Day 4568

We didn't make much progress today. Dawn didn't want to come out to the kitchen to eat and I had to take her meals back to the bedroom. She did eat though and took all her meds. At one point I found her hiding in a corner of the bedroom for no apparent reason. A strange noise must have scared her. I took her outside to show her that everything was normal, and then she was fine again. We did get all the essentials done today, but this wasn't one of Dawn's better days. Hopefully, she'll be feeling a little more adventurous tomorrow.

It was a lot cooler this morning. When I woke up the temperature was still in the mid 70's. It was an easy choice to take a long walk instead of going to the gym. I walked right after breakfast and was out of the house before 8 AM. Before eating breakfast I hooked up the second sprinkler I bought and watered the front lawn. I also watered the plants inside the atrium. I used to do this from inside the atrium, but now I just water them through the screen wire wall on the back side of the space. It's just too much trouble to open the broken sliding glass door these days.

My walk was enjoyable this morning because of the lower temperatures, but there wasn't a lot to see. The Spring wildflowers are starting to disappear and most of the animals and birds are in hiding. The fancy new bike path that is being constructed through the park is almost complete now. It looks like they are going to meet their July deadline. My feet aren't hurting as bad lately. Maybe they are just becoming numb. Summer walks aren't nearly as enjoyable as the ones I take in the Spring and Fall. I'm still getting the steps I need though. I think discipline is important. If I only did things I liked to do, I probably wouldn't do anything at all.

The Benro folks wanted me to run some tests on the star tracker to help isolate the problems I've been having lately. I ran the tests they wanted, but the camera didn't disconnect today. Actually, everything seemed to work fine, which baffled me. The phone app and firmware versions were exactly the same as they were before when I was having a ton of problems. This thing is full of mysteries and it is still difficult to talk with the Chinese manufacturers. It gives me something to do on a slow day though. When all the bugs are eventually worked out, it will be an amazing piece of gear to take out to the observatory. I could use it here of course, but there isn't much to see with all the city light pollution.

It was supposed to rain today, but it didn't even get that cloudy. I would welcome a little rain at this point. The yard is getting really dry and without a sprinkler system I need to remember when to water everything. Too much water is just as bad as too little and I definitely don't have a green thumb. I'll make an effort though. We had a wet Spring this year and the yard still looks pretty nice.

Dawn seems a little depressed. I wish she wasn't so dependent on Janet, but there's not much I can do. I make sure she gets her meals at the appropriate time, keep her water bowls filled, and take her out to pee at regular intervals. I'd like to see a little more tail wagging, but she's safe and well taken care of. I was hoping that she'd be more relaxed today, but there's always tomorrow. The last time Janet went on vacation, Dawn eventually did begin to relax. It took forever though.

I'll probably take another early walk tomorrow. The forecast says that the temperature will only be 72 degrees at sunrise tomorrow. I need to take advantage of these cooler mornings while I can. 

Rascal is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4543

We had another big thunderstorm last night. The thunder was so loud that it scared Dawn, who typically ignores these things. I woke up when Dawn kept hopping off the bed to go to her "safe" place in the corner of the room and then hopping back on the bed again a few minutes later. It took about fifteen minutes before she decided that it was safe enough to go back to sleep again. I kept getting text messages on my phone from Oncor saying that there was a power outage in our area, but we never lost power. The roof didn't leak either. Luckily, storms with straight line winds move quickly and everything was calm by morning. I'm tired of all this rain, but at least the lawn looks good. Late Spring is usually pretty wet here. By July, I'll be wishing these storms were back again.

It was way too wet to take a sunrise walk with Dawn this morning. She didn't even want to go out in the back yard and pee. We figured that we could walk her later in the day. I ate my breakfast and ran the pumps on the roof. Amazingly, they're still working. Now that Summer is approaching and most of last Fall's leaves are gone, I'm just going to let the residual standing water on the roof evaporate. There's no reason to tempt fate by climbing up there too often.

The accessory I ordered for the star tracker came in today's mail. This will make it easier to attach the camera to the tracker in both landscape and portrait orientations. I've got everything I need now. All that's missing are some dark skies and the will to go outside at night and get bitten by mosquitos and chiggers. I'll keep practicing with the tracker so I can reliably set it up and use it in the dark. One of these days it will go back to McDonald Observatory with me.

I took my long walk early today while the air was still cool from last night's storm. As long as it's not hot and muggy, I still prefer walking in the park to working out at the gym. I was surprised when after a few miles my route was blocked by a construction crew. They were putting in a new bridge over one of the creeks that feeds the lake. It looked like they built the entire bridge offsite and were just lifting it in place with a giant crane. I've been watching crews build the concrete piers for this bridge for weeks. I still didn't expect that this is the way they would finish things though. Since I couldn't walk any further, I turned around and walked the other way. I ended up getting the same amount of steps and saw a part of the lake I haven't visited in months.

Dawn was almost back to normal today, but she's still a little more nervous than usual. She freaked out for a few minutes when she heard the mailman at the front door this morning. Dawn doesn't like surprises. Anything out of the ordinary can startle or scare her. I'm beginning to think that she has PTSD. She seems to behave very similarly to the way many people do with PTSD. Clearly something traumatic happened in her past and she'll probably never forget it.

I saw a rat in the atrium today. We haven't seen rats in the yard for almost five years. There was a guy in the neighborhood who used to take care of a lot of feral cats. I think they kept the rat population down. He found homes for the cats before he moved and I haven't seen cats in the neighborhood for quite a while. Owls used to eat mice and rats in the meadow behind our house as well. I don't even hear the owls anymore. I wonder where they went? 

I'm pretty sure the dishwasher is leaking. Do we need a new dishwasher, or is there just a loose water line connection somewhere?  I'll have to call the appliance repairman to find out what is going on. He'll probably monkey around for half a day and then tell me that I need to call a plumber. Nothing is easy these days.

At least the week is almost over. I've taken this week's trash out to the curb and the weather looks like it's going to be nice tomorrow. Hopefully tomorrow will be uneventful. I'm kind of like Dawn in may ways. I'm good as long as there are no surprises.

Abby is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day