Day 2592

I have lost the ability to be spontaneous. If I deviate from my routine even slightly, everything falls apart. I almost didn't get my blog posted by midnight last night just because I left the house for a few hours. When I tried to make up the time I'd spent attending last night's meeting, I didn't watch Dot closely enough and she ended up pooping in her bed with her harness still on. This always makes things messier. Even worse, I was so tired that I fell asleep at the computer for a while and didn't notice that Dot had pooped on herself until after midnight when I was getting ready for bed. I had to wake her up and take her outside in the rain where I could clean her off and fit her in a fresh harness. Since I disrupted Dot's sleep to clean her up, she became stressed and peed in her bed later in the evening, which we discovered the next morning. I kept thinking that none of this would have happened if I'd done everything on schedule.

I'm really getting tired of all the rain we've been getting lately. My shoes get muddy every time I take Dot out in the back yard to pee and often I don't have time to take them off again while I am guiding her back through the house to her bed. The rugs are a mess. If I see a brown clump on a rug, the only way I can tell whether it is mud or poop is to kneel down and smell it. Dot has trouble getting traction on the slick, wet ground, so I have to be extra careful that she doesn't stumble and fall. I'm able to prevent a lot of the falls, but I can't catch them all. I felt bad today when she stumbled in the hallway while I was doing dishes and ended up cutting her foot.

Since I'm caught up on work again, I thought I'd get caught up on the bills that are stacking up on my desk. I paid all the December bills today and took them to the post office. I'm glad December only comes once a year. Every time I pay a stack of bills, I'm dismayed by the thought that I'll be doing this on a fixed income in just a few years. When I was younger I always thought the solution to money problems was to just make more money. It seemed to work pretty well when I was in demand, but I'm afraid that train has already left the station. I don't even want to think about what life will be like twenty years from now. Given my family history, I might not even be around by then, but if I am I'll probably be broke.

I need to catch up on sleep tonight. I didn't get to bed until 1 AM and then had to get up again at 6 AM. That's not enough sleep. I wish I could write my blog entries faster. I remain committed to my goal of writing for 5000 consecutive days, but it's getting harder. Eventful days are actually much easier to describe than days when nothing happens. Sometimes I'll stare at the screen for thirty minutes before I can even write the first sentence. This would be so much easier if I were still attending space launches, traveling around the world to create ad campaigns, and getting included in cookbooks.

I certainly won't be doing any of that tomorrow. There are two bananas left and a pint of strawberries, so I'll be having my regular fruit smoothie for breakfast. I don't know what I'll have for dinner though. The refrigerator is looking pretty empty. There's my goal for tomorrow: to find something for dinner.

Dovey is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2311

It's amazing how much time can be wasted trying to get electronic devices to play nice with each other. Everything is connected these days, but the connections don't always work. Sometimes Bluetooth is the problem. Other times it is the WiFi network. Occasionally the electricity goes out and everything goes down. Today I couldn't access one of my clients websites. I was about to call the hosting company when I decided to try an alternate WiFi connection and discovered that everything was fine. Why was T-Mobile working and AT&T U-Verse wasn't? It was weird that most websites appeared to be functioning normally, but a few appeared to be blocked on U-Verse. I unplugged the router, re-booted everything and five minutes later, I was up and running again. I never did figure out what the problem was.

Later in the day, my weather radar app quit working and I had problems syncing my new activity tracker. Life was much simpler when the most complicated machines I had were an IBM Selectric typewriter and a Leica rangefinder camera. Mechanical things used to break too, but the failures were much more predictable. Now, the problem could be anywhere. Is there something wrong in the cloud where your data is being stored? Is there something wrong with your security settings? Is the pet cam causing interference with the WiFi router? Usually I can fix things myself while I am waiting on hold for thirty minutes to talk with someone from tech support. Life in the digital age is still frustrating though. I make my living online, but I was happier before the Internet existed.

For the third week in a row Dot pooped in the car on the way to her physical therapy appointment. I walked her around in the yard forever before we left, trying to avoid another accident, but to no avail. She wasn't ready to go. Two things seem to make Dot poop; excitement and stress. A ride in the car can cause both. It wouldn't do much good to give her a sedative before we left the house, because it's not a good idea to be sleepy when you are walking in the underwater treadmill. I really don't know what to do. Chemotherapy, acupuncture and exercise help, but you can't fix old age.

I usually know the names of the flowers I photograph, but I'm drawing a blank on the clusters of tiny white blooms that pop up in the grass seemingly overnight when it rains. It's been a rainy week, so these things are everywhere. I'll figure out what they are eventually. By June they'll all be gone. Until then, I hope it stays cool. Dot is enjoying her morning walks again now that the weather has cooled down a bit. She walks very slowly now, stopping every few feet to smell things along the way. It takes Janet and I forever to make our one mile circuit through the park each morning, but I think Dot still enjoys being outside.

One problem with moving Dot's therapy appointment to Wednesday is that I don't know what to do on Thursdays now. When I wake up on Thursday lately, I initially think it is Friday. It's disappointing to realize that I've got to wait another day to go out to breakfast.  I supposed I could go out to eat two days a week, but there are still bananas and strawberries in the kitchen to use up before they go bad. I'm so structured that a single banana can keep me from doing something spontaneous.

Valli is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2114

At the rate I'm going, I could probably continue this narrative as a series of Tweets. 140 characters a day would be plenty. Today, I picked up some more Levothyroxine for Dash and went to the gym. That was about it. I read an article recently that said if you want to stay busy in your fifties and sixties, you need to spend your forties building a strong network of contacts and relationships. Oops, my bad. I was still kind of social in my late thirties, but by the time I turned forty, I had already started avoiding people. I stayed busy for a long, long time because almost everybody I knew eventually became a client. The fatal flaw in this plan was that I never knew that many people in the first place and had no desire to meet more. Now, it's become one of those Humpty Dumpty situations. All the king's horses and all the king's men...you know the story.

If I wanted to make contacts, I definitely should have picked a different gym. I'm usually the youngest person working out. The people here are ancient.  I picked this cardiovascular and fitness center because the facilities were fabulous, but forgot that it is run by a major hospital. Most of the members seem to be recovering from heart surgery or cancer and almost everybody has a nurse or personal trainer. Needless to say, I usually have the basketball court all to myself. Usually, I like this somewhat unique situation, but on days where I'm feeling isolated, exercising with a bunch of geezers doesn't really help.

I'm not sure that I even have the capacity to get out and about anymore. Even when I'm at the gym or running small errands, I worry about Dot. After all the time I've spent with her, I'd feel terrible if she ended up spending her final hours alone and scared. Dot knows that I am her legs and she depends on me. I don't know how much time she has left, but I want her remaining days to be happy ones, right up to the very last day. This is why I kind of liked it when work kept me chained to the computer. Dot was always nearby. The work kept me busy. And the money the work generated allowed me to buy enough technology toys that I never had to think about my dwindling circle of friends.

I passed a bookstore on my way to the gym and briefly thought about stopping and picking up some more books to read. That would be too spontaneous though. I'll probably pass this same bookstore three or four times before I actually stop and look for a book. I've passed the new breakfast restaurant a couple of times too, but still haven't gone in and ordered breakfast.

I need to remember to take my car to the dealership tomorrow morning. I'm pretty sure that the suspension problem is real, since the yellow warning light has come on several times now. The car still handles well, but the squeaking noise is kind of ominous. I hope this is a warranty item. Anything that isn't covered by warranty at the Land Rover dealer usually ends up being very expensive. I hope they don't give me an Evoque for a loaner car. It's too hard to load Dot into the small Evoque when we go to our physical therapy sessions. If I'm lucky, they'll give me one of the last remaining LR2s in their loaner fleet.  I learned a long time ago that they'll never lend you a Range Rover.

It's too bad the Pope isn't still around. The messages of hope on TV have already been replaced by politicians accusing each other of being liars. By the time the election actually rolls around, I suspect that everybody will hate all of them.

Sweat Pea is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1564

I got up early to meet the HVAC guy this morning and just about the time he was supposed to arrive, I got a phone call saying he was sick. We postponed everything until Monday and I went out for breakfast instead. Today's breakfast was strangely unsatisfying, since I was already prepared to do something else. As many of you already know, spontaneity is not one of my strong points.

This was another radiation therapy day for Dash. They've been getting his treatments done early this week, so he's usually ready to come home again around noon. I continue to be amazed by how well he's handling all this. Truthfully, I think he's handling the cancer much better than I am. Of course, Dash doesn't really know he has cancer. I'm fairly certain he just thinks he's going to a weird kind of doggie day care.

The weather was bad today, so I got a lot of writing done. Even by Texas standards, this was a strange day. We had bright sunshine, misty dampness, and a severe thunderstorm, all within a single day. The weatherman on TV said that a cold front had moved through the area, but the temperature still seemed pretty warm to me. When the cold fronts start feeling warm, you know that Spring is here.

Everything worked out pretty well today. I got Dash taken care of during the sunny part of the day, and returned home to write during the rainy part of the day. Even the thunderstorm wasn't very traumatic, since the dogs were so sleepy that they didn't even notice most of it.

I wish I wasn't such a hypochondriac.  I had an upset stomach and severe case of heartburn for most of the day. I couldn't decide whether this was caused by all the pills I've been taking, or if I'd just eaten some bad food yesterday. Of course, it could just be stress. Sick dogs, lots of bills to pay, and unpredictable weather have never been among my favorite things.

At least the weekend is here. I look forward to two days of doing as little as possible. Dot's new harness came in the mail today. We got her a special full body harness just like Dash's. Now both dogs will look like search and rescue pros when we take them on walks. Dot never tries to escape like Dash, but this new harness will be good for her as well, since it provides an extra level of support.

Doc is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day