Day 584

I got another business inquiry from LinkedIn. Things certainly have changed. Business relationships used to be nurtured over a long lunch. Now, you just need to make sure your name is mentioned on the right online lists. I think I liked things the old way a lot better. There's no sense in being nostalgic though, because I have a feeling that more and more strangers are going to be hiring me in the future. Already, a significant chunk of my business originates from people I have never met in person.

Today's inquiry was about translating German technical manuals. I used to do a lot of this sort of stuff in the past, but it's been a while. I never spoke German all that well. Today, I probably couldn't hold a coherent conversation with a four year old in German. That's not going to stop me from bidding on this job though. Even at my best, I was a terrible translator. I do understand technology though. When I got these sort of jobs in the past, I never bothered much about literally translating the German words. I just looked at the pictures to figure out what the subject matter was about, and then rewrote the entire thing from scratch in English. My clients generally thought I was a brilliant translator, because their brochures sounded like they were written by a native speaker. Actually, they were. I've been speaking English since I was a baby.

I'm spending more time on Google+ and less on Facebook these days. To me, Facebook seems a lot like shopping at Walmart. Google+ seems a bit more like shopping at Williams-Sonoma or Whole Foods. I like the concept of circles of interest too. If you find someone saying interesting things, you just drag them into a circle and read what they have to offer whenever you feel like it. The whole concept of "friends" on Facebook always made me a little uneasy. Jeez, in real life I only have a small handful of friends. On Facebook, I have over 500. Something is very wrong with this picture.

How many days can a body stand these 100 degree temperatures? This is one of the hottest Summers I can remember. We get 100 degree days every Summer in Texas, but usually they don't go on for weeks at a time like this. It even seems to be hot up North this Summer. Personally, I'm ready for Winter.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 583

The water bill is going to be horrendous this month. I turn on the sprinklers and then I keep forgetting to turn them off again. Maybe it's because so many things turn themselves off automatically these days. The washing machine turns itself off when its done. The coffee maker turns itself off. Even the new television turns itself off when we go to sleep. Maybe I should get some more of those battery powered timers that attach to the faucet. I've bought them before and they all seem to last about two weeks. It really shouldn't be that hard to remember to turn the sprinklers off after a couple of hours.

I feel like I've doubled the size of one of the veterinary websites I manage today. When I started working for these folks, they had eight employees. Now they have over thirty. Since they like to feature employee bios on the site, I need to bring things up to date periodically. This isn't even the largest vet I work for either. Another veterinarian I work with has over fifty employees. If you are young and still considering a career path, you definitely ought to look into veterinary medicine. I'm sure there are unsuccessful vets somewhere, but I sure don't know any. If you don't think you've got what it takes to make it through vet school, just open a doggie day care center. These businesses are becoming increasingly popular too.

I couldn't figure out why my foursquare score kept going up and down. Then, someone told me today that the points are reset every week. I suddenly lost interest in the game. If the points aren't cumulative, I'll never get anywhere. I don't even leave the house all that much.

Trash day again. I just got back from hauling this week's accumulation of trash out to the street for pickup early tomorrow morning. Yeah, I know it's Friday tomorrow, but when the trash can is empty, I consider the week officially over.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 582

I took a big new batch of employee pictures at one of my clients offices today. I was really pleased that they are starting to take this a little more seriously. The staff actually put on makeup, did their hair and everything. Everyone looked terrific and I think for once, they will actually like their pictures. The employee photos came out nice, but I'm going to show you a picture I took looking through the fish tank into the lobby instead. The water was so clear that the fish look like they are flying through the air.

One of the animal rescue websites I manage wants to start replacing all the pictures of adoptable animals with videos. This is actually a very good idea, but all I can think of at the moment is that it's going to take me even longer than it used to to keep the site up to date. I'm running out of time. I tell all my clients that they can't afford to ignore social media, but I often wish I could ignore it myself. With over 4000 Twitter followers now, I find that there are @john_sealander messages to answer everyday. Certain clients are starting to send me messages on Facebook, instead of using e-mail, so I have to check that regularly too. And then there's Google+. Folks are already asking me to explain Google+ to them and I'm still asking other people to explain it to me.

After I wrote my watch article for the day, I finally got around to making the bed. I still haven't unpacked the camera gear from this morning's photo shoot, but that can wait until tomorrow. I'm hoping that I won't have to go anywhere at all for the rest of the week. I still have several major website updates to finish and I promised that I'd have everything online before the weekend.

If you guys see a +1 next to my name on the Internet, do me a favor and click on it. I don't know why yet, but it certainly couldn't hurt.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 581

I spent quite a while on the phone this morning explaining what a browser cache was to a client who kept insisting that I hadn't done the updates they had requested. I tried to explain that the updates were already there, but that they were looking at an old cached version of the site on their computers. Why do so many people, especially in office environments, never bother to clear their browser cache? I've had people looking at old cached versions of websites that were at least six months out of date, totally perplexed at why there was nothing new on their site. I wasn't very successful at explaining the concept of the browser caching this morning, but I did finally convince my client to click on the reload button at the top of the menu, so they could see what I added several days ago.

When I was visiting with my financial adviser yesterday, I remember asking if we should buy something and pick up some bargains, since the market was having such a bad day. He said it would probably go even lower tomorrow. Hmmm. The last time I looked, the market was up over 200 points today. Go figure.

Dogs don't have to worry about the market. All they have to worry about is going to the vet. Dash had a vet appointment this afternoon for his bi-weekly antigen shot. His skin bronzing condition is getting better again after we changed his medication. Several months ago, the bronzing returned right after we started on a new bottle of antigen medication. I kept telling my vet that this had to be a bad batch of antigen, since nothing else had changed in the dog's diet or environment. The vet kept defending the pharmaceutical folks however and said that something else was causing the bronzing to return. After another round of tests proved nothing, I asked if they would switch to a new bottle of antigen just to humor me. Within a week, Dash's condition began improving again. It was a bad batch of antigen.

I think I'm going to go through this whole scenario again when I visit my own doctor next week. My blood sugar levels became elevated after he had me start taking Simcor, which has a known history of raising blood sugar levels. I've drastically cut back on eating sweets, but I think it is the Simcor that is causing the problem. Unfortunately, the Doc really likes Simcor. He thinks it's great for increasing "good" cholesterol levels. I'm not wild about taking pills in general. The side effects of taking too many pills to control various ailments eventually killed my Mom. In her case, the cure was worse than the disease. I guess that is the question. If a pill can keep you from getting a heart attack, but ends up ruining your liver, have you really gained anything?

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 580

I did my regular quarterly re-balancing with my financial adviser today. This is a lot harder than it used to be. I've come to realize than in good markets, it's easy to feel like a financial genius. As they say, a rising tide raises all boats. In uncertain markets, it's equally easy to feel like the entire system is rigged against you. You've got to stay invested though and keep making decisions, because it's impossible to tell exactly when the tide is going to turn again.

Once, when I was in Las Vegas, I played the same nickel slot machine almost all day. Somehow, this gave me a better sense of probability and the random nature of events than almost anything I've done. I learned that if you keep doing anything long enough, you will eventually wind up as a winner. Good fortune is almost inevitably followed by misfortune however. Time passes, and then you win again. This cycle goes on and on until you run out of money. If you have enough money to keep the cycle going, you will probably get more. If you run short before the next big payout, the game is over. This is, in essence, why the rich get richer. They just have a higher chance of ending the game on a high note. It's not how long you play that's important. It's when you choose to quit. As soon as you hit the jackpot, you really should get out of the game.

What does this have to do with investing? Everything, actually. During the dot.com boom I noticed that I was doing a whole lot better in the market than I usually did. The normal ups and downs I was used to didn't seem to apply anymore. I wasn't smart enough to realize that this was a jackpot though, and I didn't get out. I lost a lot, but eventually made most of it back. Just before the 2008 crash, I once again started thinking that I was doing a lot better than the law of averages said I should be. The crash caught me by surprise, but it shouldn't have. The signs were everywhere. Hopefully, I've learned my lesson. I'm slowly and methodically building my base again. The next time something unexpectedly good happens, I'm not going to "follow the tape" or let my winnings ride. The next time I meet my target, I'm not going to get greedy. I'm just going to get up and walk away from the table.

It wasn't all about the market today. I made a bunch of website changes with a client who rarely changes anything. It's a good thing these folks don't change things very often. When they do, they like to tell me the changes they want over the phone while I'm making them simultaneously in Dreamweaver. I can't think of a better way to make typos and spelling errors if I tried. It's hard enough getting all the syntax right when I'm just sitting here sipping my morning cup of coffee. Having a conversation while I'm coding isn't something I'm very good at. I always try to please however, even though I suspect that there are still spelling errors in what I did this morning.

You guys who are still wondering what Google+ is all about ought to give it a try. I like it. Google+ is especially useful if you happen to have a Blogger blog. One of the first things I discovered when I set up my account was an editable folder containing every single picture that I had ever posted on my blog. That alone made the whole sign-up process worthwhile.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 579

Dot and Dash got a bath today, I got a few more people added to my Google+ circles, and we all made our regular pilgrimage to the Wagging Tail dog park. When we were getting in the car to go to the dog park, I noticed that there was water dripping from the underside of the carport roof again. Janet said it had rained last night, which kind of amazed me. The skies were clear and blue this morning and the dogs didn't even wake me up during the night, like they usually do when it rains. If it wasn't for the standing water on the roof, there was no proof that it rained at all.

Since it was kind of a slow day, I went ahead and wrote my monthly article for my writer's group, instead of waiting until the last day of the month like I usually do. The assignment this month was to write something about the subject of celebrations. I wrote about kids birthday parties. I'm amazed at how elaborate children's parties have become. It is not uncommon for kids in Dallas to have bounce houses and petting zoos at their birthday parties. When I was a kid, I was lucky if I got a slice of birthday cake.

I have a meeting with my financial adviser tomorrow. I'm sure that the discussion will center around whether an agreement will be reached on the debt ceiling before the August 2 deadline. It's such a crap shoot. Everyone says that the congress has to raise the debt ceiling, but I can easily imagine them digging in their heals and doing nothing. How do you plan for things like this? If you start shorting things in anticipation of a meltdown, it almost guarantees that everything will work out fine and the market will go up. I'm still long, but I hate the market these days. I watched this interview with legendary gambler Billy Walters tonight on 60 Minutes. Billy told Lara Logan that he was convinced Las Vegas is a much safer bet than Wall Street. I think he's right.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 578

I'm going to have to apologize for ignoring all those Farmville and Mafia Wars requests. Lately, I've been finding myself checking in compulsively on foursquare and will have to admit that this is just another online game, like CityVille and all the rest. Does it really matter if I'm mayor of the dog park? Probably not. Will I keep checking in? Probably so. Hey, a little mindless entertainment never hurt anyone.

I had to pick up some stuff at Sam's Club today and of course I couldn't find it. Why does this store keep moving things around all the time? Just as soon as I learn where a particular item is, they move it to another part of the store. This must be part of some diabolical plan to get people to buy more groceries by forcing them to push their buggy up and down every single aisle in search of peanut butter or paper towels. Maybe it's good marketing, but I find it irritating. Walmart and Sam's Club aren't places where I particularly want to linger. Do me a favor guys and just leave the strawberries where they were last week.

I've put together a little harness so Dot can wear the GoPro camera and help me make a movie from a dog's perspective. We'll wait till it's a bit cooler outside to try everything out though. It just wouldn't be right to have her wear this contraption while it's 105 outside. She's miserable enough in the heat as it is. You might wonder why Dash isn't going to wear the camera. There's an easy answer to that one. The camera would be destroyed in about five minutes.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 577

I finally bit the bullet and got my Google+ profile set up today. Jeez, just what I need...one more chunk of social media real estate to watch over. My friend Larry Brauner convinced me that Google+ was important for bloggers though, and Becky Kopprasch had a neat tutorial on her blog showing how to conveniently move all your Facebook friends over to Google+ without a whole lot of pain. Two hours later I was good to go. The whole process was a bit more difficult than I expected. Before you can even sign up for Google+ you have to be invited. Then, you have to figure out how to attract friends. This is probably the hard part, because the last thing most people need is a second Facebook. Before I got my account properly configured, I found myself setting set a Yahoo account and a G-mail account as well. Somewhere along the line, I added Klout and Spotify accounts too. Maybe it's worth the effort though, because Google+ is totally integrated with Google search and participation will probably increase your Google ranking. Basically I've got a Google+ account now for exactly the same reason that my blog is hosted on Blogger: Google owns the Internet and I'm just along for the ride.

The rest of the day was pretty normal. I answered client's questions. I wrote some articles. I made a few website updates. I finished up the day by going to the bank and picking up something for dinner at Central Market. This is what I do every Friday. I'm supposed to write something on the topic of celebration for my writers group this month. My mind is a blank. I think the whole concept of celebration has become a bit fuzzy to me. Life isn't bad, but I'm certainly not giddy with excitement.

Maybe I should just quit watching television. Is anyone else sick of listening to politicians argue about the debt ceiling? That's all that seems to be on television these days. I'm tired of all the posturing on both sides. Jeez guys, just shake hands, make some sort of deal and move on. That's what most of us want you to do. I've had to make plenty of compromises in my life. I expect the people I've elected to do the same thing.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 576

Busy day! As soon as the dogs and I got back from our morning walk, I drove over to the doctor's office to have my blood work done. Whenever I get my blood drawn, I think about that urban legend where Keith Richards gets his blood entirely replaced in Switzerland. It wasn't true, of course, but it would be nice if it were this easy to cure all your problems: just change out your blood like an oil change on a car and you're good to go.

On the way home, I stopped by Another Broken Egg to have breakfast like I often do after an early doctor's appointment. Over the long haul, I'm very good about eating exactly what I'm supposed to eat. Occasionally however, I like to do something symbolic to prove to myself that the doctors haven't completely taken over my life. Today, I had biscuits and gravy and a Belgian waffle. Very tasty.

The heat wave continues. The thermometer on the side of the house said 105 this afternoon and it certainly felt like it was that hot. It's almost a relief to sit in a dimly lit room in front of a computer on days like this. I divided my time between paying bills, writing watch articles and revising websites. I usually only pay bills twice a month, but lately I've been revising websites every day. Either people are looking at their sites a lot more often than they used to, or all my clients decided to make changes at the same time.

I got 2000 additional AAdvantage miles from American Airlines today, just by agreeing to let them send me more e-mail spam. It seemed like a good deal to me. I get so much junk e-mail already that I'll never even notice a little more.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 575

Jeez, it's hot! I was sipping a glass of lemonade on the porch while the dogs were sunning themselves and I saw a worm crawl out of the ground and immediately fry itself on a hot rock. The dogs and I proved that we were smarter than worms by going back inside where it was air conditioned.

At least there was a breeze at dog class tonight. Granted, it was a hot breeze, but it was definitely better than no breeze at all. Everyone brings water for their dogs now. Some people even bring spray bottles and spray their dogs down between excercises. You can tell the days are starting to get shorter now, because the shadows are getting long by the time class is finished. Shorter days don't necessarily mean cooler days though. It's probably going to be hot like this until the middle of September. Dash did real good on the long down exercise tonight. He likes this one because he can just lie down and do nothing for five minutes.

After I ordered a bunch of GoPro accessories over the Internet, I discovered that the Best Buy store just down the street carries all this stuff right here in town. I can never decide whether I like online shopping better than just going to a store. It used to be that things were almost universally cheaper online, but now more and more online retailers are charging sales tax, just like their brick and mortar counterparts. I guess online shopping is still easier, but if your job involves staring at a large computer screen all day, it nice to just get out of the house for a while and do some old fashioned shopping.

I scheduled my blood work for tomorrow morning. No breakfast for me. Well, no breakfast right away anyway. I think I'll go get the blood work done early and then go out for breakfast on the way home.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 574

I wrote a letter this morning to one of my relatives who still refuses to enter the electronic age. I think it's been several years since I actually wrote a letter on paper and took it to the post office. I wonder if non-bloggers understand how difficult it is to write a personal letter when you've already said everything you have to say. I used to write distant friends frequently, but I just don't see the point anymore. I wish everyone would just read the blog. That's really all there is anyway. If you blog for a long enough period of time, you come to realize that every thought you've ever had in your life will eventually wind up as a post. I keep telling people that everything they need to know is here, but there are still some folks who seem to think a vague, hand scrawled note in illegible handwriting is more personal.

I was going to learn how to use the GoPro camera today, but every time I picked up the instruction manual, I got a call from a client with a problem that needed to be fixed immediately. I did figure out how to put the battery in the camera and set the internal clock, but that was about it. The rest of the day was spent changing prices on websites, adding missing links, and printing promotional posters. Maybe tomorrow I'll try out the camera. It is amazingly small and light. I could probably even attach it to Dash's collar.

It's time for new blood work again. I stopped by my doctor just to make sure, and just like I expected, this was something I should have done last month. I doubt that much has changed from June to July, but I'll go ahead and make an appointment so I won't end up being three months late. I need to be fasting before these tests, so I need to pick a day when I'm not particularly hungry. You probably know by now that I hate to miss breakfast.

I got the electric bill today. It was twice as much as I paid in May. I really can't complain though. This is Texas in July. As long as the air conditioner keeps pumping out cool air, I'll be a happy camper.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 573

My little GoPro camera arrived today. This was one of those "signature required" deliveries that I always hate. No matter what I do, I always seem to miss the FedEx and UPS trucks. I rearranged my entire schedule today, so I would be sure to be here when the UPS guy arrived and I still managed to miss the delivery. By 6 PM, I was still waiting and the dogs were definitely tired of waiting. I finally gave up and leashed the dogs up for their evening walk. As we were walking by the neighbors house, one of the neighbor boys came out and said he had a package for me. I had been home all day, and still UPS decided to deliver the package to my neighbor instead. Oh, well. At least I got the package.

I stayed busy working on the design for the Dalmatian Rescue Casino Party poster and writing another watch article. While I was writing, I also burned a bunch of CD's for all the kids in the picture I shot last week. I think I burned a CD for everybody except the snake. I guess I shouldn't have been surprised that all the kids had a computer and wanted a CD of their own. Just about everybody has a computer and a cell phone these days. It probably won't be long before you'll be issued these sorts of things at birth.

I got a call from one of the networking breakfast guys this afternoon who said he had a lead for me. Wow. I'm not even a member of the group yet. It would certainly be nice if this whole networking idea actually works. I think I'm going to need to be able to provide leads for the other guys too. Not a problem. Hey, if you need a veterinarian, a watch repairman, or someone to get rid of bees, I've got plenty of leads.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 572

It was so hot today that Dot was worn out before she even learned about her new photo assignment. She's a trooper though and dutifully posed as a roulette dealer for a new Dalmatian Rescue poster promoting the next Casino Party.

Earlier in the day, both dogs were eager to go to the dog park. They've both learned that this is what we do on Sunday now. Once we arrived at the park, they raced around for about thirty seconds and then proceeded to look for a shady patch of dirt where they could take a nap. It would have been easy enough to find a shady patch of dirt in our own back yard, but they seem to enjoy doing new things.

There weren't many new things on the agenda for me today. It was time to mow the grass again and the plants definitely needed watering. The heat makes everything seem more difficult than it actually is. I really didn't do all that much today, but by the end of the day it felt like I'd put in a full days work. I was so tired by the time I finished photographing Dot, that when I went to look at the pictures, I mistakenly stuck the camera's memory card into the computer's CD slot. Yikes! Don't ever do this! I thought I'd ruined the computer for a while, but I was finally able to coax the SDHD memory card out of the CD slot with a very thin pair of watch repair tweezers.

Next week looks busy. I guess busy is good. It's always nice to have enough money to pay the bills. I'm starting to think it might be nice to have a vacation too. This heat is really starting to get to me.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 571

When I arrived for my photo shoot today, I was greeted by six snakes, a rather large iguana, a dog, a cat, a rabbit, a pig, five children and a duck. There were obviously plenty of animals to go around, but some got eliminated almost immediately. The pig didn't even want to be in the same room as the snakes. The cat got eliminated because one of the boys insisted on holding a snake. Four snakes got put back in their bags because six snakes on the set were way too many to deal with. The smallest girl was fearless. She wanted to hold the largest snake and started waving it around, saying "Mommy, look at me, I'm the amazing snake girl." There was a moment of alarm when the boy with the other snake announced, "Mommy, my snake bit me." The vets in the room examined the wound, pronounced it harmless and on we went. After about 100 shots, I could tell the animals were getting restless and we called it a day. Not your average childrens' portrait to say the least, but I think we got some real cute shots.

By the time I got all my equipment packed up and put away, the day was practically over. There was just enough time to run to the grocery store and take the dogs on their evening walk. I'm not as worried about the large snake I saw near the yard the other day. I tried to describe it to one of the snake wranglers at the photo shoot and he said it was probably a Texas Rat Snake. These snakes are ill tempered and will strike if you get too close, but are basically harmless. The snake guy said that if a Rat Snake bit you, it probably wouldn't even break the skin.

Maybe I'll do a little yard work tomorrow. It felt cooler today and sure enough it was. The temperature only got up to 98 degrees.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 570

It was 104 degrees today. I had to go down to the Photo District to buy a backdrop for a photo shoot I'm doing tomorrow and the roll of seamless paper was so wide that it wouldn't fit in my car. I finally got the roll inside by leaving the front passenger window open and sliding the roll diagonally as far back as it would go. The box stuck out the window a couple of feet, but I could drive just fine. The only problem was that I had to make the trip back to the office without air conditioning. I wonder how people ever managed to live in Texas before air conditioning? I wasn't in the car five minutes before I began to feel like I was on an expedition across the Sahara Desert.

At least the car didn't overheat. Last Summer I had terrible problems with the car overheating. Maybe all the money I dumped into repairs finally cured the problem. I certainly hope so, because being stranded on the side of the road in 104 degree heat isn't a lot of fun.

I don't know what to expect tomorrow. I'm doing a group shot with a nine foot python, two dogs, a cat, an iguana, an owl, and five children. I've been promised a trained handler for all the animals, but still I'm a little nervous. I certainly hope the python isn't hungry.

It's hard to believe that it's already invoice day again. I dropped this month's invoices off at the post office on the way to pick up the photo backdrop and hoped that I'll pick up a few more jobs before the end of the month. I'm usually busiest in the Fall, but it would be nice to have a flurry of activity in July. With the air conditioner running full tilt 24 hours a day, I always worry that I won't even make enough to pay the electric bill.

It was kind of sad to watch the last space shuttle launch this morning. It's hard to believe that it's been thirty years since the first one went into orbit. I've been a fan of the space program ever since I was a kid when we all assembled in the school gym in front of a black and white television to watch Alan Shepard begin the space race strapped on top of a rather small Mercury Redstone rocket that launched him on a very short ride into space. Back then I was convinced that we'd have thriving cities on Mars by now. I never would have dreamed that all we'd have to show for our heroic efforts in space were decaying cities on earth. I still think that humans are explorers and that we need a grand adventure to inspire us. Going to the stars is a lot more achievable than finding peace and harmony on earth anyway.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 569

When I took the dogs out this morning, I almost stepped on a giant snake that was lurking just outside the back yard fence. Judging from where the snake was located, I would guess that it spent a fair amount of time inside the back yard as well. I don't like snakes. There are over a dozen varieties of snakes that make their home in the park behind our house. At least a third of these snakes are poisonous and I can never remember which ones are harmless and which are to be avoided. With the unpredictable behavior of dogs around snakes, I don't take any chances and do my best to avoid them all. Now that I've seen this huge snake so close to home, I'm going to be thinking it is slithering around in the bushes whenever I'm outside. This was one thing I liked about living in Alaska when I was in high school. The state has no snakes.

The first thing I noticed when I went to the office this morning was that the main switch that controlled all the lighting had burned out. None of the lights would come on at all. This wasn't much of a problem in the morning when light was streaming in from the window on the East side of the room, but as the day wore on, the room kept getting darker and darker. I knew I was going to be forced to fix this thing soon because it would be hard to write the blog in the dark.

I had made an appointment to get a haircut today anyway, so my outing quickly expanded to a haircut and a search for a very weird switch that I had installed years ago and didn't think was available anymore. True to form, I went back to my expensive stylist instead of going to a barber like I had vowed to do the last time I got a haircut. Equally true to form, something as easy as changing out a light switch turned out to be quite difficult. I never did find a match for the old switch assembly, but I finally found something completely different that I thought might work. I wasted the rest of the afternoon trying to get the wiring hooked up properly, and after some initial trial and error mistakes, the lights are on again.

When I was at that networking breakfast yesterday, one of the guys sitting at my table said that foursquare was really good for small businesses, because they could add their own coupons for specials that would show up whenever somebody checked in at their business. I'd been trying to avoid foursquare because I don't like things that involve badges and competition. Against my better judgment, I joined foursquare today, because I didn't want to be ignorant about it and I do happen to have several retail clients that might be interested in the coupons. Right away people started signing up as "friends." I was perplexed. Why would you need friends on a GPS location app? One of my clients told me that the whole point of the application was to make it easier for you to find your friends when you were out and about. Hmm. What a novel idea. When I'm out and about, I just want to get my business done as soon as possible so I can go back home again. Maybe I'm not part of foursquare's target audience.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 568

I got up early and went to my friend's business networking breakfast this morning. When I arrived at the Park Cities Club, there were actually two groups having breakfast meetings. I didn't know this at the time, so I just sat down with the first group I saw. This turned out to be a Bible study group and when they saw I didn't have a Bible with me, they told me that my group was meeting in a different room. The breakfast was actually pretty interesting. It was a small group of about twenty people and every one of them was a CEO of a different company. Luckily, the conversation didn't get around to the size of our respective companies, but I think the others could easily guess that my own company was pretty small.

I don't know if this group will ask me to join them, but if they do I probably will. Judging from the surroundings and the way the other people were dressed, I would think that the dues for this club are pretty steep. I'm sure I could pay for the dues pretty easily though if I just quit running my Google Adwords ad. So far, my Adwords ad has increased my website PR ranking a little bit, but it hasn't brought me any business at all. My gut feeling is that talking with real people about real business leads is a lot better investment than all the money I've dumped into useless Internet ads. This club serves bacon for breakfast too. I can't forget that.

The only problem with new business is finding the time to work on it. I was so busy today that I couldn't have worked on a new project if I tried. The day was filled with website revision requests, conference calls and writing assignments. I got finished just in time to quickly eat a few leftovers in the refrigerator for dinner and get Dot and Dash ready for dog training class.

I don't know why we even have these classes in July. The dogs are hot, the people are sweaty, and everybody keeps looking at their watch to see when the hour of training exercises is up. I guess these hot Summer classes do help us keep up a certain level of discipline though. It's kind of like making the bed every morning. Some days I don't feel like making the bed. Some days, when the dogs crawl back under the covers before I even have time to get dressed, I don't even see the point in making the bed. I always make the bed however, just like I always write the blog. A little discipline is good. If your life involves a certain amount of swimming upstream, I'm convinced that discipline will get you where you're going a lot more effectively than Prozac.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 567

I'll have to admit that I was just as surprised at the Casey Anthony verdict as everyone else. The TV was on when they read the verdict and I remember looking over at the screen and thinking "Jeez, they must have forgotten something...she's got to be guilty of something." Later in the day, I heard a commentator say, "you can't just convict somebody for being a bad person" and my first thought was "Well, why not?" Life would be a lot more peaceful if you could convict someone for being a bad person.

I'm certainly no expert, but I do have a theory why the jury returned a "not guilty" verdict. In my own little world, just about everyone I know is disgusted with the government. It doesn't matter if they are a Democrat, Republican or Independent. They are all disgusted with the government about one thing or another. Ordinary citizens don't get that many chances to tell the government what they think. Sure, you can vote the bums out of office, but even that doesn't seem to fix anything. The rising star you voted for will probably just turn out to be the next Anthony Weiner. Maybe that jury in Florida was just fed up and felt like telling the State to stuff it.

Speaking of stuff. More outdated stuff got boxed up and went to the storage warehouse today. I managed to clear off two entire shelves. Granted, this isn't huge progress, but it is something. If I can keep this up and continue to remove a little clutter every week, I may still meet my goal of having a clean office by the end of the year.

I've got a much more immediate goal for tomorrow. I need to get up two hours earlier than normal. I promised my friend Tom that I'd go to his next business networking breakfast when we had lunch last week and that breakfast happens to be tomorrow. It's been a long time since I said anything coherent at 7:30 in the morning, but I'll give it a shot. I've got to dress up nice as well. This shouldn't be a problem. I've got tons of business clothes that I never, ever wear. At any rate, it would be nice to make some new contacts. People like what I do. My doctors, my veterinarians, my contractors, my watchmaker and my old ad agency buddies have all become clients. I don't get out much though. Maybe it's time to meet some new people. Unfortunately, I don't have any business cards to pass out at the breakfast. When I ran out five years ago, I never bothered to reprint any.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 566 - Independence Day

I've taken so many pictures of flags that I could probably show you something patriotic on the Fourth of July for the rest of my life. One year, one of my clients based their entire advertising campaign around the idea of flags and I went all over Dallas, taking pictures of every flag I could find. Some of the pictures turned out pretty nice. I took this one on a highway overpass, looking back at the city just after sunset. Every time a large truck went by, the entire bridge shook. I remember thinking at the time that it was a lot easier taking pictures in an air conditioned studio.

The dogs got to enjoy yet another new dog park today. We thought this one would be real fancy, since it was located in the Park Cities, but it was basically just a large vacant lot with a fence around it. Dot and Dash didn't seem to care that the park was missing a few amenities. There were new things to smell and new places to pee. Dash chased birds for a while and Dot sunned herself. You can tell they enjoy these outings. It's just too bad that Dash doesn't travel better in the car. He's usually OK on the way home, but the outbound trip to someplace new is always stressful. Dash makes such a commotion that he's going to cause a wreck one of these days.

I keep hearing on TV that there is unprecedented interest in the Casey Anthony murder trial. I think I know why. There's absolutely nothing else on TV these days. When I turned on the television at breakfast this morning, every single channel was broadcasting the closing statements live. You couldn't avoid this trial if you wanted to.

I'm ready to box up some more things to take down to the storage warehouse, but I'm having trouble finding the boxes. I know that I saved the boxes, but they're way at the back of the warehouse, covered up by years of other things that were relegated to storage. I did such a good job of utilizing ever available inch of space in the storage unit that the place looks like a Rubic's Cube now. To rearrange things I have to remove boxes in just the right order or nothing will budge. I'm envious of those guys who have huge storage units that they turn into man caves. A man cave would be nice. It would have to be air conditioned though. My storage space is just a narrow, very hot little room filled with dusty boxes.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 565

I've got to rethink my approach to storing clothes. When I was getting dressed this morning, I realized that I'm wearing the same clothes over and over again. I have all my shirts and pants neatly stacked in the dresser drawers, but whenever I get something to wear, I always just pick something off the top of the stack. After I do the laundry, I put the clean clothes right back on top of the stack again. The clothes in the middle of the stack or the bottom never get worn at all. I pulled one of these stacks out of the dresser this morning and looked at it. It was like one of those core samples that geologists take before they start drilling for oil. It was easy to tell what I liked at different points in time. Some of the shirts near the bottom of the stack still had the store tags attached. They'd never been work at all. I thought briefly about turning all the stacks upside down, so I would start wearing the other clothes, but I'm such a creature of habit that I picked a shirt and pair of pants right off the top again.

The dogs are creatures of habit too. We took them to a brand new dog park today and from the way they acted in the car, you'd think we were taking them to Outer Mongolia. When we finally arrived however, the dogs were happy as could be. There were new smells to explore and new dogs to sniff. Their excitement was short lived unfortunately. It was so hot outside that both dogs were ready to go home again in less than ten minutes. We spent a lot longer getting to the dog park that we actually spent playing in the park.

Janet wanted me to fix one of her watches today, so when I got hers running again, I thought I'd get a few of my own running as well. I used to keep the entire collection wound and running, but eventually I realized that this was a giant waste of time and money. I got about ten watches running again today, including one that said it had to be sent back to the factory for battery replacement. When I opened the thing up, I realized why they put this warning in the instruction book. The watch had two batteries that were buried somewhere near the middle of the watch under a maze of tiny plates held together by even tinier springs and screws. Situations like this are why I don't open up watches as often as I used to. I frequently found myself in over my head and ruined a few perfectly good watches. I got this one fixed and put back together though. It took me half the afternoon, but I was determined not to destroy one of my favorites.

We're still trying to decide whether to walk the dogs in the neighborhood Fourth of July parade. Dot and Dash would be real cute dressed in something patriotic, but it's so hot outside that we're afraid that the pavement would burn their paws. We'll se how the weather is tomorrow.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 564

I'm starting to lust for gear again. Sometimes this gets a little expensive, but typically my ongoing desire for stuff has positive aspects as well. There is always a period when I am struggling to understand and learn how to use my new gear when I'm interested, engaged and at my most creative. I'll wake up in the morning with some new insight as to how the gear works and off I'll go, editing, recording and snapping pictures like there's no tomorrow. Songs get written, movies get made and entire gallery shows get mounted and framed. Eventually I master the new machine and begin to lose interest in it. The exciting new gear just becomes another boring tool that I work with to make a living. Eventually, it either breaks or becomes obsolete.

I love new things, but nothing stays new all that long. I see this commercial on TV almost every morning where some guy tells us that he loves making birdhouses and is taking care of his heart so he can continue to make birdhouses for the rest of his life. Is this guy nuts? I could never make birdhouses for the rest of my life. If I ever made a birdhouse, I'd probably spend four months making one perfect little home and then never make another one again. When I was finished, I'd probably realize that I didn't even like birds.

So what gear has caught my fancy this time? Those little GoPro cameras are pretty cool. These indestructible little bricks can be attached anywhere. You could attach one to your front bumper and film the trials and tribulations of rush hour traffic. You could pin one to a dog sweater and film your dog's walk from the dog's point of view. People who are into extreme sports love these things. Here's nothing extreme about my life at all, but I still might get a GoPro. There's a time lapse setting where you could compress an hour dog walk into two minutes of screen time. I could mount one to the bow of my kayak and film ducks and pelicans. I haven't taken the boat out in several years. Communing with nature doesn't interest me. Exercise doesn't interest me either. Making a movie however...now, that's another matter entirely.

I saw another ambulance down in the park this afternoon when I was taking the dogs on their evening walk. People are dropping like flies in this heat. I see fire department EMT crews responding to something in the park almost every week now. A couple of years ago in July, the dogs and I walked right past a guy sitting on a park bench looking out at the water. The guy didn't say anything to us, but that was pretty normal. When we were walking back home again, I noticed an EMT crew and several policemen surrounding the bench. The guy had dropped dead while he was just sitting there on the bench. I don't think I need any more reasons to stay inside and look for a good movie on TV.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day