Day 1701

I may become a morning person yet. The hour before sunrise when I've been walking Dash lately is easily the nicest part of the day. The air is still crisp and cool and there is usually a nice breeze. At this time of day it's hard to believe that just a few hours later the temperature will quickly rise by twenty degrees and we will all retreat indoors to spend the rest of the day hoping the air conditioner doesn't break.

Dot's incontinence hasn't significantly improved, but everything else has. She is taking longer walks and seems eager to return to her old routines. She's back on her regular diet and has already gained a pound. This is all good. When we went to our water therapy session today, Dot was able to stay on the underwater treadmill for two minutes longer than our previous visit. I'm a patient person and I'm happy with her slow incremental progress. I sure wish we had a better solution for her incontinence. It's uncomfortable for her and equally tiring for us. Dots vets say they are comfortable with using estrogen supplements like Incurin to alleviate incontinence, but Janet and I are still nervous about using hormones. Once we go down this road, Dot may be on the drugs for the rest of her life. We'll give her some more time to see if she can resolve this problem herself.

As soon as Dot and I returned from her physical therapy session, I turned around and took Dash to a different vet. It was time to get his anal glands expressed again. It's always something with these two. Dot and Dash have both made great progress against some very long odds. I'd be the first to admit though that, for the moment, we have two very high maintenance dogs.

I finished and launched the last of my new website projects today. These projects have kept me very busy during the summer, but I'm in the process of wrapping everything up and don't see anything new on the horizon. Things might be a little slow for the rest of the month. As my client base continues to age and retire, I don't really know where the new clients will come from. Maybe this is it. I've done my best to stay current and remain relevant, but I don't really think I'm a big hit with the millennials. Many of them have a grandfather younger than me.

This day has gone quickly. It's about time to get the bed waterproofed for the night again. Who knows what tomorrow will bring my way. I've got some animal rescue websites to update and that's about it. What would be really nice is a night of uninterrupted sleep.

Ellis is today's Dalmatian of the Day

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Day 1373

I don't seem to be cut from the same cloth as other business people. I don't know what to talk about at these new Wednesday morning networking meetings. The younger folks are talking about their bicycles and upcoming 10K races while the older folks are talking about vacation homes in Hawaii. Everyone is focused like a laser about making new contacts. Jeez, I forgot to even bring any business cards with me this week. I did join a conversation with several guys who wanted to drive a Tesla. Hey, I'd kind of like to drive a Tesla too. Today's presentation was about leveraging the power of your LinkedIn contacts. Hmm! I don't even like LinkedIn and seldom spend any time on the site. The LinkedIn fans didn't understand why I preferred Twitter and Google+. We could probably learn something from each other. I have way more social media contacts than these guys, but they seem to actually be making money from theirs. Money is usually just the accidental result of doing something else for me. I've never been focused on making money.

Like I said earlier, I could learn a lot from these early morning meetings. When it comes my turn to make the morning presentation, I'll have to resist the urge to present topics like "How to make just enough to get by while dressed in your underwear," or "brainstorming while walking Dalmatians." I dread the day I have to bring a guest. I don't know anyone who would get up this early. Well, that's not entirely true. Janet gets up this early every day, but she would never go to these type of meetings.

Dot had a much lighter workout today, since she stumbled and fell on her walk yesterday. Her physical therapy session started with acupuncture to relax some tenseness in her back and then progressed to a slow, almost relaxed, workout in the water therapy tank to stretch her leg muscles. So far, I think Dot has spent more time at the gym this week than I have.

My chronic indecision might not be good for buying a car, but it sometimes works to my advantage in the stock market. My broker recommended that I sell several stocks yesterday and I told him I'd think about it. Today, the market had a great day and the stocks that the broker recommended selling went up like a rocket. Three more days like today could pay for my new car. It will never happen though. Probably the market will reverse direction tomorrow and all of today's gains will evaporate.

I have an appointment with my hepotologist tomorrow. I hope my liver is still functioning as it should. I'm eating all the right foods now. I'm exercising regularly. I'm keeping my weight and blood pressure under control. I don't know what else I can do. I wonder if the new treatment they've been promising me has finally been approved by the FDA?  This new treatment has been delayed even longer than Land Rover's new Defender 90 introduction.

Princess is today's Dalmatian of the Day

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Day 923

I wish I were more of a morning person. Summer has arrived with a vengeance and the only decent time to be out and about is right after sunrise. I try to get the dogs out on their morning walk by 7:30 AM, but since the sun rises more than an hour earlier these days, I'm really not doing all that well. The temperature rises amazingly quickly. If it's 85 degrees at sunrise, it will be 105 degrees by lunch. The trouble is that the dogs aren't early risers either. By the time we all drag ourselves out of bed, it's usually already too late.

No matter what the temperature is, mornings are delightful compared to afternoons. Afternoons are beastly. Dot is getting older now, and she can't take the heat. In the afternoon, we usually just walk until both dogs have done their business and then beat a hasty retreat to the air conditioned confines of the house.

Now that I've had time to get used to the quirks and peculiarities of U-verse service, I've come to the conclusion that it's really no better than cable. The picture freezes on the TV periodically. I'll lose my connection to the Internet for short periods almost every day. Occasionally, even the phones go out.  Usually, these outages are brief and service returns while I'm still  sitting on hold, waiting to talk to tech support. Nevertheless, the whole situation is irritating. Cable and U-verse certainly cost enough to warrant good service. Maybe the only solution is to switch back and forth between cable and U-verse once a year to keep them from taking me for granted.

My broker called the other day and suggested that I buy Microsoft. Microsoft? Keep in mind that this was the same guy who convinced me to sell Apple just before it went up another 200 points. I told the broker that selling Apple and buying Microsoft just seemed all wrong and I wasn't having any part of it. I've been somewhat gratified to see Microsoft continue to slide in the days following this errant recommendation, but I'm a bit irritated by this as well.  Just like with Time Warner Cable and U-verse, it would be nice to get a little more for my money. At the prices most financial advisors charge, they should be right 90% of the time, instead of just 65% of the time.

I called Land Rover today to see if my repairs are finished yet. Nope. They're still working on the Defender. While I was talking to my service representative, I remembered that I had forgotten to tell him about the problems I was having shifting from first to second gear. I asked him if repairing or replacing the gear synchronizers in the transmission was expensive. What do you think? Of course it is.

Oh, and I got a guitar today.  More on that later.

Shiner is today's Dalmatian of the Day

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