Day 4667

Dawn got a bath today. That was about the only noteworthy thing that happened all day. Our sunrise walk was earlier this morning because Janet had places to go. We're well equipped with lights now on these dark pre-dawn walks. Dawn has a little light that clips to her harness and Janet and I have lights that clip to our jackets. These lights aren't to help us see better in the darkness. They are so other people can see us. We are much more worried about getting run over by cyclists than encountering coyotes.

When we returned home I has my usual breakfast of shredded wheat and fruit and then took a walk in the park. I thought it was going to be chilly, but it warms up quickly once the sun comes up. These walks are boring now, but so is walking around the indoor track at the gym. I'm determined to keep moving because all I'd probably do if I stayed home is take a long nap. Although my feet bothered my quite a bit today, I was able to complete my full six mile route.

The refrigerator and washer are still working fine. I can't decide whether to go ahead and fix the dryer before taking my car in for service. I might as well get one or even both of these tasks out of the way before I start planning another trip to Florida. I don't think another Artemis launch attempt is planned until late November, so I've got some time. 

Janet and I took Dawn to a self bathe place after lunch. Dawn doesn't like a bath but she's better about the ordeal than some of our other dogs. I didn't think she really needed a bath but I'll have to admit that she does look cleaner now. Unless she rolls in something nasty, I think she's safe for another month.

I wish I lived closer to the space center. There was an interesting ULA launch today and the Crew 5 mission to the International Space Station launches tomorrow. I think there's another Starlink launch tomorrow as well. Some of the launch photographers I've met go to every single one of these launches. I'm lucky to attend two launches a year. These trips usually last three or four days and it's just too expensive to travel to Titusville more often.

I have no plans for tomorrow. I should find a good book to read but I have little interest in reading these days. I'll probably watch a livestream of the Crew 5 launch and wonder why I'm not down there with everyone else. Maybe something interesting will happen. I doubt it though.

Jersey is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4480

Dawn got a bath this afternoon. It wasn't a big event, but it will have to do. Today was a slow day. All our dogs have hated getting a bath. They seem to love getting dirty though. Dawn loves to roll in the grass in the back yard. The grass is pretty thin in places, so she is mostly rolling in the dirt. Of course as soon as she's back in the house, she likes to roll on the bed. If you have a dirty dog, you also have a dirty house.

Dawn always feels better after a bath. She just doesn't like the whole process. We always take her to one of those self bathe places. I'm glad that someone came up with this idea since it works a lot better than trying to take your dog in the shower. At least it was a nice warm day. The whole ordeal was over quickly and now we have a clean dog again for a few days.

I printed out all my reservations, maps, and directions for my trip this morning. I always do this when I travel and carry around a yellow manilla envelope with all this information wherever I go. Everything in the envelope is readily available online, but I like having things on paper. 

When I drive I'll often take a road atlas with me. Even though the atlas is out of date, it still makes more sense to me than Google Maps.  I'm about as old school as you can yet, but I do try. I've finally realized that the app on my phone is much more convenient that a paper airline ticket.

It was such a nice day that Dawn got two walks. I continued walking after Janet and Dawn returned home this afternoon, but I didn't make it very far. My feet really bothered me today and by the time I'd walked two miles I realized that it was time to head for home. None of this makes a lot of sense to me. Yesterday I walked much further with relatively little foot pain. Today was terrible.

It's time to get the lawn mower running again. It's an electric mower and I usually have to replace the batteries every couple of years. I kept the battery inside this winter, so hopefully it will take a charge. We'll see. The large batteries are kind of expensive, but I still like the electric mower better than the old gas powered mowers I used to use. I just wish this mower was self propelled. I'm tired of pushing the heavy thing up and down our hilly front yard.

I'm supposed to pick up my press credentials at the Starfish Room in the Cocoa Beach Hilton. I looked up the hotel online and it doesn't have a Starfish room. This kind of stuff drives me crazy. Every time I go to Florida I'm always thinking "What if I get down there and they're not even having a launch?" I have no faith in anything these days. I usually call to double check everything, which probably annoys the people who put all their information on a website just to avoid people like me.

I've taken this week's trash out to the curb and am halfheartedly thinking about going out for breakfast tomorrow morning. I'll probably just stay home and have another bowl of shredded wheat, but I should resume my Friday morning restaurant breakfasts one of these days. It's been a while, but I know I used to enjoy them.

Smiley is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4205

Every once in a while I do something unpleasant just because it needs to be done. Today I bought a bunch of St. Augustine sod and covered all the bare areas in the back yard. Today seemed like a good day to put in new sod because the ground was still very wet and made it easier to prepare the soil for the new grass. I haven't put in sod for a while and had forgotten that this is a tiring, messy job. I used to put in a new turf almost every year. Then we started using a landscape company for a while. Lately we have done nothing and I just mow the weeds. Wet, muddy sod is messy stuff to carry around in a car. The old Land Rover Defender was certainly easier to clean up afterwards. It was probably good that the sod was wet though bacause it won't dry out as fast when we are trying to get it established. Wet sod is very heavy. Each square seemed to weigh twice as much as I remember.

I think I did a good job. The yard looks presentable now and Dawn will be a lot less likely to roll around in the dirt. Like other outdoor chores I've attempted recently, installing the sod reminded me that I'm well past my prime. My hands still hurt from carrying each piece or the heavy, slippery sod from the car to the back yard. I thought it would be easy to carry a square of sod in each hand while I was moving the stuff to the back yard. I must have been dreaming. I had to carry one square at a time. I definitely have some arthritis in my fingers now. The old joints don't move like they used to. I got the job done though and now there is one fewer item on my to do list.

By the time I was finished with the yard work it was way too hot to take my long walk in the park. I did a load of laundry, took a short nap, and then went to the gym. I got a notice the other day that my gym no longer has a mask requirement. Nobody was wearing masks today. This was quite a change from a few days ago and seemed to prove that everybody had just been following the rules without any strong feelings about whether masks actually worked. One old fool was wearing a loose fitting cloth bandana while he was running around the track but that was about it. Now that the mask mandate is history, I hope that the gym brings back the basketballs soon. I really used to enjoy shooting baskets on the court. They said I could bring my own basketball, but it would be a lot easier to just use one of theirs.

Dawn had a day of beauty at the vet while I was putting in the new sod this morning. Janet discovered that the price included a nail trim and getting Dawn's anal glands expressed, so the deluxe bath was actually less expensive than taking Dawn to one of those self-bathe places and then having a vet do the nails and anal glands as separate items. We still need to figure out why Dawn is obsessively licking her feet, but that's going to be a lot more complicated than getting a bath.

I watched the Space X Transporter 2 launch this afternoon on the streaming channel. The launch got scrubbed with ten seconds on the clock. There was a range violation and apparently there was a boat or an airplane in the restricted zone. Every time a launch is scrubbed it reminds me that a trip to Florida is never a sure thing. When a launch gets delayed, suddenly your trip becomes much more expensive. This has happened to me several times already and I haven't even been to that many launches. I guess nothing is a sure thing. There's been a lot of rain out at McDonald Observatory recently, so this wouldn't have been a good time for a visit out there either. The Davis Mountains really needed the rain though. It has been very dry this year.

I'm not sure what I'm going to do tomorrow. I'm definitely not going to do any more yard work. Hopefully I won't be dealing with roof leaks either. A day with absolutely nothing on the agenda is perfectly fine with me.

Sparky is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4088

Dawn got a bath today. The fact that this was the big event of the day will tell you how exciting today was. None of our dogs have enjoyed getting a bath, but they put up with it. We abandoned bathing dogs at home years ago and always take them to one of those do it yourself dog bath places that have sprung up all over town. We all got wet. Dawn got clean. And she did very well with the other dogs at the facility.

Today was tax preparation day. I think I've got everything ready to send to the accountant, but I'm never sure. Taxes seem to get more complicated every year. My big problem this year was that I keep accidentally putting things in the wrong category in Quickbooks. It took quite a while to look for missing items and move them to the proper class files. At least I'm pretty good about entering transactions in Quickbooks now. Doing a search in a software program is a lot easier than sifting through mountains of receipts in an accordion folder. I was pleased that I actually made money writing for magazines this year. It wasn't a lot of money, but it was a start.

I never did take the Allegra-D that I bought yesterday. I guess all the dire warnings on the box scared me away. Now I've got to go find something else. I should quit reading the fine print on pill bottles. I shouldn't even watch the TV commercials. Just about every pharmaceutical product on the market warns of some sort of horrible side effect. I seldom have an adverse reaction to medication. My problem is that I often have no reaction at all. A lot of pills just don't seem to work on me. It's just as well. I hate to depend on pills and still think that staying active and eating healthy food is the best way to avoid getting sick.

It was so warm today that I not only washed the car, I cleaned the dirty wheels as well. Land Rover wheels seem to get coated with oil and dirt unusually quickly. I hate cleaning them because I have to get down on my knees and scrub all the gunk away. The older I get, the harder it is to get back up off the ground. I'm going to need a cane one of these days. I guess the effort was worth it. The car looks great now. I don't drive much, so I probably won't have to do this again for a month or so. Dawn probably hopes she won't need a bath again for another month or so as well.

I talked to my editor at SpaceFlight Magazine today. He said he'd leave it up to me what to cover next. This is good and bad. I'm not really sure what I want to do next. It will probably just depend on how hard it is to get clearance and the proper credentials. I think that Kennedy Space Center has discovered that severely restricting access makes life a lot easier. Life will probably never go back to the pre-covid days when NASA created special events for social media influencers and it was easy to get a press pass.

Last year at this time I was getting ready to spend several weeks out at McDonald Observatory. Every March they hosted a special series of Spring Break star parties that would often attract up to 500 people a night. When I became an on-site volunteer I kind of thought that I'd be going back to the observatory every March. Not this year. I have no idea when the observatory is going to open up again, but I don't think it is going to be soon. Hard to believe that it's been a full year since the Covid madness started.

I've learned a lot this year. I'm not a people person and do pretty well on my own. I've discovered that it is very hard to do anything in isolation however. Getting invited to view launches at Kennedy Space Center involves a lot of interaction with other people. So does looking through big telescopes out at the observatory. I'd like to resume these activities but I'm not sure that life will ever go back to the way it was before. I'm just sitting her like everyone else, waiting to see what happens next.

Orion is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3835

Dawn got a bath today. Yes, that was the big event of the day. We took her to a neighborhood dog-wash place and probably erased weeks of car conditioning efforts. As far as Dawn is concerned, a bath is even a worse destination than the vet. None of our dogs have liked getting baths, but it was time. The dog-wash place was busier than we expected, but everybody was wearing masks. I thought the restaurant we went to on my birthday felt safer. I'm sure Dawn would have agreed. She would have loved to accompany us to the steak house.

Since Dawn was good about getting bathed, we took her to get an ice cream cone on the way home. All is well now. We have a clean dog and Dawn is starting to think that all car rides end with ice cream.

I forgot what day it was again. For a while this morning I thought it was Tuesday. I guess it's understandable that the days would blend together. The pandemic has made them virtually indistinguishable. It's a shame that infection rates are going up in Texas. I was hoping that things were returning to normal. I'm hearing now that some stores and restaurants are thinking of closing again. I might have missed my chance to get a haircut. We'll see what happens in the next week or so, but things aren't looking good.

Things aren't looking good in Florida either. I really doubt that I'm going to get media accreditation to attend the Mars 2020 launch now. Especially since states are starting to impose travel bans on other hot-spot states. Even if I did get approved, I'm not sure if it would be wise to go. Air travel still seems questionable. Now that we are all getting used to the idea of distancing, I wonder if people will ever feel safe on a plane again. Do you remember how crowded a full plane actually is? Yikes. I haven't been that close to other people since this whole mess started.

Our early morning walks are still enjoyable, but it is definitely getting warmer. At least the rain is gone for a while. I don't know if we could get started any earlier. I'm half asleep when we leave the house as it is. The only way to get more sleep would be to get to bed earlier. I've tried, but it seems to take longer and longer to finish the blog every evening. It's hard to write when you've got nothing to say.

I got a call from the dermatologist's office today saying that my biopsy results were negative. What biopsy? I didn't even know they did one when they removed the keratosis from my face. I guess this is good news. The blemishes were not melanoma or even a pre-cancerous lesion. It's a little late now, but I didn't need to have these things removed in the first place. Better safe than sorry though. You don't want to mess around with anything that might turn into cancer.

It looks like I'm going to have to go up on the roof tomorrow. There's still water up there from our recent rain. The hotter is gets, the worse it is up on the roof. Being a roofer has got to be one of the worst jobs in the world. Oh, well. I've got to keep the roof free of water. It's the only way I'm going to keep the leak from returning.

Hopefully, I'll remember that tomorrow is Thursday. I can't forget trash day since we seem to generate a lot of trash. I hope nothing terrible happened today. I didn't even turn on the TV.

Rio is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3725

I think I figured out a way that my Facebook readers can still see the blog. I created a new Facebook Group called Some Assembly Required and each night after I publish my blog entry, I take a picture of the post and upload it to the Facebook Group. There are no links and no text for the robot censors to pass judgement on. The only thing I'm actually putting on Facebook is a JPEG image. The group is private and only people who seem to like reading the blog anyway are invited. I think this is a clever plan. Let's see if Facebook can block this. If you read the blog on Facebook and didn't get invited, let me know and I'll add you to the group. I know who some readers are, but I certainly don't know all of you. If you have trouble reading the blog entry, just click on the picture and it will become larger, making everything much easier to see. I'm not sure if you are notified when new posts are added, but the Group is easy to find once you've joined. Let's see how this works. Posting this way is certainly a lot easier than convincing all of you to move to Twitter.

Today's big event was giving Dawn a bath. We took her to a self-wash place where we always used to bathe Dot and Dash. I didn't expect Dawn to enjoy the bath, but she was much better behaved than we expected. She even let the lady who runs the place clip her nails and clean her ears. Why did we go to all this trouble to get Dawn looking sparkly clean? Someone wants to look at her tomorrow and she might get adopted. Janet and I both have mixed feelings about Dawn going to a new home. She's a wonderful dog and we've become attached to her.

This is why so many fosters fail. I wanted to keep Ginny and it wouldn't have been hard to convince me to keep Hank. Basically, I've wanted to keep every Dalmatian we've had at the house. We knew this would happen when we agreed to foster dogs. The bottom line is that if Dawn gets a great home, that's all that matters. I still think that fostering is important. Janet and I don't have a dog now, which make our home the perfect place for a sick dog to recover or a scared, shy dog to develop trust. That doesn't make it any easier to say goodbye to Dawn though. She's just about perfect. We'll see what happens tomorrow. I don't think we would ever let Dawn go to a bad home. Dalmatian Rescue has an excellent record of matching the right people with the right dog.

I'm still worried that the Spring activities at McDonald Observatory are going to get cancelled at the last minute. I was shocked to learn today that SXSW was canceled this year. This is a huge event for the city of Austin. The city will lose millions and millions of dollars. Is the coronavirus really that bad or is this a case of mass hysteria? It's hard to tell at this point. If the observatory is going to cancel their Spring Break activities, I hope they tell me before I start the long drive to West Texas. I'd hate to discover that things have changed when I'm stopping for gas in Amarillo.

I think Spring might have finally arrived. Today was beautiful and I'm starting to see small flowers pop up everywhere. Crow Poison is always one of the first flowers to emerge. I wonder how this plant got its name. There are huge fields of the stuff in the park, but there are still plenty of Crows. Acording to Cherokee legend this plant was used to make a poison that would kill the crows eating their corn. The jury is still out on whether Crow Poison actually kills crows. Don't add any of the flowers to your salad though. The plants are poisonous to humans.

I bought some more socks and underwear today since I was told to bring enough clothes for my entire trip. Probably most volunteers would do this automatically. I like to travel light and would much rather do laundry every few days. I don't think this is an option.

Anne is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3393

I mowed the grass for the first time this year. I had to mow twice because the weeds were overpowering the mower. One pass took care of the top of the weeds and after I lowered the blade, the next pass took care of the rest. I used to spend hours weeding the lawn every Spring until I discovered that these weeds died on their own around April. Mowing the lawn seems harder with each passing year. The wheels aren't powered on this mower and the hills seem steeper than they used to be. One of these days I'm going to give up and hire a lawn service like all the other neighbors.

Dash got another bath today because he pooped on himself during the night. We cleaned him up the best we could around 2 AM, but when daylight arrived it was clear that we could have done better. It's sad that Dash won't eat the chicken, rice, and vegetable dinner we've been fixing for him. He did so well on this diet. Now that he's become an extremely picky eater again, we basically feed him anything that he will eat. The list seems to change every day. These frequent changes in diet are making his stools loose again. We've been through this before. So far, Dash's eating habits have returned to normal after a week or so. I've always thought the vestibular disease caused these episodes, but maybe it's something else. When Dash has an upset stomach, the important thing is to find something he can hold down and keep him taking his pills. So far, there's been no vomiting. It's always harder when there's a problem at both ends.

It's nice that warmer weather has returned. It's not so nice that the bugs came along with it. Every Spring we have a terrible problem with ants. They're everywhere. Old houses are full of cracks and these cracks are superhighways for ants. Mostly we are seeing small sweet ants. They're easy to kill, but they just keep coming. At least this onslaught is seasonal. Ants can be very irritating.

I didn't think that Dash's walks could get any slower, but they have. We just inch along these days. I try to get an early start so Dash won't get overheated. Unfortunately, an early start means nothing to Dash. It almost always feels ten degrees warmer by the time we return home. I don't know what we're going to do this Summer. Today was a beautiful, very mild Spring day and Dash was already too hot. He does best when it's about 40 degrees.

It's time for a haircut again. It seems like I just got a haircut but I guess it's been almost three months. Time seems to go by so quickly now. When I went to see the doctor the other day, it seemed like I'd just been too. It had been six months since my last appointment. Bills only arrive once a month, but it seems like I'm paying bills continuously. When I was busy with work, a month seemed like a very long time. Now that life has slowed down, time goes by much more quickly. Maybe when nothing happens, time doesn't exist. Those people who study black holes ought to look into this.

I've got to look for a birthday card tomorrow. There used to be a nice Hallmark Card store in the neighborhood, but it went out of business several years ago. I don't like the cards you find in grocery stores, but I don't feel like driving all over town either. It's not worth the effort. No wonder people just sent birthday greetings on Facebook.

Livy is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3378

We got some severe weather last night. I'm usually well prepared for bad weather, but this storm caught me by surprise. I knew there was severe weather north of us because I kept seeing pictures of hail damage on Facebook. It looked like we were in the clear on the weather radar, so I went to sleep without taking the usual precautions. Some time after midnight I woke up to the smell of poop and started hearing thunder as I was replacing Dash's puppy pad. When I went outside to clean the harness that I had forgotten to take off before I went to bed, I noticed the wind was picking up. I checked the radar on my phone and we were directly in the patch of a swiftly moving storm front.

Where did this come from? I quickly moved some furniture, put buckets in strategic locations and started the pumps on the roof. The storm didn't last long, but it dumped a tremendous amount of water. Dash never even woke up. I went back to bed, thinking that the next time Dash pooped in the bed, I would go turn the pumps off again. That's exactly how it worked out. There were no water leaks in the morning, so maybe my diligence paid off. I wish I could turn the pumps on and off from inside the house, but the circuit breaker that controls the outlet the pumps are attached to is on the same zone as the furnace. You really don't want to disconnect the furnace just to avoid going outside in the rain.

Dash seemed to have more energy today. We took a surprisingly long walk this morning. We moved very slowly, but I could tell he wanted to keep going. Since the weather was cool and clear and we were in no hurry, Dash didn't overexert himself. He even ate his breakfast when we got home. My own breakfast was pretty late today but I'm getting used to these weird schedules. It really doesn't matter when I eat anymore. It's not like I've got anywhere I need to go.

I still turn on the computer right after breakfast like I've done for decades. There are no appointments  on my calendar though. There are no deadlines to meet. I've even forgotten the passwords to most of the websites I used to manage. I wonder why the computer even matters anymore. I seldom need it. The only thing I did today was defragment a hard drive.

Dash got another bath this afternoon because I didn't do a great job of cleaning him up last night. Sometimes we get lucky and the poop never touches anything but the puppy pad. Things can get messy though if Dash has a dog dream and starts moving his tail around before I wake up and can remove the mess. There are so many variables involved in these night poops that I'm surprised we do as well as we do. When I attempt to remove the mess without it touching anything I sometimes think that this would be good training for being on the bomb squad. If you do everything right, you can be back in bed in three minutes. If you slip, you have to change all the bedding.

I probably need to go up on the roof and remove the remaining water tomorrow. I forgot to pick up some prescriptions at the pharmacy as well. Since my morning routine with Dash seems to last until noon, that's probably enough for one day

Petey is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3375

I dread Dash's periodic bouts with diarrhea. They don't happen often, but when they do, it makes a horrible mess. We'll probably never know why he had diarrhea last night. We had to change what he was eating this week because he has lost interest in the chicken and rice stew Janet has been making for him. Maybe the new food upset his stomach. Maybe he's under more stress since he's having difficulty standing. Maybe he ate something bad in the yard or got a stomach virus. We'll probably never know. We certainly never found out what caused the diarrhea in the past.

Needless to say, there was quite a mess to clean up. I've been doing laundry most of the day. We had to give Dash a bath as well. A wet rag simply didn't remove the stains. Giving Dash a bath is problematic since he can't stand up without assistance. He can't have his harness on either. One of us has to support him so he won't fall while the other one does the cleaning. Everybody gets wet. Dash is clean now. All the bed linen is clean. The smell is finally gone. It's been a long day though and everybody is tired.

I went back to the hotel for breakfast because it is quiet and peaceful. I wasn't even that hungry, but it was nice to take a break from the cleaning brigade. Janet stayed home to watch Dash while I was away and then I stayed home for the rest of the day. The diarrhea seems to be over, but Dash still seems weaker than usual.

I didn't think that Dash would want a walk this evening, but I thought we'd give it a try when he headed for the back gate at the appointed time. We probably should have stayed home. Dash seemed confused and would stop for long periods of time and just stare off into space. I tried to get him to turn around and go home, but he kept moving forward. He is very stubborn. Dash would walk for about twenty yards and then stop for a while. Then he would walk for another twenty yards. I thought I'd have to call Janet to come pick us up in the car for a while, but eventually we made it home.

I was disappointed to see the stock market drop over 450 points today. It was the worst day since January. Things have been going well lately and I always hate to see a big sell off. If you weren't watching the business channels, you would nave never noticed the steep decline. Everyone else was talking about the Mueller Report. Of course nobody actually knows what is in the report yet, but people are already second guessing the results. A lot of folks seem really disappointed that Trump wasn't immediately indicted as a Russian spy. I'll be glad when we move on to other things. I wonder how bad the floods really are in Nebraska. I wonder if the 737 is actually a safe plane. Hey, I flew in one last week. I wonder if Britain will stay in the European Union after all. I wonder about a lot of things, but I don't spend a lot of time thinking about the Russia Probe.

I hope that Dash feels better tomorrow. He had us worried today. I think we all need a good night's sleep. Dash already seems a little perkier than he did this morning. I don't think I've been perky all day.

Brooke is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3361

It's hard to get used to Texas weather. It was eighty degrees this afternoon and I had the air conditioner running in both the house and the car. It was such a warm day that we were even able to give Dash a much needed bath. We used to regularly take the dogs to neighborhood dog washing facilities, but Dash has difficulty standing up in the tubs now. There's not enough room to bathe him at home in the shower, so we have to wait for a warm day and go outside. It takes two of us to clean him and everybody gets wet, but the effort is worth it when he starts to smell like pee.

Dash didn't enjoy his bath, but he sure smelled good afterwards. He did enjoy two leisurely walks on a beautiful, warm day. Maybe Spring isn't quite here yet, but it's definitely on the way. It felt like Spring today.

I went back to the hotel for breakfast, because I felt like relaxing. The dining room is always quiet and sedate and the waiters know me by name. Even the chef looked up and smiled when I arrived this morning. I'd eat at this place all the time if the menu wasn't so small. Everything is delicious, but you'd think they could come up with more than four items. The trendy restaurant seems to have hundreds of items on their breakfast menu.

I knew when we gave Dash a bath that there would be other cleaning as well. A clean dog doesn't last long in a dirty house. Both of us spent most of the afternoon vacuuming, dusting, and doing laundry. All this activity didn't stop Dash from peeing on the living room floor, but the house is reasonably clean now. I expect that this will last about two days.

I finally got the telephone bill. In an effort to pressure me to go paperless, they keep sending me my bill later and later. If I don't pay it on the same day it arrives, I'll get hit with a late fee. A week before this bill arrives, I get an e-mail saying that my paper bill will arrive in seven to ten days and asking me if I wouldn't prefer to just pay it electronically. So far, I have resisted. What's so bad about writing checks and taking bills to the post office? I like the leisurely pace of paper. The electronic world seems hectic and rude.

Even the airlines have done away with paper. I was wondering when I was going to get my boarding pass for my trip to Houston and then I got a message saying that I should download the airline's app and an electronic boarding pass would show up on my phone. It's a brave new world we live in. I find it ironic that everybody is worried about hacking, but still feel compelled to live their lives online. People didn't tend to steal your information when you put it in a letter.

I was hoping for a good night's sleep last night, but Dash had other ideas. He pooped in the bed three times. Everything landed squarely on the puppy pads and it only took me a minute or two to roll the pad up, seal it in a plastic bag, and take it outside. I've even gotten better at quickly getting back to sleep after these episodes, but it's not the same as an uninterrupted night of sleep. Eight hours of continuous sleep is still the holy grail. Oh, well. Three blocks of two hour sleep, followed by a one hour nap are still better than nothing.

Bacardi is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3326

An incontinent dog who can barely walk with explosive diarrhea is not a good combination. Needless to say, we didn't get a lot of sleep last night. We still don't know what caused the diarrhea, but Dash was very sick. Every hour on the hour he had to go and he usually didn't even come close to making it outside. It had to be our messiest night on record. We debated about taking Dash to the emergency vet, but we knew we would just sit in the lobby in the middle of the night for two hours and they wouldn't really do anything. This morning I got some Metronidazole from Dash's regular vet and hopefully it will help stabilize him. This all happened pretty suddenly. Dash was acting normally yesterday. He's eating the same food he always eats and I don't think he got into anything. You never know with a dog though. It only takes a few seconds for them to eat something bad.

Pooping in the bed is one thing, but diarrhea in the bed takes matters to a whole new level. I hope the Metronidazole is starting to work, because I'd really like to get some sleep tonight. There are so many things wrong with Dash that's it's hard to tell if this diarrhea is the result of an upset stomach or if it is connected to some other ongoing problem. Our instructions from both his vets were to watch him carefully and report anything alarming. Just the smell was pretty alarming last night.

Other than spewing runny poop all over the place, Dash seemed relatively normal this morning. We took a short walk, got him to take his morning meds, and then he was ready for a long nap. Janet stayed home to keep an eye on things while I went out to breakfast and then I stayed home for the rest of the day. Dash seems calmer now but he still isn't eating much.

I was planning to go back to the hotel this morning, but it took so long to clean Dash up and tidy the explosive mess in the house that the hotel kitchen was already closed by the time I was ready to leave. I went back to the trendy new restaurant I discovered and had Shrimp Grits again. This place is really popular but it seems kind of strange to me. The waiters are super friendly, but they dress like homeless people. I'm old school. I guess I like the starched white coats the hotel waiters wear. This place is only open for breakfast but it has a full bar and serves alcohol. I saw several people having drinks with their breakfast. Maybe I'm old fashioned, but coffee is fine with me. There were several couples with young children this morning. These children were crying and acting terrible until their Mom took an iPad out of her purse and stuck it in front of the kid's face. The kids calmed down immediately. I don't think this will end well. We've got an entire generation who are already addicted to sitting in front of a screen before they turn three. The food was delicious this morning, but I think I'll go back to the hotel next week. It feels more like home. The trendy restaurant seems like something you might see in Bladerunner.

It's been a long day. Luckily it was warm enough that we could take Dash outside and give him a bath. He definitely needed one. I've done a ton of laundry today, but everything is finally clean again. All bets are off for tonight. If we're lucky, Dash will sleep calmly. We could easily have a repeat of last night though. I put another case of puppy training pads on the shopping list for tomorrow. We're going to need them.

Myles is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3267

Brrr. It was really cold this morning. I couldn't clean off a poop stained dog blanket right away because the garden hose was frozen. Dash didn't want to wear his sweater this morning either. He's usually pretty patient when we suit him up for his walks, but I could tell that he was letting us know that enough is enough. I don't know how Northerners put up with this stuff. Everything takes longer in freezing weather.

Today was much messier than yesterday. Maybe I just got lucky yesterday. While I was cleaning up poop on the porch, I didn't notice that Dash was near the back door and apparently needed to poop again. In warmer weather I would have just left the door open while I was working so he could come and go freely, but as I said, it was very cold this morning. Dash pooped on the floor next to the door while he was waiting for me, slipped and fell in the mess, and smeared it all over himself as he was struggling to get up again. I had to give him a bath to clean him up. Dash wasn't happy about that either. It took a while before the floor, the dog, and several assorted blankets were all clean again. This wasn't really how I wanted to spend my morning but I didn't have anything better to do anyway. By the time I finished breakfast it was almost time for a meeting I had scheduled at the bank.

The bank recently upgraded my account in an attempt to sell me more stuff. I like having an account with no fees, but I've never been interested in buying securities from a bank. To be polite I said I would listen to their proposals, but after today's meeting they probably wish they'd never given me the special account. To me a bank is a place to have a checking account. It's not a place to buy and sell stocks. Jeez. I've got a stock broker for that kind of stuff. After a long conversation I think they finally realized that I know more about the market than they do. I get to keep my no fee account though. That's all I wanted in the first place.

Today wasn't a good day to talk about the market anyway. Yesterday everybody was optimistic about a trade deal with China and the market went up. Today everybody was pessimistic about Trump's angry tweets about tariffs and the market went down. I hate this volatility. It would probably be safer to just bet on the NFL. Of course, I never would have guessed that the Cowboys would have beat the Saints last week, so a safe bet on anything probably doesn't exist these days.

I've finally gotten a few bids on my lots in the online auction. Maybe I should have put a reserve on my lots, because the bids are quite low. There's one day left before the auction concludes. Maybe there'll be some activity in the final hours. That's usually the way it works on eBay. People often don't start to bid on eBay items until the final seconds. We'll see how the auction goes. This online auction was an experiment anyway. I still think I like live auctions better.

What was I thinking? I had leftover pizza for dinner tonight and I've already got heartburn. I seem incapable of throwing away leftover food. This pizza was a leftover from dinner on Friday and I was determined to eat it before it went bad. There are still leftover sandwiches from last weekend's photo shoots too. Hey, they were good sandwiches from Panera Bread, so I'm sure I'll eat them as well. I think my stomach is in for a rough ride this week.

I'm glad now that I didn't apply to attend the Space X resupply mission launch that was supposed to take place today. The launch got postponed because some mouse food in the cargo had gotten moldy and needed to be replaced. What are they sending mice to the space station for anyway? At any rate, if I had gone to the launch, I would have had to reschedule my return flight and extend my hotel stay for at least another day. Watching a launch is complicated and it can get expensive quickly. Maybe I need to rethink my retirement hobbies. I really can't leave Dash right now anyway. I've got poop to clean up.

Camp is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3175 - Labor Day

There wasn't a lot of labor taking place at our house today. It rained all day. Sometimes the best thing to do on a day like this is nothing at all. Dash did get his walks, thanks to the weather radar app on my phone. I don't know how I used to survive without weather radar. Even on wet, dreary days like this, there are usually opportunities to walk your dog. It's all a matter of timing.

Janet went to the gym, but I didn't feel like doing much of anything. I ended up watching a Strange Inheritance marathon for quite a while. It's fascinating how ordinary people often end up with extraordinary things. One of today's episodes was about a family who had a Rembrandt hanging on their dining room wall for decades and nobody knew what it was. When the parents died, the kids took a lot of their stuff to an auction house that specialized in estate auctions. Even the auctioneer didn't realize that he had an old master painting. Several weeks before the auction they put everything on their website where the painting attracted the attention of three European art dealers. The bidding started at $500 and quickly went to six figures. When the bidding was over, the lost Rembrandt sold for over a million dollars. It turned out to be genuine too. There were other episodes about a family who inherited a zoo and then there was the guy who inherited a huge collection of army tanks. There is nothing strange or valuable in my family tree. I'm pretty sure of that.

Dash got wet on one of today's walks, so we decided it was the perfect opportunity to give him a bath. Bathing a dog who can barely stand up is not an easy task. I think I got more water on me today than Dash did. Dash definitely needed a bath. He pees on his feet a lot these days. After we washed and dried him off, he definitely looked and smelled cleaner. Next on the list is to get his nails trimmed again. That's going to be a lot harder than a bath.

Today's heavy rains mean that the grass is going to start growing again. I was kind of hoping that I was done for the year. I should have known better. The weather is unpredictable here. It's not uncommon to still be mowing grass in December. I'm going to have to go up on the roof again too. I don't think I'll do this tomorrow. According to the forecast, it's supposed to keep raining.

If tomorrow is as wet as today, I'm going to have to come up with a plan. I'm not sure if I can tolerate doing absolutely nothing for two days in a row. It's a good thing that I have a high tolerance for lethargy, because I think this might be a very slow week.

We'll see what happens. I could wake up to sunshine tomorrow. I just hope that whenever I do wake up that I've been sleeping for a long time. Let's try for six hours. Waking up every two hours to take Dash outside is wearing me out.

Dalmatian of the Day

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Day 2568 - Christmas

It's been a very quiet Christmas. Dot and Dash were both sleeping soundly when I woke up, so I just stayed in bed until they started to stir. I need all the sleep I can get. I get up several times each night to see if Dot had pooped in her sleep, and then I change the Puppy Training Pads I've strategically placed under her if necessary. This usually works pretty well, unless she wakes up when I'm cleaning her up. It's amazing how soundly a dog can sleep. I wish I got that kind of sleep. I need it. My cold is finally getting better, but when Janet called to wish me a Merry Christmas this afternoon, I immediately started coughing again. I guess it was because I haven't used my voice in several days.

Yesterday Dot was eager to walk as soon as she'd finished her breakfast. Today, she wanted to go right back to bed as soon as I'd taken her outside to pee. Dash wasn't in a hurry to go anywhere either, so I ate my own breakfast. I thought about fixing myself something a bit more festive than my usual fruit smoothie, but I knew that bananas would probably get the dogs moving again. I was right. As soon as the dogs had finished sharing a banana with me while I drank my smoothie, Dash was ready to walk. It was still a grey, dreary day, but it wasn't nearly as foggy as yesterday. I probably would have forgotten it was Christmas if it weren't for two strangers who wished Dash and I a Merry Christmas as we passed them on our morning walk.

Dot was finally ready to go around 10 AM. It takes longer to walk Dot to the end of the street now than it takes to walk Dash a mile and a half. I wonder how long we can keep doing this? Each month Dot gets a little slower, but I can tell that she still enjoys the short walks. I wish the entrance to the park was a little closer. After all these years, Dot still loves to smell things in the park. There are so many animals that call the park home, that I'm sure this area is quite a sensory experience for a dog.

I've got to figure out how to give Dot a good bath. She's starting to smell like pee, despite my best efforts to clean her up. Janet thinks once of those mobile grooming trucks that come to your house might be a good idea, but I'm not sure if these people have much experience dealing with an injured dog. Dot's physical therapy vet could give her a bath, but it's such a long drive. Dot would probably poop in the car and get herself dirty again before we even got home.

I can remember when I sent out tons of Christmas Cards each year. They went to clients, co-workers, friends, and just about anybody I had an address for. It wasn't always the holiday spirit. Like many designers, I thought Christmas cards were a cool way to show people how creative you were. It was fun to print up something new and original every year. Times have certainly changed. I sent out exactly zero cards this year. I didn't receive many either. I still put a tree up, but I'm starting to wonder why.

I'll tape the Dr. Who Christmas Special this evening to watch later. This is Dot's restless time of the day and I've got a feeling that I won't be watching much television. All in all, it's been a calm and relatively peaceful day. It just doesn't feel like Christmas.

Dot is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2280

We got off to a late start this morning. I woke up at 7 AM, which meant it was really 8 AM because of Daylight Savings Time. Dot couldn't wait that long. She needed to go outside immediately and before I could get her harness attached, she peed on the living room rug. It wasn't her fault. It was her old, slow companion. I hate it when she has an accident just because I wasn't alert enough to see the signs. She does try to tell me, but it doesn't always work in the morning when I am sleep deprived and haven't had my coffee yet. At any rate, it wasn't a big deal. I sprayed the rug with Nature's Miracle, took it outside and hosed it down and left it to dry in the sun. The rug will live to serve another day.

Dash got a bath today while I went to the gym. I don't think either of us really enjoyed the experience. Janet always asks if I had a good workout and I don't even know what that means. She really enjoys going to the gym, but to me it's just a way to moderately reduce the chance of having a heart attack. It's kind of like taking statins and blood pressure medication, except that I sweat more. It would be nice if I enjoyed these workouts, but that would be out of character for me. It's rare that I enjoy anything these days.

I definitely didn't enjoy going up on the roof for the third time this week, but maybe the third time is the charm. According to the weather forecast, we are supposed to have clear skies and warm weather for the next four or five days. I probably should get the landscapers out to refurbish the back yard before the rainy season is completely finished. Last year, we planted the St. Augustine grass in March and the Spring rains really helped it get established before the Summer dry spell and underground grubs killed it again. It wouldn't hurt to call a tree trimmer as well. Now, that the Oak and Elm trees are starting to bud, I'm starting to see more than a few dead limbs.

The park was really crowded today. It's always this way on warm, early Spring days. Dash can smell food from quite a distance, so he's always trying to crash someone's picnic. It's a shame that there are so many loose dogs in the park on weekends. When Dash sees a loose dog, he immediately turns around and wants to go home again. Our afternoon walk got cut short this way today. It's been many years since Dash was attacked, but he has never forgotten. A single loose dog can ruin his day.

I bet we'll be walking the dogs in the dark again tomorrow. I looked outside around 6 AM this morning and it was still quite dark outside. I should of gotten up then and taken Dot out to pee, but I didn't. No worries about repeating this mistake on a weekday. The clocks have been re-set and we'll all be up at the crack of dawn whether I like it or not.

Wyatt is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2210

It was nice to see the sun again. It seemed like I got a lot more done today. Truthfully, I didn't accomplish much of anything, but clear skies and sunlight streaming through the windows can magnify the smallest accomplishments. When we walked the dogs this morning, everybody cast a shadow. This was much better than yesterday. Dot seemed to have a lot of energy today and there were no accidents in the house. During the holidays, we've all been sleeping longer. I'd like to think that this is why Dot is back on schedule, but it's probably just blind luck.

I made it back to the gym this afternoon and had a surprisingly good workout. It always amazes me that whenever I happen to arrive at the gym, some of the same people are always there. Some of them appear to live at the gym. This seems a bit excessive to me. I know I should go several times a week, but every day seems a bit much. I could never do that, even if I did have the time.

I probably get more exercise than a lot of these gym rats anyway. The two dogs walks we took today and the hour I spent wrestling with the Dyson vacuum cleaner probably burned off more calories than my afternoon excursion to the gym. Sunday's are always busy. It's the last chance we have to get things straightened up before another week of chaos arrives. Since it was such a nice day, Dash even got a bath. You never realize how dirty your dogs are until you give them a bath. Dash looks several shades whiter and his coat is soft and smooth again. I'm sure that Dash would just as soon have stayed dirty, but maybe he won't itch so much now. Hopefully, spending time in the underwater treadmill each week keeps Dot clean. It's too hard to bathe her at one of those self-wash dog places now, since she has trouble standing on her own.

I thought this evening might be a good time to find Mercury just after Sunset, but there must have been too much haze on the horizon. All I saw was a nice sunset. Maybe I missed my opportunity. January 1st was supposed to be the best day to look for this illusive planet, but it was cloudy that day. As I stood on a small hill scanning the horizon with my binoculars, I did notice that the park completely changes its personality after dark. I heard drums and chanting off to the South of me and down by the water I saw some people setting off fireworks. I've started seeing coyotes in the evening again too. Several days ago, Dash and I had to curtail our evening walk when we came face-to-face with a coyote around dusk. Coyotes will usually leave you alone, but I didn't want to take any chances.

Janet is taking a vacation day tomorrow, so we'll all get another chance to sleep in a bit longer. Left to my own devices, I would never get up until the sun was streaming in the bedroom window. Getting up early has been good for me though. We walk before dawn because it is the only time when Janet and I are both available, but it is also one of the prettiest times of the day. Most of our walks are around 45 minutes and that is almost exactly the amount of time it takes the sky to go from starlight to sunlight in the morning. Sunrise can be quite beautiful. Hopefully, tomorrow will be another day exactly like today.

Petey is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2159

Life is returning to normal. Water is flowing. The large tunnel under the house has been filled in. The dogs have quit barking. The only reminder of our plumbing problems is a big blue dehumidifier humming away in our living room. Since I knew the tunneling crew would be arriving early this morning, I masked off the windows again so Dot wouldn't see strangers in her yard and picked up some take-out breakfast tacos instead of going out for breakfast like I normally do on Fridays. Apparently, it is much easier to fill in a hole than to dig one. The tunnel took about fourteen hours to dig, but only about four hours to backfill. By mid-afternoon, the crew had packed up their tools and left.

I turned the furnace on this morning for the first time since the leak started and the humidity in the house didn't rise appreciably. I no longer have to huddle around the little ceramic heater while I work. It seems decadently luxurious to have a warm, moisture free house with working toilets and a washing machine that can handle as many blankets as Dot is able to soil. I think we're back in business.

Dash got a bath today in preparation for a big animal rescue event tomorrow that he will be attending. I took a bath today to give the shower stall I've been attempting to repair one more day to cure and dry. That was a mistake. I'm definitely not a tub person. I'm going back to the shower tomorrow whether my grout work is ready or not. How can you wash your hair in the tub? I think it's impossible.

It is so sad to watch what is happening in Paris tonight. I'm glad that Janet and I had an opportunity to spend time in that wonderful city when life was sane and the city was peaceful. I've spent a lot of time in Europe and used to work there frequently. I don't know if I'd ever feel comfortable traveling there again. Every time I see wave after wave of refugees descending on European countries from the Middle East, I think that this isn't going to end well. I'm convinced that hidden in the midst of these refugees are many more of the same terrorists that are currently laying seige to Paris. Western nations need to start getting serious about closing their borders, or this is only going to get worse. I don't understand what our military planners are thinking. Bombing these people just makes them mad. What we really need to do is totally isolate them. If they want to continue living in the middle ages, let them do it in their own countries.

I got my November invoices out today. Hmm. This isn't going to pay the plumbing bill. I've got to come up with a new source of income, or I'm going to be fretting about money for the rest of my life. I've gotten good enough at designing responsive websites that I could probably get hired by one of the big interactive design shops. Then I would have to go to work though. That's not going to happen. I don't think I'm even capable of leaving the dogs anymore. We have bonded. I'm not a team player anymore either. Actually, I was never a team play, but I was pretty good at faking it. When you get older, faking it loses its appeal. Poor, uncompromising, and a little frustrated. Maybe that's my destiny.

Puppies are today's Dalmatian of the Day

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