Day 3631

I finally got the Christmas tree up today. It doesn't seem possible that the year is almost over again. Where did the time go? Jeez. I still have things on my to-do list from last Summer. I try to keep up, but it's getting harder and harder every year. One of these years the tree is just going to seem like too much trouble. I've already stopped buying a pumpkin for the front porch on Halloween.

All the dog things we brought home for Ginny went back to the storage warehouse this morning. I returned with a big load of photo gear for the upcoming Santa Paws events. I doubt that I retrieved everything I need, but it's a start. We've been doing these holiday photos for so long that we've almost got it down to a science. I still forget things though. At least I've got a few more days to remember. I felt optimistic and didn't bring home any of the old muslin backdrops. I still think the new backdrop we ordered will arrive on time.

It took a lot longer than I thought to add the new petcam we bought to the network. The price was right on this thing, but the instructions were almost nonexistent. I knew the camera would probably work because when I looked at the comments on the website, people either loved it or hated it. Usually when you get such a polarized response it just means the device is difficult to install. I almost gave up, but eventually I did something right and the little camera sprang into life. Hopefully the petcam will keep working until the next time we foster a dog.

The hotel I booked in New Orleans called me this morning and told me that my credit card had been declined. WTF? I know this card is good. After sitting on hold for what seemed like forever, the issue finally got resolved. Apparently, the credit card company didn't think someone like me would really travel to New Orleans and just declined the charges in an abundance of caution. Why didn't they ask me first? Janet says I make my life difficult by still using the land line for contact information. She says credit card companies will send you a text that you can confirm on the spot if they have questions about a purchase. Who knew? I think they called the land line I had on file and nomorobo thought they were a telemarketer and kept hanging up on them. Life is way too complicated these days. The technology we use to make our lives easier often ends up making it harder instead.

By the end of the day, I felt like I finally had my ducks in a row. I added apps for the airline, the hotel, and the rental car company to my phone. I sorted through the photo gear to see if I had forgotten anything. I showed Janet how to use the new petcam, and I made sure the Christmas tree lights worked. Not bad for a Tuesday.

By the time I finished my walk, it was dark again. It really doesn't take much to completely use up my day. I used to accomplish so much more in a day, but for the life of me I don't know how. Even though I didn't accomplish much, I felt really busy today.

Spot is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2593

My new scale that measures everything arrived today. I'm always intrigued by the latest technology; especially stuff I've never heard of before. This WiFi scale not only tracks your weight, it also analyzes your body composition, measures your body mass index, determines your resting heart rate and pulse wave velocity; plus it gives you a daily weather report. At first I couldn't figure out how this little flat box could calculate your bone and muscle mass, the percentage of water in your body, and half a dozen other things just by standing on it for a few seconds. I did a little research and discovered bioelectrical impedance technology. Basically, sensors in the scale measure the electrical impedance, or opposition to the flow of an electric current passing through through body tissues in your feet. The results are used to provide an estimate of body composition. Is impedance analysis accurate? Who knows. It sure is cool though. I bet my doctor will hate it when I start showing him results on my phone that contradict all his fancy machines. I'm convinced that this is the future of medicine. It's already getting harder to see a doctor in some parts of the country. As medical costs continue to spiral out of control and options for care diminish, a lot of people will just start doing the simple things themselves. I can easily imagine a future where my phone will give me a warning if my vital signs get out of whack and then make me an appointment to see a robot doctor.

It took me longer than I thought to pair the scale with my WiFi network. It always takes me a long time to configure network devices. WiFi gizmos that only include a superficial two page "quick start" manual are the worst. There's always something weird that prevents stuff from playing nice with my router. I eventually got everything working properly and was amazed to see that all my vital signs were automatically imported into the Apple Health app on my phone. The cloud knows everything apparently. I'm not sure that I want Amazon Alexa listening to all my conversations, but it's actually quite convenient that Facebook knows everybody's birthday. I guess it's OK that my new scale knows my body composition. I don't use Siri much on my phone, but that's just because I don't talk very much. If I did have one of those Amazon Alexa personal assistants, all it would hear is me swearing occasionally when I accidentally stepped in dog poop.

The weather was really nice today. I wonder how long this will last? Every Winter, people in Texas go around telling each other how weird the weather is, but the truth is that rapid changes have always been normal. What would really be weird is if it remained cold all winter like it does up North. Today was perfect for walking dogs. I didn't need a heavy coat, but it was still cool enough so that Dot didn't get overheated.

I had to pick up some more phenobarbital for Dash this afternoon, as well as order more printer ink. It seems like I refilled both these things only a few weeks ago. It's too bad I can't pick up printer ink at the pharmacy. My prescriptions and my printer ink seem to run out at about the same time.

I'm glad it's Friday tomorrow. I can't decide whether I want an egg sandwich or pancakes for breakfast. I should probably weigh myself before I leave the house though. I always eat a big breakfast. If it stays clear this weekend, I'm going to look for Mercury again. It should be easy to find in the pre-dawn sky for the next several weeks. I'm not really worried about the inauguration. I've got astronomy, a plethora of personal tracking devices, and a tasty breakfast to amuse me.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2422

Today was a lost cause. It was hot. I couldn't get organized. And despite some valiant efforts, I didn't really accomplish anything. Since work was slow, I though I'd try to figure out why the pet cam wasn't working. The camera worked perfectly last month and I haven't changed any settings. Why wasn't it working now? The elephant in the room was the new router that AT&T sent me recently. It made perfect sense that this would be the source of the problem if it weren't for the fact that everything in the office except the pet cam connected to the Internet just fine. Google wasn't any help at all, since this particular camera isn't very popular. I couldn't find many people who were having the same problem. I suspected that the default settings on the new router are blocking the pet cam, but I also suspected that I could easily turn the router into a brick if I messed around with the configuration without knowing what I was doing. If I were more knowledgeable about such matters, I would enable port forwarding on both the router and the pet cam and force the two devices to connect. I did discover that I could use a proxy server to bypass the router entirely, but since I don't have a proxy server there was no way I could test this. In the end, I wasted three hours experimenting with different settings, and the pet cam still doesn't work.

I was going to wash the car today, but when I took the dogs outside after lunch, I quickly decided that this was a bad idea. It was way too hot. I guess it was too hot for the roofers too, because they didn't show up. When I tried to find out what was going on, I was told that my roof was still going to get fixed this week. We'll see. It seems like it's either too hot for the roofers to work, or it is too wet. Apparently this is a three bears story where the porridge has to be just right.

When I tried to make an appointment to take Dot to the vet, I discovered that I've lost my Wednesday time slot to someone else. I couldn't get in this week at all and had to settle for next week. That was fine with me, since I'm not in that much of a hurry to restart Dot's physical therapy anyway. I would like to know whether the water therapy will still benefit her and try to resume her acupuncture treatments, so I guess we'll wait until next week.

I hope I'm more organized tomorrow. Maybe I ought to tackle a project I know I can finish. The dogs certainly aren't helping me become more productive. They spent most of the day sleeping. I was real tempted to join them.

Snoopy is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2356

It was raining so hard this morning that I quickly abandoned my plans to go out for breakfast. It just wasn't worth it. The dogs are always restless when it rains and even more restless when they can't go on their morning walk. They will stand at the back door and just look at you like they expect you to stop the rain. It took about five tries before Dash would venture outside and pee. Dot ended up pooping inside the house while I was fixing my breakfast. Once I got the mess cleaned up, breakfast really wasn't bad.

I made some delicious French Toast with a leftover loaf of bread I found in the refrigerator and cooked a few fresh sausage patties to go along with it. Add some dark roast coffee and real maple syrup and this meal easily held its own with any of my recent restaurant outings. Since there were no bananas today, the dogs even let me eat in relative peace. They go nuts when there's a banana around.

I talked with Dot's oncologist after breakfast and rescheduled her appointment for next week. There actually was an ultrasound technician available today, but not the one the oncologist wanted. There is a specific technician that the oncologist wanted to use who is familiar with Dot's case. Evidently Dot's tumors are located in an area that is difficult to scan and the technician who was sick today was the only one who knows exactly where to look. I was happy to reschedule, because transporting Dot in the car on a wet stormy day is even more difficult than on a normal day.

I got an e-mail from AT&T this morning warning me that there would be a non-returned equipment charge if I didn't hurry up and install the new router they sent me and return the old one to them. Jeez. It's only been one day since the UPS guy delivered the package. Truthfully, I'm reluctant to install the new router, since everything has been working perfectly since the package arrived. This is the first time in a month that I've had no problems and so far I've made no changes at all. I still think the tech support guys fixed something after my irate calls and just didn't tell me. I'd like to just put the new router in the storage warehouse and keep it in case I need it in the future, but apparently AT&T frowns on this. If everything is still working properly in the morning, I think I'm going to call and ask if I can return the package they sent unopened. I'm very superstitious about setting up and configuring a completely new home and office network at this point. Maybe I should just leave things alone.

The city didn't pick up my garbage again. My can was the only one on the entire street this morning that wasn't emptied. This has happened too many times. I don't think the garbage men are purposely trying to harass me, but something is definitely wrong. I'm starting to think that the lid on my can doesn't open properly when the automated truck picks it up. Things worked much better when real people emptied the cans. The robot automated truck picks up the cans, but I don't think it can sense if it has actually emptied them.

I think I've finally found someone to help me walk Dot while Janet is on vacation next month. It's been a lot harder to find a reputable dog walker to come over every morning than I thought it would be, but things are looking up. The dog walker is going to come over and meet Dot next week and I think we'll be able to work something out. I've been walking Dot and Dash for over a decade and never dreamed that a simple walk would become so difficult. It's important to keep Dot moving though, so I'll do what I've got to do.

We've got a three day weekend ahead. We've also got lots more rain ahead as well. It remains to be seen whether we'll have a relaxing holiday.

Libby is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1983

It's been a long day. It was raining again when we woke up this morning, so I had to wait until later in the day to walk the dogs. As usual, they refused to go outside and do their business while it was still raining. They acted agitated and upset until I got the bananas out, and then they both completely forgot that they wanted a walk. The rain was already diminishing by the time I finished breakfast, so I only had to wait an additional thirty minutes before the morning showers stopped and I could take Dot and Dash to the park.

When I finally got the dogs taken care of, I turned on the computer and discovered that the Internet was down. Actually, the entire U-verse service was down, because the land line phones and televisions weren't working either. I tried re-booting the router several times and when that didn't work, I called tech support. After spending forever in automated call center hell, I finally got to talk with a real person. AT&T couldn't get things working from The Philippines, or Malaysia, or wherever their call center is these days, so a technician is going to come out tomorrow. I hate it when the network goes down. Usually the problem turns out to be a defective router and when they replace it, I have to reconfigure every WiFi device in the house so all the devices can join the network again using the new router's password. Even the thermostat and several of my cameras are on WiFi now. It's going to be a lot of trouble to reconnect everything.

Luckily, I have access to an alternate WiFi network, so I could still get my work done today. Having U-verse down definitely slowed me down though. Just calling tech support took forever. In today's world, having a network outage is just about as bad as a power outage. This is why I always have a backup network. You can't really be a web developer without access to the Internet.

Dot did great today during her physical therapy session, but she hated riding to the vet in the loaner car. It's too small and the rear seats don't fold completely flat like they do in my car. I had to pull over to the side of the road several times to reposition Dot, because the slight incline of the folded rear seatback made her slide backwards and get stuck every time I went up a hill. I would never buy a small car. Large dogs and small cars just aren't a good mix. The old Defender 90 was the perfect vehicle for hauling dogs around in. The entire back of the car was completely flat and there was tons of headroom. Dot and Dash enjoyed riding around in that car. Too bad I couldn't keep it running forever.

I had been planning to do some additional work on my mobile friendly test site today, but several real jobs got in the way. I was surprised that I got as much done as I did, since I was uploading files using the much slower backup WiFi hotspot. Where there's a will, there's a way, I guess. I'm just glad it's Friday tomorrow. A week of relentless rain, car problems, dental problems, and a bad case of cabin fever have taken their toll on me. I'm looking forward to the long Memorial Day weekend, even though I have no plans whatsoever.

Casey is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1321

Today was pleasant. The weather was surprisingly mild for a July day in Texas. Janet fixed a nice breakfast. The dogs enjoyed their visit to the dog park. They even saw several dogs that they knew. When we returned home, I got the lawnmower out and mowed until the yard looked presentable again. I'm more or less caught up on work assignments too. The only thing that was missing today was a mid-afternoon Dr. Who marathon on BBC.

Since I finished my weekend cores early, I decided to brave the crowds at the mall and go looking for a better WiFi camera to monitor Dash when I'm away. I may have overdone it. The camera I came home with not only has a great picture, it also monitors sound, keeps track of the temperature and humidity, allows two way communication, and plays a lullaby on command. Yes, I really bought a baby monitor instead of a pet monitor. I guess people with babies are even more apprehensive than I am with the dogs, since this thing had features that had never even occurred to me before.

The icing on the cake was that the camera actually worked. Sometimes they don't. I read all the reviews and they were split 50/50. Half the people thought this was the best WiFi camera on the planet and the other half thought it was a worthless piece of junk. I bought the camera making the assumption that the 50% who hated the camera had never hooked anything up to a WiFi network before. Routers, firewalls, and wireless gateways aren't always friendly with each other and it is often difficult to introduce a new piece of equipment to the system. Luck was on my side today though. The camera works like a charm.

The electrician is coming to fix the garbage disposal at 7:30 AM tomorrow. Lord knows why he wants to come so early, but it's just as well. Maybe he'll be able to get the faulty wiring fixed in time for me to take the dogs on a walk at their normal time and proceed with my Monday work day. You never know with electricians though. He may fix the problem in five minutes, or he may tell me that the entire house is not up to code and that everything needs to be rewired.

I hope I have time to go to the gym tomorrow. It's been more difficult to establish a regular schedule than I anticipated. Dash has a vet appointment every other Tuesday and Dot has a vet appointment every Wednesday. Walking the dogs and carting them around to their various appointments eats up a lot of time. Work is erratic too. Some days there is so much to do that I don't even have time to eat. Other days are so quiet that I have trouble staying awake. Workout or no workout, I'll be a happy camper if I have a working garbage disposal at the end of the day.

Queenie is today's Dalmatian of the Day

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