Day 3477

Yay. When I was eating breakfast this morning, I heard some loud noises coming from the front of the house. When I went outside to investigate, I discovered that a handful of city workers with two large trucks were in the process of hauling away the huge pile of brush and logs that has covered our yard ever since the big wind storm roared through town on June 10. I was glad to see the woodpile disappear. I was beginning to think I'd be stuck with the unsightly brush for the rest of the summer. The grass that was underneath the brush pile is all dead. That's a shame because it took years to get the yard looking decent. Hopefully the grass will start to grow again after a few soaking rains. Otherwise I'll be faced with resodding the lawn later this summer. In the short term I've traded one kind of ugly for another kind of ugly, but at least we're making progress.

After breakfast I prepared some high resolution images I took at Kennedy Space Center to send to Spaceflight Magazine. The editor wants to use some of the pictures I took to illustrate my article. This surprised me almost as getting the article accepted. I know for a fact that there were better pictures taken of the launch because I met the photographers who took them. Nevertheless, I'm pleased that the magazine wants to use my pictures. Next time I'm at a launch I'm definitely going to take a better camera.

While I was working at the computer, I added the two new dogs to the Dalmatian Rescue website. Hank and Pongo ought to get a lot of attention. They are both very good looking dogs. Actually, I think my dog pictures are better than my rocket pictures. I guess I've had a lot of practice. I've been taking pictures of Dalmatians for a very long time.

I've started to see road construction signs in the neighborhood. No actual construction has begun but the signs have me worried. It's hard enough getting out of the driveway on a normal day. If our street is under construction, it will be even worse. I definitely don't want to get tar on my car. There's nothing wrong with the street, but that won't stop the city from tearing it up. I think half the streets in town are in a permanent state of repair.

It's hard to believe that a full year has passed since I began my downsizing campaign. Last July, my art was on its way to New York and my train collection had just arrived in Kentucky. A number of things have sold, but there's still a long way to go. I didn't realize at the time that this would end up being such a long, involved process. Maybe by this time next year I'll feel better about this whole endeavor. Right now, everything seems up in the air. Things do eventually sell. You've just got to be very patient.

I'm a patient person but things do seem to move very slowly. It take me an hour every morning to take my walk. Coincidently, it also takes me an hour to eat my breakfast. It took almost a month to get the brush removed from the front yard and it might be a year before I attend a space launch again. I'm in no hurry but sometimes I'd like things to move a little faster.

Bud is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3107

The yard looks nice again. I thought the guys were only going to replace a few squares of obviously dead St. Augustine sod, but they ended up replacing about half the grass in the yard. The landscapers were very nice and I felt a little bad about calling them multiple times about the bad grass. I was polite but persistent. You have to be. I've learned the hard way that the squeaky wheel gets the grease.

Now it's time to focus my attention on the leaky roof, the stuck sliding glass door, the faulty backyard light, the noisy toilet, and a half dozen other things that are falling apart around the house. There are lots of little things that need attention this Summer, but the big thing is still Dash. I worry about Dash every day.

I talked to two different vets today about blood thinners and internal bleeding. Both of them agreed that Janet and I did the right thing to discontinue the low dose aspirin Dash was taking when we started seeing dark stools. Evidently baby aspirin has a greater tendency to irritate the stomach and intestinal lining than Plavix. Low dose aspirin can easily cause internal bleeding in both humans and animals. We're going to stop the aspirin for now, but continue the Plavix. So far, this plan seems to be working. Dash's poop has already returned to its normal color and there are no longer any obvious signs of bleeding. We can only hope that we are still keeping the blood clot from growing.

I'm way behind on the website project I'm supposed to be doing this Summer. I've been waiting for input, but I finally decided that I could get started without it. I didn't really accomplish much today, but I did manage to recover my password and gain access to the server. I created a space for the new site to reside and now I've got a place to come back and work whenever I'm in the mood. As my deadline for completing this project approaches, I imagine that I'm going to be in the mood a lot more often.

As soon as the new grass got installed, the yard squirrels started to eat it. When the squirrels aren't eating the grass, they are digging holes to bury acorns under it. With all the critters that call this place home, it's amazing that I have a yard at all. I have a feeling that critters are responsible for the faulty security light in the back yard as well. There are thousands of spiders in the yard and they are constantly building webs. I wouldn't be surprised if there a thick spider web covering the photocell that turns the light on and off. This would certainly explain the erratic behavior of the photocell, but I'm not sure about the solution. You can't tell spiders what to do.

I'm recording the two hour season finale of The Expanse tonight. I wonder when I'll find time to watch this? Dash doesn't usually sleep this long. Whenever I watch, I'm sure I'll have to stop and start the show over and over again, so I can take Dash outside to pee. Dash will sleep for a long time if I'm sleeping with him. If I'm trying to do something else, he's constantly interrupting me. Like any Dalmatian, he thrives on attention. I probably spoil him, but why not. Dash has so many problems that he deserves all the happy moments he can get.

I can't decide whether to stay up late tonight. Saturn is at opposition and less than one degree away from the full moon tonight. It ought to be quite a sight. The only problem is that there are so many trees in our area that I won't be able to get a good view of this rare alignment until almost 1 AM. If I want to see Saturn's rings, I'll need to get the telescope out too. I wonder if I can even find the telescope? I know it's here somewhere.

Deuce is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3106

Years ago I thought nothing about hitchhiking around the country to save a little money. It was fun. Hitchhiking not only seemed safe, it actually was pretty safe. When I wanted to sell something back in the day, I would routinely run a classified ad in the local paper, confident that the buyer would be a nice, honest person. Times have certainly changed. A friend was trying to tell me today how to sell guitars on Craigslist without getting scammed or robbed. Jeez. There were so many precautions to take that it made my head spin. No thank you. Why would anyone trust someone on Craigslist or eBay these days? It's sad. These once promising marketplaces have become a minefield.

Maybe some of the bright young people who work at Space X still see a world filled with limitless opportunities. I tend to see Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome. Where has civility and simple decency gone?  We live in a world where people follow the UPS truck and steal packages off your porch. Real estate agents are frightened to show a house alone these days because of all the stories about assaults and robberies. Even police officers have stopped riding in their squad cars without a partner.

Dystopian science fiction has become way too close to real life. I think I prefer the simple minded black and white worlds of Perry Mason, The Kingston Trio, and Leave it to Beaver. Strangely, few people seem to want to follow me back to the 1950's. Hey, I'd gladly trade my cell phone for a world where you didn't have to lock your door at night.

Time only moves forward unfortunately. I still spend my days waiting for the roofer and the landscaper. I actually got a text message this morning saying that the dead grass will be replaced tomorrow morning. We'll see. I'm not going to get my hopes up though. I've heard promises before.

They did the wrong test on Dash's poop at the vet. I'm glad to know that he doesn't have parasites, but I still don't know whether there is any internal bleeding. I'll have to get another stool sample and have them do the test again. I thought I was pretty clear about what Dash needed, but maybe not. Janet says I mumble a lot and people don't really listen to me.

Dash has started eating grass again this evening. We've got our fingers crossed and hope he doesn't throw up tonight. If we're really lucky, we'll all sleep well and his poop will look normal in the morning. I try to focus on simple things like this. The world close to home still makes sense. Everything else is starting to seem like an episode of Black Mirror.

Derrick is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3099 - My Birthday

How did this happen? I'm seventy years old. That seems impossible. Just yesterday people were still calling me a forty-something. Where has the time gone? I shouldn't complain though. I'm still here. My Mom never reached this age and my Dad already knew he had Parkinson's Disease by the time he turned seventy. All things considered, I'm still pretty healthy and there is no reason not to enjoy my remaining years.

Birthday's are pretty low key these days. My insurance agent and dentist are the only people who send cards anymore. Lots of people send birthday greetings on Facebook though. I love the birthday feature on Facebook. Without it, I could never remember anyone's birthday.

Janet took me out for dinner tonight. We ate early, so there would still be time to walk Dash when we got home. Our meal was great. I never would have discovered this place even though it is located nearby. My knowledge of restaurants is limited to breakfast. Janet still works though and takes people to lunch. She knows where all the cool restaurants are.

She also knows what I like. My birthday gift was a trip to the Houston Space Center. This is perfect for an aging space nerd like me. When Janet retires (again) later this Summer and can stay with Dash, I'm going to enjoy visiting mission control, standing next to a Saturn V, and maybe even having lunch with an astronaut.

I wonder if the landscaper knew it was my birthday? Much to my surprise, he and his assistant came over today. They were very nice and said that they would have been here earlier if they hadn't been so busy. The replacement grass wasn't installed today, but they measured what was needed and said they'd be back on Friday. Sounds good to me.

Dash seemed very relieved when we returned from dinner tonight. We weren't gone that long, but he isn't used to being alone anymore. He knows he is a special needs dog and one of us is always around in case he stumbles or has a seizure. I thought that Dash would probably poop in the house while we were gone, but he waited until we returned to poop in the house. Poor guy. He doesn't enjoy having an accident. Incontinence goes hand in hand with aging though. In dog years, Dash is a lot older than I am.

I can't say that turning seventy is as much fun as turning 25 or 30, but it does have a silver lining. I am now permanently exempt from jury duty.

Inky is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3096

Summer is noisy. In the morning I'm greeted with a cacophony of lawn mowers and leaf blowers as the lawn care companies descend on the neighborhood to take care of chores that everyone but me seems to have abandoned. The evenings are filled with the sound of Cicadas. Why are these bugs so loud? Their song starts in the afternoon and continues unabated through the night.

I'm pretty quiet myself. The noisy neighbors would never know I'm here. I never play loud music and I don't even make much noise when I mow the grass. My electric mower is very quiet, but it isn't self propelled like a lot of gasoline mowers. I was very tired after I finished mowing the grass today. I've thought about using one of those lawn care companies myself, but they seem expensive to me. I try to tell myself that chores like mowing the grass are just as effective as going to the gym. I'm pretty sure that I burn more calories mowing the lawn that I do on the treadmill at the gym.

The landscaper didn't replace the dead grass today. Why do people make promises they never intend to keep? Eventually, the dead sod will get replaced, but it will probably take ten more phone calls to get any results. The landscaper is probably hoping that that healthy grass will fill in the dead spots and he won't have to replace so much. Either that, or he is waiting until he has some left over grass from another job.

I've been doing some research on the Internet to find out more about the art I'm trying to consign. It's amazing how much information is out there. Pick a subject and you can find out volumes about it in a matter of minutes. Today, I discovered the name of a painting I've had for thirty years. It has a history.    This thing has been hanging in my office for all these years and I knew nothing about it. The only problem about looking up things on the Internet is that a lot of the information is inaccurate. I've been looking up the names of flowers I see in the park for years, and about half the information I find is total nonsense.

I made some updates to an animal rescue website this afternoon. This time the edits worked. I still don't know what went wrong with my upload yesterday. I'm not even going to bother calling technical support until Monday. You can never get a problem resolved on the weekend. I don't know who they hire to work the weekend shift, but they need to take a refresher course in website maintenance.

Dash continues to do well. Three months ago nothing seemed to be working, but now he seems almost normal. I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop, but that's probably the wrong attitude. You can't spend all your time walking on eggshells. Dash wants us to treat him like a normal dog. No, scratch that. I think Dash really wants us to treat him like royalty. He likes being spoiled.

Hershey is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3091

We're making progress. The landscaper said he's coming over and will replace the dead grass. The roofer contacted me and said they were very busy with hail damage, but hadn't forgotten about me. The art auction house sends me about three e-mails a day and we are inching closer and closer to a deal. All this stuff will get taken care of. It just takes time.

There was blood on the bed again this morning. I don't know where Dash is bleeding. When I look in his mouth, there are no obvious signs of bleeding and all of his paws look fine. The blood is obviously coming from somewhere. Maybe Dash is coughing it up. When I mentioned the bleeding to the vet at Dash's last big exam, he didn't seem very alarmed. The bleeding is sporadic and only seems to happen about once a week. I guess I'll just keep an eye on things. It's probably nothing. Plavix can make even minor cuts seem alarming.

I got some Thai food the other day that was way too hot. Janet suggested rinsing the noodle dish with warm water in a colander to remove a lot of the spicy sauce. Surprisingly, this worked great. I had the noodles for dinner. They were still tasty, but were only half as hot as they were yesterday. Live and learn.

I like the picture of the purple thistle I took this morning. You may be seeing a lot of thistles. The park is full of them this year. There isn't a lot of variety in this years crop of wildflowers, but there are a ton of Texas Thistles, Engelmann Daisies, Native Sunflowers, Yucca Flowers, and Horse Nettle. I wonder what happened to the other flowers this year? Sometimes the meadows are a carpet of colorful plants. This year, not so much.

I'm watching the coverage of the big summit in Singapore. It appears like every reporter in the world is over there. Non stop coverage and nobody has a clue about what's actually going on. It's non-stop speculation. Kim went sightseeing. What does that mean? Why is Dennis Rodman wearing a pot crypto currency t-shirt? Kim is smiling? What does that mean? It's a circus. I wouldn't be surprised if something significant actually does happen. Why not? It would be pretty easy for the two leaders to formally end the Korean War. If it were up to me, I'd start with a meaningful symbolic gesture like this and leave the hard stuff for later.

I'm all for leaving the hard stuff for later. That's why I didn't do much of anything today. It's weird not having websites to update. For years and years I had websites to update and articles to write every single day. Now I spend my days figuring out how to dispose of things I acquired during the busy years. Working is winding up a watch and retirement is watching it unwind.

The roofer and the landscaper didn't show up today, but at least they called. There's always tomorrow. Maybe I'll see these guys tomorrow.

Willa is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3086

Some of the grass the guys installed yesterday looks dead. The landscaper said the sod was fine and would turn green after I watered it for a while. I doubt it. I've seen dead grass before. To add insult to injury, the grass was more expensive this year, even though it looks worse than last year's grass. I'll water the new turf faithfully for a few weeks. If the brown squares don't turn green, I'm going to demand a replacement. Believe it or not, I really don't enjoy complaining and wish that people would just do things right the first time.

I went to retrieve some art from the storage warehouse and was dismayed to discover that one piece had been damaged by humidity. The paper wasn't flat anymore and has developed some alarming ripples. I should have kept this lithograph at the house, but I ran out of space a long time ago. I called a good art conservator and explained my problem. She was convinced that the art could be saved, but warned me that the process took a long time and could get expensive. What a shame. I don't think this piece is going to the auction house.

Water is my enemy. I'm always fighting water. I had a really nice vintage guitar ruined by moisture several years ago. The shower pan leaks. The toilet runs. And I'm worried that I'm going to need a new water heater soon. If I water this new grass too much it will die. Conversely, if I don't water it enough, it will also die. Don't even get me started about the roof. My ongoing problems with the roof are all about water.

There are still a lot of e-mails going back and forth between me and the auction house. Consigning the model train collection was much easier. One of the hardest things about selling art is providing appropriate provenance for each piece you are planning to sell. It's not easy to find detailed records for things you bought forty years ago. My memory isn't that great anymore. I have no idea where some of this stuff came from.

I have an opportunity to apply for a chance to provide social media coverage for the launch of NASA’s Parker Solar Probe at the end of July. This sounds like fun, but it's probably too soon to participate in another one of these NASA social media events. I can't afford the three day event for starters, and taking care of Dash is still a team effort. I'm glad that NASA is still providing these opportunities for bloggers, because one of these days I'm definitely going to go cover another launch.

I think that this is the last day that NetworkedBlogs is in operation. If the site hasn't already shut down, it will tomorrow. I signed up for a new blog syndication service, but I don't know if it works yet. We'll see. The blog will still be published on Google's Blogger platform, but it you don't see it on Facebook or Twitter, it means that I haven't figured out how to use the new syndication service yet. I guess I could just share each night's post manually, but I haven't really figured out how to do this either. I'm sad to see NetworkedBlogs disappear. It's been a useful tool for many years.

Dash has his big follow-up exam at the cancer center tomorrow morning. Wish us luck. Tomorrow's test will determine if the blood clot in Dash's heart is really gone. Hopefully, this final echocardiogram will confirm that the clot has completely dissolved and is gone forever.  It's always good to have one less thing to worry about.

Wendy is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2785

I didn't accomplish much today. At least Dash ate well. He finished both his breakfast and dinner with no hesitation at all. Will he throw up tonight? I've learned that anything can happen with Dash. Everything seems normal now, so that's a good sign. I did call his vet to ask if there is anything we might have overlooked, but haven't received an answer yet. Something is wrong, but I'm not sure if there is anything more we can check. Once every week or so, he just throws up in the middle of the night for no apparent reason. On the days he throws up, there is usually no prior sign of an upset stomach. We watch him carefully now when he goes outside, so I don't think he's eating bugs either. It's frustrating.

I don't know why the grass is dying in the back yard either. There are no signs of grubs and the new grass has received plenty of water. I mowed today and now the grass looks even worse. There are lots of reason why we have to replace this grass frequently, but it should last at least a month or two. I'll call the landscaper, but somehow I feel that this problem will be as difficult to resolve as getting a refund on the fraudulent gift card.

When my client told me that he has put a check in the mail on Monday, I kind of expected to receive it on Tuesday. We're in the same zip code. I mean, how long could it take? Well, I didn't get the check today either. Maybe the guy was just thinking about putting the check in the mail. I'll wait until next Monday before I complain again. I believe in giving people the benefit of the doubt, but there is no reason to be this late with a payment.

I'm trying to think of something that didn't frustrate me today, but I'm coming up blank. I still can't get old Windows video files to play on my computer. The software that used to convert them isn't being updated anymore and probably won't be in the future. Nobody cares about old Windows video anymore. I don't even think Microsoft supports these files now. The price of progress is having to  abandon old habits and old routines. Upgrading to Sierra allowed me to continue using the important software I use in my business, but I lost a lot in the process. This happens every time I do a major upgrade. Eventually, I'll just forget about the old, obsolete stuff.

I made an appointment to get my hair cut tomorrow. At least this is one thing I won't be disappointed with. My hair is such a mess now that it couldn't possible look any worse. I probably should have made a vet appointment for Dash instead of getting a haircut, but it is much easier to get a haircut on short notice. I've already taken Dash to two different vets for this vomiting issue and nobody seems to have a solution. Give him a Pepsid. Change his food. Look for signs of a vestibular event. We've already tried all the obvious things.

I did get a response to the website proposal I sent out last week. The guy seems interested, but he wants a lot of complicated stuff that I know he doesn't have the budget for. I've either got to convince him to simplify his wish list or come up with more money. I'll put together a modified proposal tomorrow, but I'm not very confident that this project is ever going to happen.

I accidentally left out some ingredients in my smoothie this morning and it actually tasted better. Why did it take me three years to discover this?  I shouldn't have been surprised. I learn most things by accident.

Nautica is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day