Day 3846

It was so hot and humid this morning that we had to cut our walk with Dawn in half. Dawn was still tired when we got home and I had to change my clothes. It's definitely going to be a long summer. I thought the day might improve, but it actually got worse. By the time I took my afternoon walk, it was stifling outside. At least I managed to complete my 20,000 steps before the weather changed again. Around mid-afternoon a sudden storm appeared out of nowhere and drenched us with rain.

I turned on the pumps and they worked fine for about an hour and then one of the pumps shorted out. I went up on the roof in the rain to see if any of the electrical connections had become submerged. Yep. I moved an extension cord out of the water, reset the circuit breaker and the pumps started working again. About thirty minutes later the lights in the kitchen went out. The pumps had tripped another circuit breaker. Something is definitely wrong with the pumps. I disconnected the pumps so I wouldn't start a fire and I guess I'll have to deal with this later. It might be quite a while later. There is more rain in the forecast for tomorrow and Tuesday.

I skipped going to the gym for the second Sunday in a row. The way things are trending in Dallas, I wouldn't be surprised if my gym decides to close again. This is the third day in a row we have had more than a thousand new Covid-19 cases a day. When we only had ten or twenty cases a day everyone was staying inside. Now, despite a dramatic resurgence, everyone has gone back to normal mode. Some blame the resurgence on Memorial Day. Others blame the people who don't wear masks or the protests in the streets that were taking place a few weeks ago. Very few people appear to be blaming themselves.

I think we have given our adversaries a blueprint for taking us out whenever they want. When we stay united, we are a badass country that will nuke you back into the stone age. If you can manage to turn us against ourselves though, you won't have to go to war at all. You can just sit back and watch while we destroy ourselves. Who would have thought that a tiny little virus combined with an avalanche of conspiracy theories could render all our missiles and aircraft carriers useless. I still think the virus was created in China for a specific purpose, but that's just my own conspiracy theory.  Just watch China be the first to come up with a vaccine and we all rush out to take it and die. Relax. That's a  conspiracy theory too.

I have a dental appointment next week. Why are dentist's offices still open? Aren't dental procedures right up near the top of the danger list? I guess I'll go ahead and keep the appointment. My dentist is extremely careful and there is only one patient in the office at a time. I wouldn't want to be a dental hygenist though. They're bound to get coughed on sooner or later.

I guess we'll go visit the Dalmatians tomorrow. It is Monday tomorrow, isn't it? It's getting to be so hard to tell the days apart. Even our walks are starting to seem like Ground Hog Day. We see the same people walking the same dogs or riding the same bicycles over and over again. They probably are saying the same thing about us. Everything is so predictable that Janet and I have started wondering about the "Hello Guy." There is this one cyclist who says Hello very loudly to every single person he passes. We used to see him every morning and he's been gone for several weeks now. I wonder if he got the virus.

Isabella is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3461 - Father's Day

Good grief. Our power went out again last night. As I was calling in the outage report, I had visions of ice cream melting in the freezer and an immediate need for large quantities of ice. Jeez. We'd just finished returning the ice chests to the storage warehouse and replacing the spoiled food in the refrigerator. Enough is enough. Luckily, this appeared to be an isolated outage and power was restored early this morning.

Unfortunately, the bad weather wasn't over when the electricity was restored. We had sporadic severe weather warnings for the rest of the day. There was lots of rain accompanied by loud thunder. At one point we were even under a tornado warning. The worst is over now, but the forecast still shows we are in store for more thunderstorms tomorrow.

The weather doesn't look so good in Florida either. Launch day still look good on the long range forecast, but the entire week leading up to the launch shows rain. A weather cancelation is certainly a possibility. Flying to Florida is starting to look a lot more attractive than driving. The thought of being on a freeway all day with eighteen wheelers on either side of me throwing up rooster-tails of water on my windshield doesn't sound fun at all. There are already flooding problems in Mississippi. With more rain, it could get worse. If I fly, I'm going to book something that allows same day flight changes. I have a feeling that schedules are going to change several times between now and the Falcon Heavy launch.

The weather was terrible today but at least I got to go to the gym before the severe weather warnings started appearing on my phone. There were no walks today and Janet and I had to curtail other activities because of the tornado warning. I really shouldn't complain. The roof isn't leaking and we've still got power. Only one of the pumps on the roof isn't working, but at least the other one is. We're on high ground, so there is little risk of flooding no matter what the weather decides to do. All that being said, I'm still sick of all this rain. We deserve some nice weather before the Summer heat returns to stay.

I still hear thunder off in the distance. I hope the bad weather keeps moving to the East. It was a loud thunderclap and bolt of lightning that woke me up last night. About ten seconds later the power went out. It was hard to get back to sleep. I kept thinking about what I would need to do the next morning if the power failed to return. I could feel my resting heart rate start to rise as I lay in bed listening to the rain pound in the roof. Maybe I require more calm than most people.

We'll see what tomorrow brings. No thoughts about Father's Day this year. I'm not a father myself and my own Dad has been gone so long that memories are starting to fade. When Father's Day arrives, my birthday is usually not far behind. Occasionally these two events happen on the same day. Mom always used to tell me that I was her Father's Day gift to Dad. I'm not sure Dad would agree.

Hershey is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3198

Another day dominated by weather. We had to postpone our morning walk because of rain. I hate to do this because Dash becomes confused when his routine changes. I really didn't have a choice though. I put the bucket back in the living room because some of the showers were pretty intense. So far, I don't see any signs of a water leak. That could change at any time. I still don't know what triggers this leak. Nobody else does either because the roofers still haven't returned my calls.

I started to see some blue sky right after lunch, so I thought it might be a good time to take Dash on a walk. Since the weather seemed to be improving, it never occurred to me that there was another storm right over the horizon. When we were almost a mile away from the house, the sky quickly became very dark and it began to pour. Dash and I both got soaked. There was little point in turning around since we were already at the halfway point of our walk. Dash continued his slow, steady pace all the way home. He didn't even seem to be aware it was raining.

I was very aware that we were getting wet. It was raining so hard that I thought my Apple Watch might be ruined. I don't think the early model that I wear is very waterproof. Eventually we made it home and I spent the next twenty minutes drying Dash off. I think there's more rain in the forecast. Needless to say, I'm really getting tired of this.

I watched part of a live Phillips auction on my computer this morning. I wanted to get an idea of what to expect. The auction process was mesmerizing. Everything happens so fast. If you blink you miss something. It was impossible to guess what people were interested in. Some items sold for a lot more than I expected and others received no bids at all. A lot of money changed hands very, very quickly.

We found a tick on Dash this morning. This shouldn't be happening because he's taking Bravectco. We were a little nervous about removing the tick, but it had to be done. As expected, Dash started to bleed, although it wasn't as bad as I expected. I sure wish he didn't have to take blood thinners. Even the smallest problem can end up being dangerous.

The roofers never replied to my enquiries yesterday, but the vintage guitar folks did. I guess all this proves is that guitar players are nicer than roofers. The guitars still haven't sold, but the store seems optimistic. I'll sure be glad when all these sales have been completed. All this uncertainty makes me nervous.

We seem to be getting an enormous number of telemarketing calls. It's irritating. I don't know whether my number has been hacked or if this is just what happen prior to an election. I'm sure that a lot of these robocalls are political. I guess I could pick up the phone and find out what is going on, but that's the last thing I want to do. If you answer a telemarketer's call, you'll immediately wind up on ten more lists.

Suki is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2800

I wish weather forecasts were more accurate. Earlier in the week, I made an appointment to take Dash back to the vet for another fasting blood test on Friday because it looked like it was going to be the only sunny day this week. My plan was to walk Dash very early to make sure that he would poop before he got in the car. I definitely don't want a repeat of Tuesday's disastrous trip to the vet. Now that Friday is approaching, it looks like it is going to rain early tomorrow morning. That might spoil my plans for a walk. Jeez. It was dry as a bone on Wednesday and Thursday when it was supposed to rain. The little weather app on my phone is never right. I don't know why I even look at it. Hopefully, this new forecast is wrong too.

It turned out that it was more difficult that we anticipated to change Janet's bandages. We didn't have all the supplies we needed, so I had to make a trip to the specialty pharmacy before we even started. You'd think that nothing could be easier than changing a bandage, but these have several layers and each layer must be applied exactly right. You don't want to do anything that would disturb the delicate sutures and you definitely don't want to do anything that might cause an infection. I think we did a good job, but it is nerve wracking. I think we would both rather just drive to the doctor's office every day and have them do it. That wasn't an option unfortunately.

I think I discovered how water is getting under the shower tiles, but I'm not sure how to fix the problem. I taped the area where the shower door frame attaches to the tile floor with painters tape so water couldn't seep into a small space that was designed to let water dripping down the glass doors drain back into the shower. There is no way to access this drainage cavity because it is covered by the door frame itself. I think some of the tiles have cracked under this frame due to foundation settling and that's how water is getting between the tiles and the shower pan. None of this is fix it yourself stuff. The only way to see if I'm right would be to remove the entire shower door assembly from the wall and look underneath. Since you can't unscrew the frame from the wall, or remove the heavy glass doors, I think this is beyond my pay grade. I guess I could just leave the blue painter's tape where it is. It is ugly and is probably not meant to be where I placed it, but it has dramatically diminished the leak.

Dash was a very finicky eater this morning. He wouldn't eat his regular food and wasn't interested in Dot's either. The only other food we had on hand was a holistic blend that we discontinued about six months ago because it made his poop soft. Wouldn't you know. Dash loved this brand of kibble today. This doesn't bode well for tomorrow morning. I really don't want him to poop in my car again.

I'm glad I don't live in Houston. It looks like a hurricane is headed their way this weekend. We have the occasional tornado here in Dallas, but the chances of actually getting hit by a funnel cloud are very low. Hurricanes are much harder to avoid. Here's hoping that the hurricane changes course. Let's also hope that Dash has an uneventful trip to the vet tomorrow morning, and that Janet and I will soon become pros at changing bandages.

Hero is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2624

I usually check the dogs on the baby monitor before I start my workout at the gym. Typically they're just sleeping, but today I heard Dot yelping like she was in pain and saw Dash looking around with a worried look. I turned around and went back home again, wishing it wasn't a fifteen minute drive. The house was quiet when I arrived home, but Dot was resting in an awkward position on her dog bed. She must have tried to get up while I was gone and twisted one of her rear legs. On a good day, Dot can still get up on her own. On a bad day she can't. It used to be pretty safe to leave the house for a few hours when the dogs were taking their morning nap. They both sleep soundly and would typically still be snoring on their beds when I returned. That's all changed in the past month or so. Dot is a lot more restless now and doesn't sleep as soundly. Since the oncologist thought that the restless might be caused by discomfort, I was hoping that the Gabapentin might help. If the drug makes her as limp as a wet washrag though, it only makes matters worse.

When I got the dogs up, everything seemed fine. Dot was able to walk and both dogs were eager for me to feed them their lunch. I think Dot's yelping was more of a panic attack than an injury. She has grown very dependent on me and doesn't like to wake up and find me gone. I took the dogs outside to pee, fed them their lunch, and then cleaned up after Dot when she decided to poop while she was eating. After lunch we walked around for a while until Dot got tired and then they were both ready to take a nap again. After making sure that Dot was relaxed and resting in a comfortable position, I got in the car and went back to the gym. This time the trip was a success. It's always a balancing act to care for Dot while still finding a little time for myself. I'm almost always nearby when Dot needs me, but I do need to occasionally get out of the house.

The rain that was supposed to arrive today got delayed. Now, we're supposed to get some severe weather starting at about 1 AM this morning. I wish the tree guys had already come out to trim our trees. One of the main reasons I wanted to remove the dead limbs is that I'm always afraid that they're going to fall in a strong wind. Maybe the storm won't be a bad as the weatherman on TV is predicting. Sometimes I think they make things sound alarming to get more viewers. Of course, Texas weather actually is alarming, so I never ignore what the weatherman says.

I don't know what to do about Dash. He has gotten finicky about his food again. This is nothing new. It has been going on for years. We'll find a healthy diet that Dash likes and after enthusiastically eating it for months and months, he'll abruptly stop and refuse to touch the stuff. We look for a new diet and the whole process starts all over again. I've asked every vet I know what causes this behavior but have never really received a satisfactory answer. Sometimes Dash will refuse to eat something in the morning and then enthusiastically scarf the same food down in the afternoon. Nothing is simple at our house.

I didn't even bother with vacuuming this weekend. Every time I thought about getting out the vacuum cleaner, the dogs were sleeping peacefully and I didn't want to disrupt things. Sleeping peacefully is the Holy Grail around here. When the dogs are asleep, maybe I've got time to take a nap myself, or even get something productive done. Actually, Dot is asleep right now, so maybe this is my opportunity.

Spot is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2477

The weather was terrible today. We'd been warned to expect rain, but the warning didn't sink in until we were halfway around the block with the dogs this morning. The overcast skies suddenly opened up and we got drenched. Poor Dot. There was no way she could walk any faster, so we slowly made our way home in the rain and immediately changed all our clothes. Eventually, we got both dogs dried out and continued our day.

I stayed home all day because it was hard to anticipate when the rain would turn to high winds and thunderstorms. I've learned from experience that it isn't a good idea to leave Dot and Dash alone in a thunderstorm.

I should have gotten more done today, but it was so nasty outside that there was little motivation to clean. Every time we took the dogs out to pee, we ended up tracking in wet leaves and dirt. There was little point in vacuuming, even though the house needed it. I concentrated on little things like cleaning toilets and shining shoes. We seemed to have used up all our towels drying the dogs off after we got caught in the downpour, so there was lots of laundry to do. This would have been a good day to binge watch something on Netflix, but I don't have the patience for that sort of thing. I have trouble watching TV for more than five minutes at a time. I'll usually just turn on the news, read the captions scrolling across the bottom of the screen and then turn the TV off again.

I used to just have trouble with seasonal allergies in the Spring, but now it seems that they are worse in the Fall. There must have been lots of pollen in the air today because I was sneezing and putting Visine in my eyes all day. I hope the allergy season is over soon because my nose is getting to look like Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer.

I finally managed to get Dash out for a short afternoon walk when there was a break in the rain. I've started noticing that some of the flowers that bloom in the Spring return briefly in the Fall. Maybe it isn't the time of year that causes them to bloom, but just a certain length of day or amount of sunlight. In many ways Spring and Fall are very similar. I am glad to be leaving Summer behind, but I sure hope the roofers can get out to make the rest of the repairs I need before the rainy season starts in earnest next month.

They say that 100 million people are going to watch the presidential debates tomorrow. Somehow, I doubt this. There just isn't that much new to learn. At this point, most people have already made up their minds and just want this election to be over. The media loves a circus though, so they are going to hype this event as much as they possible can. Am I going to watch? Probably not. I'll end up seeing it next week anyway as the pundits endlessly rehash the all the high and low points on dozens of news and commentary shows. I'm sure there will be plenty of debate memes on Facebook too. I'd probably watch if they let Gary Johnson and Jill Stein participate. I've heard more than enough from Trump and Hillary already.

Zorro is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2440

I was going to take Janet out for a birthday dinner this evening, but there was a horrendous rainstorm and both dogs were freaking out. We canceled our dinner and huddled with the dogs until the storm blew over. You really don't have a lot of flexibility with storm phobic dogs. Dot and Dash get so upset that they could easily injure themselves. Since Dot is already injured, there isn't much margin for error. I learned my lesson about Dalmatians and thunderstorms with an earlier dog we had. We came home after a surprise thunderstorm to discover overturned furniture and a big hole in the bedroom carpet where Petey had apparently tried to dig an emergency storm shelter. He dug completely through the carpet, the carpet pad, and the plywood sub-floor. When the weather's bad, it's much easier to just stay home.

I felt bad about canceling dinner, since Janet thinks I never do anything fun anymore and seldom leave the house. Some things can't be helped though. We'll go out for a nice dinner when the sun returns. I wish Dot and Dash were a little calmer when it rains, but that's just the way it is. Back in the days when the roof used to leak, I was probably just as bad are they are.

With the exception of the bad weather, the day was pretty uneventful. When I went out for breakfast this morning, there were two huge trucks in the parking lot, apparently transferring sewage from one truck to another. I took a gamble that the restaurant's air condition system would filter out the smell and went inside for breakfast anyway. Throughout my meal, I kept thinking that the smell was seeping through the walls, but I was probably just imagining things. I still have no idea why the trucks were there or what their smelly cargo really contained.

It's been so wet lately that mushrooms are cropping up everywhere. They're in the yard and they're in the park. Some of the mushrooms are pretty, but I have no idea which ones are poisonous. I do my best to keep the dogs away room all of them. I have enough trouble keeping Dash from stepping on broken glass or getting stung by a bee. The last thing I need to worry about is whether he's been eating mushrooms.

My credit card bills were lower this month. It's a start. I've been trying to cut back on spending to compensate for my paltry income, but the exercise hasn't been easy. I'd still rather go buy something than read a book. I saw an article the other day about how important it was for older people to begin downsizing and simplifying their lives before they become senile. It was disheartening to realize they were talking about me.

Hopefully, the weather will improve this weekend. The dogs aren't calm on a normal day and it's even worse when they've got cabin fever.

Spot is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2395

Independence Day ended as it began, with a horrendous thunderstorm that lasted for the rest of the night. I didn't get much sleep. Dot got so upset that I thought she was going to have a stroke. Dash was pretty upset too. This was some of the most intense thunder and lightening I've ever seen. The storm went on for hours and this morning I heard that some parts of town had gotten up to four inches of rain.

The U-Verse TV didn't work when we woke up this morning. Rebooting the receiver didn't fix things. Rebooting the router didn't help either. Nothing worked. Oddly, the U-Verse land line phone and the WiFi network were just fine. I called technical support and they said they needed to do some tests. After they tried to reboot the router remotely, everything went dead. Somehow they fried the entire gateway. The tech support guy claimed that last night's storm had damaged the router, but I think they ruined it themselves. Luckily, I had a spare router that AT&T sent me last month. I had been reluctant to install it because I knew I would have to re-pair every single wireless device on the network.

Since the router I'd been using was toast, I really had no choice. I spent the rest of the day configuring the gateway and then painstakingly reattaching all the devices on the network. Some devices were easy to reattach, but others were insanely difficult. A wireless office is convenient when it's working, but it can drive you crazy when something goes wrong. If I had it all to do over again, I'd just hook everything up with Ethernet cables.

After I finally got everything working again, I heard something on the weather report saying that there were more thunderstorms in the forecast for tonight. That's all I need. After spending all day getting my network running again, I certainly don't want to fry my new router tonight. I don't want to deal with two storm phobic dogs either. If the storm is bad enough, I really worry about Dot and Dash. When they go into panic mode, it feels like I'm only inches away from a medical emergency. Hopefully, things will be a bit calmer tonight. I really need some sleep.

I did manage to update some websites today, but I don't remember much about the assignments. All I remember is struggling to get the wireless thermostat working again and cleaning up dog poop. When I watched the Juno orbit insertion maneuver last night on NASA TV, I couldn't help feeling a bit envious of the folks I was watching at the Jet Propulsion Lab. I felt the same way when I watched the New Horizons spacecraft rendezvous with Pluto and as I held my breath watching Spirit, Opportunity, and Curiosity make successful landings on Mars. Ad people often think they are doing something important, but it's all just smoke and mirrors. These scientists at JPL actually are doing something important.

I don't expect to get a lot done tomorrow. It's Dot's physical therapy day and each week these sessions seem to take longer and longer. There are things I'd rather do, but the therapy is important. Maybe the weather will be nice tomorrow. Maybe Dot's won't poop in my car. A little good news tomorrow could go a long way.

Isabella is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2315

What a wet day. It started raining last night while we were asleep and it hasn't stopped yet. I'm sure the plants enjoy days like this, but they don't do much for me. Wet weather and restless dogs are a recipe for cabin fever. I should have gone to the gym, but my aversion to driving in the rain prevailed and I stayed home. There were occasional power spikes and brief outages, but nothing serious. It was a good thing we had power, because I spent the day vacuuming and cleaning the house. The dogs still wanted their walks, so I kept looking at the weather radar until I found a dry interval between downpours to take them out and pee. My timing was pretty good, but we were slow returning home on our morning walk and got wet. If we were just two minutes faster, everyone would have stayed dry.  I did a little better walking Dash in the evening. We were able to walk about twenty minutes between storm cells.

Dyson has won all sorts of design awards for their vacuum cleaners, but I bet they will never win an award for easy maintenance. The thing is impossible to clean. It takes almost as long to clean the vacuum cleaner as it does to clean the house. Couldn't James Dyson have just used bags to hold the dust like a normal person would. My old Hoover was easy to clean. You just put in a new bag when it got full of dust and you were good to go. You have to literally take Dyson's clear plastic contraption apart to clean out the residual dust. The machine was unusually dirty today, because I haven't vacuumed the house in two weeks. I shouldn't complain. It's not like I had anything better to do. Little rugs went in the washing machine. Big rugs got vacuumed. Floors got scrubbed. For a brief moment in time, the house was clean.

Since it was raining anyway, I tried to figure out why the weather app on my phone only works when WiFi is turned off. Logically the radar images should update faster when I'm using WiFi, but the opposite seems to be the case. The app works fine using 4G cellular data, but is impossibly slow using WiFi. Other apps seem normal using WiFi. I've called technical support and they say nothing is wrong.  Janet's phone picks up the radar better and mine too. It's all very complicated. This wouldn't be a big deal if I wasn't hooked on weather radar. Most people look at their Facebook feed. I look at weather radar.

I almost forgot Dot's Palladia pills today. It's really hard to remember to give these things every three days, since the days never repeat. Every Wednesday would have been so much easier. The only way I remember at all is to write the dates down on every calendar I own and hope that I remember to look at a calendar from time to time. Don't worry. Dot got her pills. Just a few hours late.

There is thunder and lightning outside and the dogs seem to have noticed. Dot is barking and Dash is hiding under my desk. They say we're not going to see the sun again until next Friday. I'll probably be stark raving mad by then.

Bella is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2314

We went to a concert tonight. One of Janet's friends is a singer in the group and we go and see them perform from time to time. This evening's event was a fundraiser and there was a barbecue dinner, a silent auction, and casino night gambling. Janet was probably hoping that I wouldn't look at the baby monitor on my phone, but I couldn't help myself. I worry about Dot. The first time I looked, she was sleeping. The second time I looked, she was barking and appeared to be struggling to get up. I could hear Dash barking too in the background. We left the event early and came home.

I was almost certain that there was either a thunderstorm in the area or that Dot had pooped in her bed, but everything was calm when we returned.  I have no idea what got the dogs so upset. It's probably just as well that we came home a little early. It takes me longer to write the blog that it used to. If we stayed for the gambling, I would never have gotten tonight's entry completed before midnight.

The weather forecast looks ominous. There is supposed to be wind, rain, and severe thunderstorms for the next ten days. This is one reason I was worried about the dogs this evening. Dot and Dash are both very storm phobic and tend to panic when there is thunder and lightning in the vicinity. The rain is supposed to start later tonight, so I thought it might have arrived a little early. Probably it is me who has the real storm phobia in the family. Bad storms freak me out. Trees have fallen on our roof twice since we bought the house, and if a tornado ever blew through, we are sitting ducks. There is so much glass in the house that there are no safe rooms anywhere. Even the interior walls are pretty close to floor-to-ceiling glass windows. With a flat roof and no basement, this house wasn't designed to weather much of anything.

For the past few weeks I've been noticing that the price of gas is going up again. Why? When I filled the car up today it seemed that prices had risen even further. The price of oil has been basically falling for the past two years. It seems like the price of gas should stay low for a long time. I've gotten used to seeing prices gradually go down. It will be a low blow to watch them go up again. I guess it doesn't really matter. I don't drive much anyway.

The new grass in the back yard is starting to grow. This is always a good sign. Every year when we refurbish the yard I think that this might finally be the year that the grass takes root and thrives. It never seems to happen though. Grubs eat the roots below the ground and squirrels eat the grass above the ground. In the Summer there is always a thick canopy of Oak leaves overhead that blocks most of the direct sunlight. The grass always has an uphill battle, but I keep thinking that one of these years it might make it.

I'm not sure whether I'll be going to the gym tomorrow or sitting at home watching an approaching storm on the weather radar and hoping the power doesn't go out. You never know about Texas weather. I hope the rain doesn't start until after we've walked the dogs in the morning. Life is much more peaceful once we've gotten the morning walk out of the way.

Becker is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2203

I had no idea how bad last night's storm really was until I turned on the television this morning. This wasn't your usual Texas tornado scare. It was a major disaster. I had always thought we had been spared from tornadoes in the past because we lived next to a lake, but the worst damage from last night's storm was right next to Lake Ray Hubbard to the northeast of us. Entire blocks of houses were completely destroyed. At least eleven people died. Cars filled with people were literally blown off a freeway overpass. This was a very serious storm.

It was unbelievable how many dogs got lost during the storm. All day long my Facebook feed was filled with shared requests to look for a lost family pet. There were hundreds of lost dogs. Someone I know actually saw the tornado pass right in front of her while she was trapped on a busy road with no place to hide. We didn't realize just how lucky we were when the worst of the storm passed a few miles to the east of us on its way to causing so much destruction in Garland and Rowlett.

The tornado danger passed as soon as a cold front arrived from West Texas. The temperature dropped forty degrees, but the rain continued. It's been raining all day. I can't blame the dogs for not wanting to go outside today. I didn't want to go outside either. The rain never really stopped, but I did manage to find a few periods when it slowed down a bit. It was too cold and nasty to take Dot outside, but I did take Dash for a short walk. Luckily he was sensible enough to do his business quickly.

Other than two short walks so Dash could poop in his favorite place, I didn't leave the house all day. With the furnace working properly and the dehumidifier sucking moisture out of the air, the house was actually quite comfortable. I spent the day updating the Dalmatian Rescue website and watching Dr. Who episodes I had missed.

Updating the Dalmatian website wouldn't have taken so long if I could remember how to code responsive websites. I don't do these things frequently enough for the knowledge to stay permanently in my brain. It's complicated, and every time I have to update a mobile friendly site, I end up having to relearn things I've already done before. Initially the code looks like someone else wrote it. Hopefully, the new skills I've learned will eventually become second nature. I don't think anybody's going back to using Dreamweaver and it's getting frustrating becoming baffled by my own code.

It's a good thing I viewed the Dr. Who season finale a second time this afternoon. I found Hell Bent to be confusing the first time I saw it, but it made a lot more sense when I realized that I had missed a full twelve minutes of the show the first time around. Maybe I fell asleep when I was watching on my computer. Maybe the dogs distracted me. Those twelve minutes made a big difference though. I actually liked the show this time. I didn't get around to watching the Christmas Special. I'll save that one for another rainy day.

I hope everyone finds their missing dogs. I'm going to put leashes on ours the next time we sit huddled in a corner waiting for the all clear signal after a bad storm. Dash panics easily and if our house was damaged, he might run away too. Hopefully, the weather will clear up soon. There is too much to worry about already.

Taylor is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2202

We've spent the evening listening to tornado sirens and weather alert messages beeping on our phones. So far, there have been three tornado alerts with the storm track passing fairly close to us. I hate it when the TV weatherman tells people to "go to your safe room now." We don't have a safe room. We don't even have a safe closet. Every room in the entire house has an exterior wall. There is lots of glass too. Basically, if a tornado hit our house, we're toast.

Luckily, today's storms passed slightly to the East of us. There was lots of lightning and a few moments with very high winds, but that was about it. Our power is still on too. When we were all huddled together in the little hallway that is a pitiful excuse for a safe room, I was sure Dot was going to poop. She kept her composure though and we rode the storm out. We've been lucky over the years. There have been several close calls, but no direct hits. A tree blew over on our roof once, but in Texas that was nothing. You've got to take the weather seriously in Texas.

I was able to get the grocery shopping done and the dogs walked before the bad weather arrived. The grocery store wasn't nearly as crowded as I expected. I guess people don't return groceries after Christmas. I don't go anywhere near shopping malls on the day after Christmas, but Janet said those places were a zoo. A lot of people must have gotten drones as gifts. There were certainly quite a few folks making their maiden flights in the park today. I'm not sure I understand the current fascination with drones. They're basically just model airplanes that can carry a Go Pro camera. Judging from the piloting skills I witnessed today, a lot of these things are going to be broken before New Years Eve.

I was going to watch the Dr. Who Christmas Special this evening, but ended up watching the weather on the local news instead. I'm really glad that we didn't lose power during the storm. The fast moving storm caught me by surprise and virtually nothing was charged up. With dead batteries on the laptop and phone, I might have had a hard time posting the blog this evening. I'll be better prepared tomorrow. A cold front is headed our way, but I don't know what that means. As long as it doesn't snow or do anything weird, I'm fine.

As the year draws to a close, I don't have any resolutions for the New Year whatsoever. It would be nice if next year wasn't quite as grueling as this one, but we'll just have to see what happens. You really can't predict the future. Expect nothing, but be prepared for anything might be a good motto. In less than a year, I'll be halfway to my goal of blogging for 5000 consecutive days. There's still room for a lot of surprises.

Dash is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2014

Today was all about the weather. Things got off to a very early start when I smelled poop as I got up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night. Dot had pooped in the house again. I kind of suspected this might happen when she refused to stay outside long enough to do her business before we went to bed last night. Who could blame her. The yard was wet and she was tired. I cleaned the mess up, put the soiled dog blankets in the washer and we went back to bed again. The rain continued sporadically throughout the night, but when daylight arrived, it had stopped. Since the radar showed that more storms were on the way, we dressed quickly and used the opportunity to give the dogs their morning walk. Dot and Dash were in no hurry, so we barely made it home again before the next round of rain started.

Whenever Dot poops in the house, it sets off a clean frenzy. We start by cleaning the soiled blankets and rugs. Then we notice how dirty everything is surrounding these areas and the vacuum comes out. It doesn't take long for the house to get dirty with two dogs and the seemingly endless rain we've been having. I'm glad the new Dyson has a five year warranty, because we're going to wear the thing out. By the time I was finished cleaning today, I had emptied the Dyson several times. I'm glad I got the yard taken care of yesterday, because today would not have been a good day for yard work. It wasn't a good day to fix the screen door either. That will have to wait.

The skies had cleared quite a bit by mid-afternoon, so we decided to take Dash to a new dog park in the neighborhood. Since everyone in the house has been having cabin fever lately, it seemed like a good idea to let Dash do something fun for a change. We hadn't been at the park for five minutes before I noticed some ominous looking black clouds to the South of us. We made several circles around the park perimeter to let Dash smell things and then headed home again. On the way home, the rain started again. It was like this all day long. There would be a short torrential downpour, followed by a dry spell of an hour or so, and then the rain would start again.

It was just as well that I was mostly housebound today. I had a huge website update to complete and rainy days are generally good for this type of thing. I added over 60 new dogs and cats to a rescue website I manage. It's hard to keep these type of sites current. By the time the photographer has time to take pictures of the new animals, half of them have already been adopted. I imagine that I will get a call in the near future asking me to remove many of the animals I just finished adding today. It's not an entirely futile effort though. The dogs and cats do get homes and sometimes it is the website that brings people and pets together.

When I finished working on the rescue website, I started writing another article. By the time I managed to come up with a decent headline, I realized I was very tired and took a short nap. That was it for writing today. When I woke up, it was time for dinner and a brief evening walk with the dogs. Dot pooped right on schedule this time, so maybe we'll all be able to get a good night's sleep tonight.

Next week is already looking pretty busy.  There are two vet appointment, a doctor's appointment for me, an appointment to get a haircut, and then there is a meeting I really ought to attend even though I detest meetings. Of course there are still all the usual articles to write and websites to update. I often feel like a hamster with one of those exercise wheels in their cage. I'd like to get caught up on everything and have absolutely nothing to do, but I don't think it's going to happen.

Barley 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 1968

I know it sounds impossible, but I've lost all interest in food. I still get hungry, but it's so hard to find food that doesn't get hopelessly lodged in the gaping socket the wisdom tooth left behind, that I don't look forward to meals at all. All the dentists have told me that this hole will close on its own as part of the healing process, but I'll believe it when I see it. In an effort to find something soft and easy to chew, I broke down and fixed myself French Toast this morning. This was a lot better than the crunchy granola and fruit I ate yesterday morning, but the bread got lodged in my teeth anyway. I've thought about a liquid diet of tomato soup, but acidic things like tomatoes give me heartburn. Even scrambled eggs get caught in my teeth. This sucks. I thought about going to the store and getting a package of hot dogs and eating them without a bun until my jaw healed. Maybe I'm just hungry for hot dogs right now. I have a feeling that they wouldn't work any better than anything else I've tried.

I had a huge website update to complete today. Somehow the new person responsible for social media at the company didn't realize I needed to be in the loop and when it finally dawned on them that the website was out of date, I was three months behind. More than anything, this shows you how completely Facebook has replaced the company website as the go-to place to show the world what you are doing. This website was hopelessly out of date and nobody even noticed.

I spent the remainder of the day writing an article for another client about an upcoming trade show. Many of my clients actually used to send me to these trade shows and conventions back in the day. Every one of them has abandoned the practice and just have me pretend I was there instead. Apparently Wikipedia and a little imagination are all you need these days. I kind of miss going to trade shows. It was a chance to stay in nice hotels and discover interesting restaurants using other people's money. Of course, this is probably why everyone quit sending me to these events. Nobody really needs to go to trade shows anymore. They are an anachronism. If it weren't for all the people desperate to get out of the office, trade shows would have died out quite a while ago.

I bet my electric bill is going to be higher this Summer. The severe trim the power company crews gave my Live Oak trees is already letting a lot more sunlight into the house. I've always liked the thick tree cover in the back yard and have been convinced that the shade keeps the house ten degrees cooler in the Summer. I certainly hope this massive tree trimming effort in the neighborhood eliminates our power outage problem. It looks like we're going to have bad weather for the rest of the week and if the power still goes out after the power company ruined my trees, I'm really going to be pissed.

Patches is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1959

When Dash woke up this morning, his limp was much worse. This was an unexpected surprise, since for several days his condition had been getting better. Dash refused to put any weight on the leg with the cut paw pad today and hopped around on three legs. This was not good. He could easily tear his cruciate on the remaining good rear leg if he continues to walk this way. It was clear that Dash needed immediate medical attention and I was lucky to be able to get him in to see Dot's vet today on very short notice. My initial worry was that he had torn a cruciate ligament, but the vet said that he was beginning to get an infection under his paw pad instead. It happens. We left with prescriptions for Clavamox, Rimadyl, and Tramadol, along with instructions to return for another exam if his condition hasn't started to improve within 72 hours. It's hard to imagine that a little cut could cause so many problems, but the vet said to imagine a paper cut on your finger, only ten times worse. There are lots of nerve endings in a dog's paw and this type of injury can be very painful.

Dealing with two dogs who are having trouble walking at the same time isn't quite as difficult as it was dealing with Dot and Dash when they both had cancer at the same time, but it definitely is tiring. Whenever you're trying to help one dog go outside, you're always wondering what the other dog is doing inside. When there's time, I always try to pen the dog I leave behind in a safe secure place. When either of these dogs has to poop though, you have to act fast. Neither one can hold it very long and there have already been a few accidents. Even the vet agrees that I have two very high maintenance Dalmatians right now.

Lately, every day of nice weather seems to be followed by a day of terrible weather. Today was grey and stormy again. Yesterday's nice weather didn't even last 24 hours. Luckily, it didn't rain while I was driving Dash to the vet. He doesn't ride well in the car even on a sunny day. Since he wouldn't go near the hammock contraption I use for Dot, I had to completely reconfigure the car and make the rear section flat again. Dash usually hops in the back when I open the tailgate, but since he can't hop anymore, I have to lift him up to get him inside. Did I mention that Dash hates to be picked up. He squirms around and squeals like something terrible is about to happen. I had a hard time even getting him in the car today. As I said, I have two very high maintenance dogs.

I hope the antibiotics kick in soon. Dash really needs to start getting better in a hurry. I have a feeling that I'll be having my own problems after the dreaded dental surgery. Maybe the dental work will go smoothly and there won't be painful side effects. I hope! I'm not expecting miracles though. Nothing else has gone smoothly this month. Why should my luck change now? It's weird that Dot was actually walking better than Dash today. It just goes to show that you should never take anything for granted.

Needless to say, work hasn't been going terribly smoothly either. There have been some miscommunication here and there this week and several things have had to be done over. I blame it on the weather. When is this rain ever going to stop? It's certainly not the end of the world, but a few days of sunshine and a little luck would definitely improve my mood.

Chance is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1900

When Dot's neurologist called this morning to give us a progress report, she seemed pleased. Dot is already eating and drinking water on her own, so she was taken off of IV fluids today. When the nurses help her out to pee using a special sling under her belly, Dot moves her rear legs and even squats fairly normally. She can't support her own weight yet, or walk unassisted, but the neurologist assures me that this is normal at this stage of the game. Dot is still very weak and on a lot of pain medication, but everyone at the hospital thinks she's doing even better than expected. Her doctors are optimistic that she will learn to walk again.

I'm glad Dot is safe and warm at the hospital now, because the weather in Dallas has turned cold and nasty. It snowed most of the day and the temperature never got above freezing. Traffic was a nightmare and there were lots of wrecks all over the city. Janet and I both canceled afternoon appointments when we saw how the traffic was inching along in front of our house. It just wasn't worth trying to get out in this mess. You don't really worry about snow or ice when you venture out on days like this. You worry about the other drivers. A single idiot who doesn't know how to drive on snow can snarl up traffic for hours.

Dash is such a baby about walking in the rain that I didn't think he'd go out in the snow at all. Much to my surprise, he seemed to enjoy the stuff. We took a long walk where he hopped around in the small drifts, smelled the tracks left by other animals in the snow, and peed on everything. I think I got cold long before Dash did. I took some pictures while we were out to document the rare snowfall. The one I liked the best captured a single perfect snowflake caught in a spiderweb. If you look carefully, you can see the six sided flake suspended in the web.

We were going to visit Dot this weekend, but that will depend on the weather. It could get better tomorrow, or it could get worse. I think even the weather forecasters have given up trying to predict things. Two days ago, they said it was going to be sunny today. UPS delivered Dot's new rehabilitation dog bed this evening. It looks like it's about the right size and can be easily repositioned around the house when needed. Now we've just got to figure out an easy way to quickly assemble a secure fence around the bed when we have to leave. A friend said that that we could use some of the rubber backed rugs she'd used when she had an older dog who had difficulty walking. Slowly but surely, we're getting the house ready for Dot's return.

I'm glad I went to my favorite restaurant yesterday, because I certainly didn't feel like venturing out in the snow today. Apparently, not everybody shared my aversion to the wet stuff. Schools closed early and children were enjoying sledding down hills all over the neighborhood. I guess I've lost the fascination with snow I had as a child. I didn't build a snowman or even make a snow angel. It was fun watching Dash cavort around in the snow on our walk, but even he was glad to get back inside again where it was warm. I've got my fingers crossed for another sudden temperature reversal and a quick return to warmer weather. With the fickle Winter we've been having, it could happen at any time.

Thanks for keeping Dot in your thoughts and prayers. I'm looking forward to tomorrow's report from her medical team and I'll keep you posted on how she's doing. This remarkable dog has beat the odds again and again. Dot has been an inspiration to me for many years and it looks like the old girl is not ready to relinquish her role as the head of the household yet.

Princess is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day