is that I was able to get her to the vet and back again before the rain even started. Dot actually did quite well in the underwater treadmill today. She was able to walk in the tank for a full seventeen minutes and even had two short intervals where we raised the treadmill speed a bit. Dot's resilience and tenacity are really pretty amazing. When we got home, it looked like the approaching storm was imminent, so I immediately went up on the roof and swept away a huge accumulation of pecan shells and acorns. The squirrels had already eaten most of the pecans, but there were an enormous amount of acorns on the roof. Now that the roof is clean, it will be a lot easier to remove the water when the rain stops. I probably did the squirrels a favor too. All the acorns are on the ground now and it will be much easier for them to dig unsightly holes in my St. Augustine grass when they bury their nuts for the Winter.

I sent in my application to NASA to attend the Orbital ATK CRS-4 launch. I have no idea if or when I'll hear back from them. The last time I applied to cover a launch, I thought they had totally forgotten about me until I received a surprise e-mail out of the blue telling me that my application had been accepted. We'll see what happens this time. I hope my Klout score and blog readership numbers don't influence their decision. Both these numbers are trending down. It's kind of ironic. I think my blog posts have improved over the years, but I actually had more readers in the early days when my posts were crap. It's all being in the right place at the right time. Any way you slice it, blogs just aren't as popular as they used to be.

It's raining hard now. There's no way we're going to get the dogs outside during this downpour. If Dot poops in the house in nice weather, she's certainly not going to make the effort to go outside during a storm. Hopefully, most of these storms will pass through the area tonight and we'll be able to take our regular walk tomorrow morning. If Dot and Dash don't get their walk, tomorrow is going to be miserable.

The world continues to change around me while I stay the same. One of Dot's favorite nurses has unexpectedly moved on to a new opportunity at another hospital. We didn't even get a chance to say goodbye. I certainly can't fault young people for taking advantage of every opportunity that comes their way. I worked at 17 different ad agencies before I finally realized that the only way to avoid having problems with my boss was to be the boss. So far it has worked out pretty well. Nobody can fire me now and my little company will celebrate its 26th Anniversary at the end of the year. That should impress NASA, but it probably won't.

Dot is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2008

It was definitely Monday this morning. Monday is always the day when things get off to a slow and often rocky start. When I woke up this morning, Janet was already on the phone, having trouble getting an appointment to get her car in for service. Both dogs were barking at me because I wasn't fast enough getting their breakfast. After a fairly peaceful walk, I turned on the computer and discovered even more problems. Somebody must have gotten up even earlier than me. There were short, ambiguous e-mail questions that required long, detailed answers. There was confusion about who was in charge of certain projects. Was I ahead of schedule, or falling behind? I still don't know.

It took a while to get everything sorted out, but after I did, I noticed a letter in yesterday's mail offering me a two month free trial of satellite radio in my car. Since the was no obligation to continue the service after the two months were up, I decided to give it a try. I signed up, and of course when I started the car later in the day, the satellite radio didn't work. It took two more calls to tech support before the satellite found me. "You have to turn off Bluetooth before you can acquire the signal," someone in a far away call center told me. "But I'm talking to you right now using Bluetooth," I said. "If I turn it off, this call will go dead." That's kind of how it went. Eventually the satellite did find my car and I discovered that SiriusXM was just as boring as regular radio. I tuned into a live traffic report channel and found that it only monitored traffic conditions in Boston and Philadelphia. The Rock and Roll channel was just playing very old Elvis Presley tunes. I'll still probably continue listing to NPR instead. National Public Radio does have some good programming, but I wish they quit talking about the Middle East. I'm tired of hearing about problems in the Middle East. I wish there was a channel that just played Ted Talks. A veterinarian channel would be nice too. I'm always interested in learning how to keep the dogs healthy.

Summer has definitely arrived. Every morning I wake up with a new batch of mosquito and chigger bites. I don't know how all these mosquitoes got inside, but they're very hard to get rid of. The air has turned hot and muggy and the fire ants have returned. The birds that poop on my car have returned as well. I don't know where these irritating birds go in the Winter, but our house has definitely become their permanent Summer home. At least we are in no danger of a drought. There is more heavy rain in the forecast for tomorrow, as a big tropical storm in the Gulf of Mexico heads inland. I'm glad I don't live in Houston. We'll get wet, but Houston is in danger of flooding again.

I need to get up early tomorrow because I've got a dental appointment in the morning. I hope there are no complications and I can get home again before the rain arrives. I hate leaving storm phobic dogs alone in the rain. I don't like being out in the rain myself, but I want to put this dental work behind me. There's no point in postponing things anymore. The only thing I'd like to postpone is my upcoming birthday. I used to look forward to birthdays, but the years go by too fast. We need to slow these birthdays down.

Shadow is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1989

The bad weather continues. Last night our power went out twice and strong straight line winds blew part of the roof off the greenhouse. This is the second time that winds have blown part of the roof off the greenhouse, so I'm not sure if the problem is strong winds or a weak greenhouse. Dash was upset by the thunder and lightning last night, but Dot slept through the entire thing. Even the beeping noises from the electronic devices when the power went out didn't wake her up. One of the blessings of old age is that Dot sleeps very soundly now. She needs her rest, so I'm glad the storms didn't send her into a panic like they used to.

It became obvious as soon as I looked out the living room window that one of today's chores was going to be putting the greenhouse back together again. The structure is so old and rickety now, that it's hardly worth the effort. Rain gets inside with or without the roof, since two of the roof vents blew away three years ago and a couple of panes of glass are broken. I gave up raising plants in the greenhouse decades ago, since all the local critters just looked at the place as a convenient place to have lunch. Rabbits, squirrels, rats, and possums all managed to get inside. They all seemed to love tomato plants. Now the place just houses the lawn mower.

When I was testing one of my mobile sites this morning I kept getting an error message from the phone company when I tried to make a call directly from the website. I thought I had made a coding error and wasted about an hour trying to research the problem. It was a mystery. I marked up the code exactly the same way I did on another site where everything worked successfully. Why wasn't this working? Finally I noticed that I had the wrong area code in the phone number. The number I was trying to dial didn't even exist. When I corrected the phone number in the HTML document, everything worked perfectly. Sometimes obvious mistakes aren't so obvious after all.

I hope the power doesn't go out again tonight. There's more rain on the way and I need to get some sleep. Whenever the power goes out I have to immediatly disconnect the Uninterrupted Power Supplies for the computers to save the batteries and make them stop beeping. Then I have to call in the outage report from my mobile phone and hope the battery will last long enough to navigate my way through the power company's lengthy automated messaging system. When the power finally does come back on again, I have to go to the utility room and quickly turn off the washer and dryer. They always turn themselves on automatically when power is restored. The printer beeps when it tried to reconnect to the WiFi and the thermostat has to manually be rebooted before it will reconnect to anything. The two clock radios and even the clock that turns the coffee maker on every morning all need to be reset. I try to do all this without waking the dogs, because if they see I'm up they will think it's time for breakfast even if it's three in the morning.

I'm not even going to bother with the water on the roof. What's the point if it's just going to continue to rain.

Libby is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1969

Benicar, the medication I use to control my blood pressure, has joined the growing list of drugs targeted in class action suits. Every time I turn on TV I seem to see one of those 1-800-BAD-DRUG ads about Benicar. It seemed like it would be prudent to switch back to Zestril, my original blood pressure medication, so I stopped by my doctor's office in hopes that he'd just write me a script. No so fast buddy. I have to have a full exam and probably some more blood tests first. Nothing is simple anymore. Knowing my doctor, he'll probably want to keep me on Benicar, despite the ominous sounding TV commercials.

At least Dash has finished with all his meds. He seems to have made a full recovery from the torn paw pad and no longer needs antibiotics or pain pills. Maybe I should take his leftover pain pills. My teeth are still bothering me. I'm starting to think that it's not even the wisdom tooth extraction that is causing the problem now. When I initially went back to the dentist at the first of the year, he mentioned that I may have to have a crown replaced. He thought the existing crown had a crack in it and that this was causing the temperature sensitivity I was experiencing at the time. Unfortunately, he also said it was impossible to fix the crown until I had the crooked wisdom tooth removed. Somehow, having the wisdom tooth removed has upset a delicate balance that left me thinking I had great teeth for years. Now, the fortress appears to be crumbling.

Dot did great during her water therapy session today. The vet is very pleased with her progress, but thinks we need to be doing more strength building exercises. Instead of taking Dot on longer walks, she wants me to spend more time walking her up and down hills and inclines. This shouldn't be hard to do. The park is full of hills and inclines.

On the way home from the vet, I hit a deep pothole in the road and damaged one of my wheels. Potholes are everywhere this Spring, since we've had so much rain. Road crews are repaired some of them, but they have only scratched the surface. I've never seen the roads this bad. I'm really glad I got the tire and wheel damage coverage when I bought the car. It seemed expensive at the time, but when you figure in the damaged tire that was already replaced under the policy and the repair to this wheel, I've already paid for the coverage.

We've been on the verge of a bad storm all day. It rained a lot last night, and then off and on during the day, but I managed to get the dogs walked without getting wet. I may not be so lucky tomorrow. I think the weather is supposed to keep getting worse through the weekend, with the possibility of tornadoes on Saturday.  I hope this forecast is wrong. I don't even want to think about tornadoes on Saturday.

Spot is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1950

This may be shorter than usual. Our power just went out. There's a big storm headed our way, but it hasn't even arrived yet, so a power outage with no wind and no rain is a bit unusual. A feather could knock our power out though, so I'm not terribly surprised. If I'd known this was coming, I'd have charged up all the device batteries. The laptop is only half charged and the phone is even closer to dead than that. I do have the little generator now, but it's so much trouble to hook everything up, that I'm hoping that I can write fast and get this posted before everything goes dead.

The power outage wasn't the only thing that caught me by surprise today. I didn't have a clue that a big storm was headed in our direction. It was clear and sunny for most of the day. Since the weather was nice, I thought it would be a good time to get the water off the roof. I spent two hours getting everything cleaned up. That was a total wasted effort. In two more hours the storm will be here and the roof will fill with water again. I think the roof must have sagged a bit in the center, because a few years ago there was never this much standing water after a hard rain.

There wasn't really that much to do today. After I finished sweeping the water of the roof, I got groceries, filled the car with gas, and listened to a few more tutorial videos about responsive web design. Creating adaptive, mobile friendly websites might seem easy for a hard core coder, but the learning curve is going to be pretty steep for a visual designer like me. I'm curious whether I still have it in me to learn something difficult and new, so I'm going for it. Ask me in six months whether the experiment was a success.

It's harder to keep an eye on Dot now that she's feeling better. She wants to move around, but she's still pretty shaky. I try to maintain a balance between giving Dot some freedom around the house, while still being able to get to her quickly if she looks like she'd going to fall. I had to put her in her pen while I was up on the roof, but for the most part she wandered around the house on her own this afternoon. She's really a lot happier if she has a little freedom. We can't overdo it though. She was pretty tired after her short evening walk.

The first wave of rain has already arrived and we're starting to hear thunder and lightning now. The dogs are getting restless and my backup batteries are getting low. I've got both dogs penned in the office with me. We have two small camping lights and each dog has their bed. It seems cozy to me, but Dot and Dash still look nervous. I definitely don't want Dot to wander off in the dark house and trip over something. This seems as good a time as any to call it a day and get under a blanket with the dogs for the rest of the evening. This usually calms them down. I sure hope the power is restored before morning.

Mattie is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1828

It was another wet, cold day. As soon as the dogs finished their breakfast, they hopped right back in bed again. They didn't want anything to do with this day. Since they wouldn't budge, I just crawled back in bed myself. Eventually we pulled ourselves together and took our morning walk. I always have trouble getting the dogs outside on damp days, but once we're on our way they show no desire to return home again. I think the smells must be more intense in damp weather, because they both love to smell things.

I think my shoulder must be worse than I thought. Today was my first physical therapy session and some of the initial stretching exercises brought tears to my eyes. You'd think it would be easy to lie on a table and bring my hands behind my head, but it just wasn't happening. I could see my therapist wince every time she heard popping sounds coming from my shoulder as she manipulated the joint. We did a series of simple exercises to loosen the muscles around the joint and after about fifteen minutes I was able to rotate my arm about 15 degrees further behind my head. This is going to be a long, slow process. For the past several years, I've been compensating for the loose shoulder by tensing the muscles on the right side of my back in an attempt to keep the joint in place while I walk the dogs.  Now these muscles are very tight and are restricting a full range of motion. I think things are worse than they used to be, because I remember I could do some of the stretching exercises we tried today as recently as three years ago when I had physical therapy before. At any rate, I promised to do my exercises the best I could and I will see the therapist again next week. I still don't want to consider surgery at this point.

I wanted to check on a package on the UPS website today and discovered I couldn't log in because I'd forgotten my password again. I hate sites that keeping asking you for a ridiculous combination of upper case letters, lower case letters, numbers, and special symbols before they'll approve your password. I can never remember these complex passwords. What's even worse is that many sites don't allow you to re-use a password that you have used before. It doesn't take long to completely run out of easy to remember password ideas. I'll be glad when you can just use a fingerprint or retinal scan to identify yourself. Apple is getting there with its new fingerprint recognition technology, but so far you can only use your fingerprint to unlock the phone. You should be able to use it for everything.

I wish I could teach Dash to read the weather radar. I thought I'd found a nice little window between rain showers to take the dogs out to do their business this afternoon. Dot, as always, peed and pooped quickly and efficiently. Dash was oblivious to the approaching rain and dawdled around until the rain caught up with us. He eventually pooped, but we were all drenched by then. By the time I finally got the dogs back in the house, cleaned their paws, and dried them off with a bath towel, the only sensible thing to do was take another nap. We ended up right where we started, in a big dog-pile on the bed.

Duke is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1603

My website prototype was a success. There will be some tweaking in the weeks ahead, but I won't have to start over. In the realm of website design, a little tweaking is always OK. A website is such a fluid medium, that most websites are never finished anyway. It took me a while, but I eventually discovered that you could make more by maintaining websites than by designing them. I always try to get maintenance agreements now, because I've finally learned that whatever I do now will never be considered finished.

Dot had her day of beauty today. In addition to her regular acupuncture and water therapy sessions, she got a much better bath than I've ever given her. She looks and smells wonderful now. The fact that Dot is finally sparkling clean again just makes Dash look even dirtier.

I had trouble getting a prescription renewed today. The doctor said I needed new blood work and would only renew the prescription for three months. I tried to explain that I'd been having blood work done every two weeks by another doctor for the past six months, but apparently that wasn't good enough for them. They wanted to do their own blood work. Whatever. It's not like having my blood drawn is a big deal anymore. Doctors have drawn so much blood from me during the past five years that I'm amazed that I have any left.

Work was quite busy today. It was the usual mix of writing assignments and website revisions, but there just seemed to be a little more on my plate today. I did manage to get everything completed, but with Dot's extended spa day at the vet, there wasn't much time left over. It also took forever to get my somewhat essential prescription renewed. You'd think that doctors, pharmacies, and hospitals could come up with a better way to share information. Everyone else has elaborate cloud-based databases and digital record-keeping systems, but the medical community still prefers to write things down on paper, and share information using very antiquated fax machines. I haven't used a fax machine in years, but all of my doctors continue to use them everyday.

It's going to be harder to remember Dash's chemotherapy pills now. It was easy to remember when a big chunk of my day was devoted to getting him back and forth from the cancer center. Now that we're back to a normal schedule at home, I'll need to come up with a foolproof way to never forget these very important Monday, Wednesday, and Friday pills. As some of you already know, I am a very forgetful person. Janet normally gives the dogs their meds, and when she travels, she carefully places each dog's daily dose in a plastic Zip-lock bag with the day, date and dog's name written in laundry marker on the side. The chemotherapy pills can't be mixed with other pills for safety reasons, and aren't even given at the same times, to avoid mix-ups. The oncologist has even told me to pen Dot in another part of the house while I am giving Dash the Palladia pills, just to ensure that she doesn't accidentally get one by mistake. Probably the fear of doing something wrong will be enough to keep me on schedule. Those purple rubber gloves that I always have to wear when administering the drugs will be a good reminder too.

Rain is headed our way. I have mixed emotions about the upcoming storms. It's been a very dry month and the yard could really use the water, but I still hate rain. Maybe we'll just get a quick downpour to keep the grass green and then it will all be over. Better yet, maybe the storm will move somewhere else, and we'll get nothing at all.

Patches is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1450

It was 80 degrees today. It is supposed to be 20 degrees tomorrow. That's Texas weather in a nutshell. All the TV weathermen in town are predicting a monster storm this weekend that will coat the roads with a sheet of ice and knock out power lines throughout the region. Hopefully, none of these alarmist reports are true. Weather reports in Dallas tend to be sensationalized because there are plenty of people like me who freak out at the thought of bad weather. Bad weather equals good ratings. Even the hint of a Winter bad storm will send people to Home Depot in droves to stock up on batteries, kitty litter, generators, rock salt, and snow shovels. Needless to say, most of the snow shovels never get used. Grocery stores are equally busy before a storm, although I don't know why. If the power goes out, a lot of food in the refrigerator isn't going to do you much good.

Although anything could happen tomorrow, I certainly can't complain about today's weather. It was nice all day. With blue skies and mild temperatures to cheer me on, I got quite a bit done. The breakfast networking group liked the website I'd developed for them. This is probably one of those sites that will never be finished, but at least there weren't any major snags when it was unveiled for the first time this morning.

Dot did great at her physical therapy session today. She walked over half a mile on the underwater treadmill and had no problems with the 60 second bursts of speed that are part of her interval training. I'm really proud of Dot. Not only is she visibly stronger than she was when we started this, she actually seems to enjoy the therapy as well. Hopefully, Dot has many good years ahead of her. One of my neighbors has an old dog and it's sad to see how quickly a dog can go downhill as they approach the end of their life. One day they're active and a few months later they can hardly walk.

All the dogs in training class seemed a bit on edge tonight. I think they could sense the cold front that is headed our way. As the wind picked up, Dot and Dash made sure to let us know that they were ready to go home. I couldn't blame them for wanting to get back inside again. By the time class was over, the temperature had dropped ten degrees.

I found out today that my mechanic is losing the lease on his garage and as a result, I'll probably have to take my old Citroën Maserati back again before it can be restored. This is definitely a big disappointment. There are very few people in the entire country who still work on these things. The car has sat for so long that I'm sure it will need some serious work before it runs properly again. Even if I can find another mechanic, I'm not sure I'll be able to find the parts I need. Certain parts have already become almost impossible to find. I'm not sure what to do with this car now. 

In retrospect, I should have started the restoration last year. It was always easier to just postpone things though, since my mechanic was usually busy with other repairs anyway. Now, it might be too late. I have the same sinking feeling I had when I failed to sell my Lucent Technology stock and watched it slide from $70 a share to $4 a share. There is a time and a place for everything. I just don't always know when that time has arrived.

Camp is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1220

Around 8 PM last night I thought I saw a flash of lightning on the Southeast horizon. I'm always a bit worried about lightning at dog training class since our class takes place on top of a hill. Everyone walking their dog is a potential lightning rod. I didn't hear any thunder, so I thought the storm was still far away. It wasn't until this morning that I realized what I saw was actually the flash from the fertilizer plant explosion in West, Texas. Something similar happened back in 2003, when I heard the sonic boom from the space shuttle Columbia exploding overhead. I had no idea what that was either until I put the pieces together while watching a news broadcast several hours later.

I'm a big complainer. Ordinarily I would be complaining about the water leaking through the roof as a result of last night's severe storms. The recent events in Boston and West put everything in perspective though. I've got nothing to complain about at all. Actually, I'm quite lucky. When I was walking the dogs today, I noticed that a huge oak tree that Dash loves to pee on had become uprooted during the storm and fallen directly across the path. We have stood under this tree many, many times. It's just lucky that we weren't nearby when it fell.

I almost passed out when I was up on the roof sweeping the water away this morning. It's generally not a good idea to pass out on your roof. I'm almost certain that the lightheaded, fainting sensation was caused by the carvedilol I take. These meds slow down the heart rate and can make you quite dizzy if you stand up quickly from a squatting or sitting position. When I'm up on the roof, I'm constantly squatting to look for a leaking seam, and then standing up quickly again. I guess I'll have to avoid going up on the roof right after I take these pills.

I went to the battery store to pick up a replacement battery for a power drill this afternoon. The original battery was made in Japan, but I noticed that this new one was made in China. I'm seeing more and more of these Chinese batteries, even though some manufacturers specifically warn against using them. The instruction manual for one of my digital cameras even says that using Chinese replacement batteries will void the warranty. What are you going to do though? Everything is made in China these days. The only batteries that are made in the United States that I've heard of recently are the lithium ion electric car batteries made by A123 Systems. Oh, I forgot. That company filed for bankruptcy recently, so their batteries will probably be made in China soon as well.

I'm glad it's Friday tomorrow. It's been a long week and I'll be glad when its over. I'd like to do a whole lot of nothing this weekend, but the Dalmatian Rescue group has another Casino Party. Hopefully, that's the only thing that's going on this weekend. We don't need any more rain either. I'm tired of the rain. Like I said, I'm not complaining, but Mattie looks exactly the way I feel.

Mattie is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1100

The dogs and I pass by Erykah Badu's house almost every morning on our walks. For some reason when she initially built the house, Erykah wrote the words LOVE, FORGIVE, EVOLVE on her garage door with colored chalk. I've noticed recently that the word EVOLVE has faded away to near invisibility. Has the singer already evolved, or did she just give up on the matter?  In my limited experience, it is a lot easier to love and forgive than it is to evolve. Most people I know, including myself, are just the same as they've always been. It's easy to pay lip service to the idea of change, but it's incredibly hard to make fundamental changes. With all the talk about needing to change our violent society, I wonder if we have the collective will to do what's necessary. Any student of history will tell you that our country has been a pretty violent place almost since the day it was founded.

I was trying to tell a client that the the work I do for them is boring while simultaneously expressing gratitude for the dull assignments. I hope I threaded this needle properly. I certainly need the work. In truth, most of my work is boring. That's the nature of work. I guess I don't believe the people who tell me their jobs are fun. If working was fun, you'd think I'd have experienced the sensation by now.

When I was at the vet yesterday, Dash sneezed in the exam room. "Does Dash have a cold?" the vet asked me. It certainly was a valid question, since we were trying to determine why Dash was throwing up every night. "Haven't you ever seen this before?" I asked the vet. "All Dalmatians do this when they think they're being ignored or you aren't doing something fast enough." "This isn't a cold," I told the vet, "it's an indignant sneeze." I was right, of course, and every Dalmatian owner would recognize that sneeze as a sign that Dash was tired of being examined and was ready to go home. I only mention this because Dot and Dash both gave me simultaneous indignant sneezes tonight when I was late fixing their dinner.

The temperature is supposed to drop over 40 degrees overnight. A cold front is moving through town as I write this and the weather forecasters say it will be close to freezing in the morning. We saw the front approaching in the distance at dog training class this evening. I thought class would be called off the moment we saw lightning on the Northern horizon. Not a chance. Everyone except Janet and I seemed determined to ignore the approaching storm. I guess they don't have dogs who are terrified of thunder and cars that have been demolished by hailstones. Luckily, we made it home before the deluge started.

Ranger is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day