Day 3693

We had a lot of fun with the Dalmatians today. They know us now and are all eager for their play time. Each of them wants to be first. The big news this week is that Sock has gone to a home. The rescue program has taken in a large number of dogs recently and currently only five of them are still waiting for homes. It's really encouraging to see these dogs find their forever homes so quickly. The dogs we visited with today are all delightful. I can't imagine that they will be here long.

So much for working on the roof today. It rained again. This came as a total surprise to me. There was blue sky when I woke up, but by the time we arrived at the Dalmatian kennel, it was raining again. I sure wish the roof was dry yesterday. Now I don't have any idea how long I'll need to wait for dry conditions again. I know in the short tern, the weather is only expected to get worse. There is still a chance of snow or sleet on Wednesday.

Today was full of surprises. I got a long awaited letter from Sky and Telescope and they are apparently still interested in an article about my visit to McDonald Observatory this Spring. It has been so long since I've heard anything from the magazine that I'd almost given up on them. I just assumed that they weren't interested anymore. Maybe I just need to learn to be patient.

Due to the many changes in the Solar Orbiter launch schedule the social media mavens have lost access to the launch pad on the day the rocket is rolled out. This apparently hasn't deterred some in our group. I found out today that someone is going to charter a boat to get close to the pad by water. This sounds interesting. It would be even more interesting if I didn't tend to get seasick. I'm still on the waitlist for the press bus, but so far my chances of getting on the bus don't look promising. I'd really like some good pictures. I may throw caution to the wind and join the group on the boat. We'll see. I keep waiting for an e-mail saying that NASA has found one more seat on the bus.

Do I need to go buy a box of surgical masks? I don't think so, but I'd hate to be the only person on the plane not wearing a mask. Social pressure can be quite powerful at times. Southwest doesn't even fly internationally so there shouldn't be a problem. I lived through the ebola scare and there were ebola patients at a hospital only a few miles away from me. My gut feeling is that there is a much higher risk from the ordinary flu here in Dallas than from the coronavirus. That could change overnight though. All it would take is a single case of the coronavirus and the whole town would be in a panic.

I'm so hooked on filling all three activity rings on my Apple Watch and getting at least 10,000 steps on the Fitbit that I went on a walk today even though it was raining. Hey, it wasn't raining that hard. Weird, I never would have done this before I started wearing the Fitbit tracker. I guess being a slave to an activity tracker isn't inherently a bad thing. I do feel like I'm in better shape than I was last year.

I got a little good news today. Maybe I'll get some more tomorrow. I don't need a lot of encouragement, but it's always nice to know you're headed in the right direction.

Casey is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 3570

We went to the State Fair today. I haven't been to the fair in years, but it hasn't changed much. The main difference I noticed was that everything was much more expensive. We did a lot of the same things we used to do. We visited the auto show building and looked at new cars. We went to the building where they usually have pig races and watched the Amazing Trick Dogs. The dogs were basically well trained agility dogs and it was fun to watch them catch frisbees, jump over hurdles, and run through an agility course. I wasn't very interested in sitting in a vibrating chair or eating a deep fried pickle, but a talented dog can always make me smile.

One of the weirdest things we saw today was a booth called Shrink Yourself. These people would make a full body scan of an individual or even a small group and then turn it into an amazingly realistic small doll that was 3-D printed. The whole process was fairly expensive and it took three weeks to get the finished doll, but people were lining up to be scanned.

As we were walking around today we found ourselves walking on a brick walkway paved with memorial bricks. This immediately brought back memories. We used to take Spot, our first Dalmatian, to Fair Park every Sunday. After he died we bought him a brick with his name on it to be placed on this walkway because Fair Park was one of his favorite places to walk. We spent a long time this afternoon trying to find Spot's brick and eventually found it. I had forgotten that we had also bought a brick for ourselves to be placed on either side of Spot. There we were thirty years later, John, Spot, and Janet, memorialized on some old bricks right in the middle of the State Fair.

Instead of having fried food on a stick, we had dinner at the Old Mill. This restaurant, located on the fairgrounds, has been around as long as I can remember. This place was built as a flour mill for the 1936 Texas Centennial Exposition and hasn't changed much since. The menu is exactly the same as it was when we used to bring Spot here to share fried chicken with us at an outdoor table on Sunday afternoons. Some of the old waiters seemed to be the same as well. The place that used to give Spot a free burger every year still exists at the fairground too, but none of the people we knew are still around. I imagine that many of them have died. It's been a long time.

I heard from Sky and Telescope today. They rejected my article. I was disappointed, but this was actually the most positive rejection letter I've ever received. The editor told me that everyone at the magazine loved my article. They thought the article was interesting, well written, and encouraged me to submit to the magazine again. The magazine would have loved to publish the article if I had actually seen anything through one of the telescopes. This is understandable. Sky and Telescope is an astronomy magazine, not a travel magazine. The editor liked my writing style and encouraged me to pitch other articles to the magazine in the future. I got the impression that they would like me to become a contributor. I just can't write about rainy nights at an observatory. What I need now is a plan to guarantee clear skies the next time I visit the Davis Mountains.

I walked over 25,000 steps today. This is a new Fitbit record. I'm a little tired, but I enjoyed our time at the fair. It was nice to rekindle some old memories of Spot. Sometimes it feels like my life has always been about Dalmatians. It probably always will be.

Hobbs is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day