Day 1638

When I was getting the water off the roof today, a code compliance car stopped in front of the house and an officer got out and asked what I was doing. "I'm getting the standing water off the roof from yesterday's rain," I said. "You can't flood a city street with water like that," the man told me. I tried to explain that water flows downhill and that the street was lower than any place in the yard. "The same thing happens when it rains," I told the man. "There is nowhere else for the water to go." I showed the man what I was doing and said that the water would all evaporate in about twenty minutes anyway. The code compliance guy seemed comfortable with my answer and wasn't going to write me a citation. As he prepared to drive off, he told me to hurry up because he didn't want anyone to complain. Sometimes I wish I lived way out in the country, about forty miles from anybody. City life has become way too complicated.

The entire day was like this. It was just a series of random events that didn't add up to much. I wrote a letter to my Luddite historian sister who still refuses to use the Internet. I meant to send her a birthday card in April, but somehow never got around to it. The letter was probably a futile effort anyway. When my sister does reply, it is with a incomprehensible hand written note that is almost impossible to decipher. I can't convince her to use a typewriter. Physicians writing prescriptions have better handwriting than this. She thinks that hand written notes are more personal though, even if nobody can read them.

The doctor who does write most of my prescriptions told me recently that I needed new lab work before he could renew my prescriptions again.  Really?  I stopped by his office on my way to the post office today just to make sure. I explained that I'd had a boatload of blood tests this Spring during my Hepatitis C treatment. This didn't appear to be good enough. They wanted their own tests. "Fine", I said. "Can we do them now?" Nope. They wanted me to fast. I need to go back again later this week  before I eat breakfast.

Every time I go up on the roof, I notice worn spots and I decided today that I'd better call the roofer to come out and inspect the roof. I feel the same way about dealing with roofers as I do about going to the dentist. I'd just as soon avoid this, but I know that if I wait until the roof actually leaks, the roofer will just tell me that I should have called him sooner, before things became a problem. When I made the call, the roofer was surprisingly responsive and friendly. No excuses whatsoever. He said he'd come out later in the week and take care of anything that might be a problem. Maybe I overthink things. I probably should have called the guy last month.

I'm trying to decide whether to change Dot's Thursday acupuncture appointment to tomorrow. I probably drive my vet crazy trying to avoid taking Dot out in the rain, but that's just the way it is. Dot used to be the only one with storm phobia. Now, Dash shares her fear of storms. I fear the disease may be spreading. Now, I think I may have acquired Dot's storm phobia as well. Of course, Janet thinks Dot got her fear of storms from me in the first place. It's one of those chicken and egg things.

Escher is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1637

The power went out as we were waking up this morning. Janet had to go to work with wet hair, since the power went out while she was in the shower. I had to stay home with storm phobic dogs, who seem to think a power outage is a sign that the end of the world is near. The storm was brief, but it packed a punch. When the cold front passed through and the rain stopped for a while, I was finally able to walk the dogs and immediately noticed large downed trees all over the park. We must have had some severe straight line winds during the storm. Despite all the damage in the park, none of the trees in our yard were damaged. We got lucky. The dogs got muddy, I ate a very late breakfast, and everything ended well. By 10 AM the power was back on again.

These periodic power outages are so common that I know the drill by heart now. I immediately call the power company on the land line to report the outage before the battery backup for the IP phone system goes out. You have to report the outage on the automated system using a land line, so the power company knows your location. This might have made sense back in the days when everyone used an old fashioned analog phone where the phone line provided the power.  Now, most people's phones go out when the power goes out. Strangely, if you report an outage using a cell phone, your location isn't identified at all. Luckily, I have a four hour battery backup on the IP phone system. After I call in the outage, I look for the camping lanterns, so we can find our way around, disconnect the alarm system, so it won't trigger an alarm when the power is reconnected, and turn off the air conditioner, so a power surge won't cause the power to go out again when electricity is restored. Finally, it's time for the most important thing: keeping the dogs calm.

When life eventually returned to normal, I fired up the computer and began my Monday website updates. The updates didn't take that long, so I still had time to finish doing my June invoices and take them to the post office before the rain started again. It continued to rain off and on for the rest of the day. We got another break in the rain around dinner time, so the dogs were able to have their evening walk as well.

Dash's radiation treatments are finished, but Monday, Wednesday, and Friday are still chemotherapy days. After dinner, I put Dot in the bedroom, get out my purple rubber chemo gloves and place Dash's three chemo pills in a dog food meatball. After Dash takes his pills, I clean the gloves with alcohol and put them away until the next time. I can't imagine that the pills are really this dangerous, but I'm just following directions.

It looks like it's going to be sunny tomorrow. I hope so. Maybe I can clear the water off the roof and get caught up on work again. Even though I don't like rain, I'll have to admit that rainy days are good for flower pictures. The soft light is just about perfect.

Liberty is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1636

I hooked up the Roku streaming stick to the TV this morning. It worked. I was curious how this little gizmo could offer so many channels for free and it didn't take me long to find out. The first free channel I added was PBS. When I tried to use the channel, I got a message saying that I had to provide my e-mail address before the channel could be activated. So, that's how it works! Now, the never ending pledge drives on PBS will wind up in my e-mail Inbox as well. Sure enough, the next time I checked my e-mail, there was already a message from PBS asking for a donation. I'm sure the other free channels work the same way. Before they can be activated, you probably have to agree to let advertisers send you e-mail spam. Personally, this is not a big deal to me. I already get such a monumental amount of spam every day that I won't even notice a little more.

I went back to the gym this afternoon. I think Sunday is my favorite day to workout. The place is never crowded on Sundays and since Janet is usually home, I don't have to worry about leaving the dogs alone for long periods of time. I can easily see myself going to the gym more often in the future. It's not a bad way to kill time and my doctors have told me that exercise is just as important as my diet.

It's probably good to get out of the house on Sundays anyway. When I'm home I tend to find myself doing things like cleaning toilets and knocking down wasp nests. I did both of those things today, along with adding those 56 new dogs and cats to the animal rescue website. As you can probably guess, it was hot and muggy outside today. It rained a little bit in the morning but it all turned to steam by afternoon. No mowing the grass today. I even dealt with the wasp nests under the eaves from the inside by opening windows and knocking them down with a stick.

I'm still having a hard time keeping Dash's tail from bleeding. As soon as the cut area at the tip of the tail starts to heal, he shakes or wags really hard, typically banging the tail against a wall which starts the bleeding all over again. My vet says that bandaging the tail isn't a really good idea, since it could cut off circulation. Janet found a couple of tail protecting devices on the Internet, but they seemed way too complicated. I couldn't leave anything on his tail while I was gone anyway, because he might chew it off and eat it. There's always the cone of shame, but Dot and Dash absolutely hate wearing the cone. I'll save that as a last resort.

Who knows what I'll be doing this week. It's still a mystery to me. I'm typically crazy busy at the first of the year. Things always slow down a bit during the Summer and than I get busy again in the Fall. That's the way it's been for as long as I can remember. I used to spend my Summers worrying that the Defender 90 would overheat in traffic and leave me stranded. Sometimes it did. Hopefully the new car will eliminate that concern for at least a year or two. I've got a birthday coming up pretty soon, but at my age birthdays aren't as exciting as they used to be. Wouldn't it be nice if after a certain age, you just started getting younger again. I'm already tired of getting older.

Lacey is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1635

Today was for the dogs. They both got a nice walk early this morning while the temperature was cooler and there was still a breeze. Later in the day, we took them to a party. Every Summer, our Wednesday training class has a big party with games for the dogs and barbecue for the people. The fried chicken and ribs were especially good today, since out meal was catered by Babe's. Any local will tell you that Babe's Chicken Dinner House has the best fried chicken anywhere. Their ribs are pretty good too.

Dot used to love the running events, but she doesn't run very fast or very far anymore. She enjoyed sitting quietly in the grass while we fed her little pieces of chicken as the other dogs ran. Dash is the social butterfly in the family, so we really go to this party for him. He loves seeing all the other dogs and excels at his favorite event: bobbing for bones. The object of this game is to see which dog is fastest at retrieving, and of course eating, six large dog biscuits that are sitting in the middle of a plastic kiddie pool filled with water. Dash got all the biscuits in 23 seconds this year, which was good enough for a ribbon. After all he's been through with the cancer treatments this Spring, it was nice to see him acting like a normal dog and having fun again

The barbecue and fried chicken I ate this afternoon was the first time I've had a big lunch for well over a year. The food was great, and even though I didn't eat that much, I was full for the rest of the day. I didn't feel like eating dinner tonight at all. I had a small salad and that was plenty. I don't think I'll ever go back to eating three meals a day anymore. It's too much food.

I got a Roku streaming stick for the TV today. It was pretty cheap, so I thought I'd give it a try. I'm getting so sick of paying huge cable bills for 100's of channels I don't even like that I'm wondering if there a way to pull the plug on cable altogether. I already have Hulu, but it would be nice to have access to other things using WiFi as well. If I discontinued cable entirely, I would lose my land line phone too, but as far as I'm concerned, that would be no great loss. Absolutely nobody calls us on the land line phone anymore. We still get plenty of robocalls and telemarketers though. If there's a local election on the horizon, the robocalls are relentless. Since I work at home, I get really sick of telemarketers. It seems weird to actually pay someone for the privilege of getting calls you don't want in the first place. That's what the world has come to. The post office delivers junk mail. The phone company delivers telemarketers. And the cable company delivers hundreds of worthless channels that you will never even watch.

I'm not sure what I'll do tomorrow. If I'm smart, I'll get an early start on the week's website work. I received 56 new dogs and cats to add to an animal rescue site this afternoon. That's a lot of work in Photoshop and Dreamweaver. I'm a realist though. 56 new HTML pages still beats mowing the grass.

Domino is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1634

A friend shamed me into going to a Hallmark Card store today. I'm not really a greeting card person. I don't send them and rarely receive them. I felt guilty though. A former co-worker had gotten very sick and since I could barely remember who this person was, I felt even worse. I looked through the cards and couldn't find anything that seemed right. I never can. The cards either seem too emotional, too disrespectful, or all too often, something only a fan of Duck Dynasty would appreciate. I usually just end up getting a blank card with a picture of a dog on the front. A blank card wouldn't really work in this case, since I didn't know the person that well and wasn't really sure what to say. I was looking for a card that said what I would have said if I hadn't already erased this entire work experience from my memory. It took me forever to find a nice simple get well card that I wouldn't be embarrassed to send. Maybe this is why I hate going into Hallmark stores.

I do still enjoy going out to breakfast on Friday mornings and this is probably what put me near a Hallmark store in the first place. I'm still amazed at how nice the baristas and waiters treat me at the restaurant, since I rarely speak a word. I just eat my meal quietly, staring out the window and wondering about the things I'm seeing. I wonder why so many people wear nylon running shoes everywhere they go. People seem to love these ugly shoes whether they run or not. I still prefer heavy leather Red Wing work boots. These boots are virtually indestructible and I almost always wear them while I'm walking the dogs. Heavy boots kill two birds with one stone for me. They're kind of like wearing leg weights and can can turn an ordinary walk into a decent workout. They also keep my socks dry on wet days and provide a certain amount of protection against snakes. I was the only person in the restaurant wearing work boots though. Everyone else was wearing running shoes.

Even sillier than running shoes are the tight spandex outfits that male cyclists wear. There are always lots of bicycles at the restaurant and every one of them seems to be owned by a middle aged male with a shaved head, wearing a ludicrous spandex suit plastered with cycling logos. I don't get it. You guys aren't riding in the Tour de France, you're just having a burrito for breakfast.

Really, very little makes sense to me these days. I just do the best I can. My utility bills keep going up. Today, AT&T U-Verse joined the electric and gas companies in raising their rates. The rent for my storage warehouse is going up too. Gas is almost $4.00 a gallon and every time I go to the grocery store I seem to pay a little more for exactly the same things I got last week. These people who continue to say that we have no inflation are idiots.

The dogs get to go to a party tomorrow. Our training class is having their annual summer party. Dash enjoys playing a game called "bobbing for biscuits" where the dogs try to grab as many dog biscuits as they can out of a kiddie pool filled with water. Dot is much too dignified for this sort of game. She'd prefer that we just feed her some of the tasty barbecued brisket we always have at the party.

Wendy is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1633

I learned how to brush Dot's teeth correctly today. How could I have been doing it wrong for all these years? Every Dalmatian we have ever had has hated having their teeth brushed. They either immediately eat all the toothpaste off the brush, run away, or grab the entire brush and start chewing on it. Today, I was amazed to see Dot sit calmly in the exam room and let the vet slowly and carefully brush each of her teeth. I've been told for years about how important it is to brush your dog's teeth after you have them cleaned at the vet. I usually try for a month or so, and then just give up. Maybe this time it will be different. If I can learn to duplicate what my vet showed me today, brushing Dot and Dash's teeth should be a piece of cake.

I wasn't very busy today. I should have gone and had lunch with someone like I used to do in the old days. The problem is that I don't eat lunch anymore. Even the thought of eating something at lunch time turns my stomach. I don't know exactly when this happened, but I haven't enjoyed lunch for quite a while now. A big breakfast and a light dinner seem to be plenty for me now. The odd thing is that I don't even miss catching up with former co-workers anymore. What's there to talk about anyway? I'm not really interested in everybody's grandchildren, I haven't been to Barcelona or Paris lately, and I'm not planning on remodeling my house. I probably have more in common with the millennials living in their parent's basement than I do with people my own age.

Many of my local clients seem frustrated that their websites aren't bringing them the customers they expected. I don't know what to tell them. When everybody is on the Internet, nobody is special. Websites have become a commodity. Maybe you get lucky and do something amazing and your site starts trending. A few days later everyone has forgotten about you again. There's just too much out there. The internet has become a "pay to play" environment, just like modern television and print. Old fashioned SEO strategies are largely irrelevant these days. If you're a retailer and want to get noticed, you buy advertising on Yelp or Angie's List. That's just the way it is.

I can't believe that Pope Francis is telling people that having dogs and cats instead of children is all wrong. I was a big fan of this new Pope until I heard this. He says that people who choose animals over kids will spend their old age bitter and lonely without the companionship of their children to comfort them. Maybe this is true for some people, but it hasn't been my experience. I know several senior citizens who openly prefer the companionship of a loyal dog or cat to dealing with squabbling siblings fighting over who gets what in the will. I just wish that our pets lived longer. I'm always sad when an old person's dog dies and leaves them alone. Despite what the Pope says, a good dog is about the best companion you could possibly wish for.

Scooby is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1632

I got a letter in the mail from the local social security office today reminding me that I was approaching full retirement age and suggesting that I apply for social security benefits online. Applying online is safer, faster, and easier the letter said. I would have appreciated this friendly reminder a lot more if it weren't for the fact that I'd already applied for social security online well over a month ago. Apparently a month is not long enough to get on their radar yet. Lord knows how long this process actually takes, or when they will discover that I have applied already. Hopefully the process is not as long or confusing as applying for medicare. For the first six months after I began receiving medicare, they rejected all the claims my doctors sent them, telling them that medicare was not my primary insurance.

When I was finally able to find a real person with enough knowledge to sort things out, I discovered that since medicare had not received a formal notice from my "employer" that I had retired, they just assumed that I was still working and was covered by group insurance. I told them that I was self employed and didn't have an employer. I was my own employer. This seemed to be a strange concept to grasp for bureaucrats who had spent their entire lives having a boss and working for someone else. They didn't seem to understand that being self employed and unemployed were two different things entirely. Eventually, the medicare problems were worked out and I suppose eventually I will start receiving social security checks as well. You just can't have very high expectations when the government is involved.

I found time to go to the gym today and it felt good to get back on a regular workout schedule again. I was surprised at how crowded the gym was on a Wednesday afternoon. I suppose the weather had something to do with it. The temperatures are already in the 90's in the afternoons. It's been very humid this week too. I think the cool Spring days where people would rather stay outside are over.

I saw my first wasp nest of the season tucked away under the eaves of the house. This means that for the rest of the Summer, I will be constantly trying to knock these things down before they grow too large and become a danger. If you leave these nests alone, they grow to huge proportions and become a home for hundreds of wasps. The mosquitoes seem bad this year too. At least the dead possum in the neighbor's yard is gone. I don't know what happened to it, but I certainly didn't touch it.

I'm having trouble deciding whether the dogs enjoy going back to training class on Wednesday evenings. Dot is too old and tired to do many of the activities she used to excel at and Dash just wants to play with the other dogs. Although neither dog appears to enjoy the "training" aspect of the class anymore, they both still enjoy getting out of the house and doing something different. Dot sits out the difficult exercises now and Dash seems to have forgotten how to sit, but I guess we'll keep going.

Tomorrow is Dot's acupuncture and physical therapy day. I moved her appointment from Wednesday to Thursday because I thought physical therapy plus training class might be too much for her. She might have been just fine though, since she spent most of tonight's class sitting under a tree.

Daisy is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1631

I spent the day getting unsatisfactory answers to some very reasonable questions. How long has it been since you called someone and found a real person on the line who could actually answer your question? It's a pretty safe bet that the larger the organization, the longer you're going to wait. I will only call a government agency when I have plenty of time on my hands. I just put the phone on speaker and continue working on the computer until someone finally answers. Often the wait time is up to an hour. Today I only had to wait thirty five minutes. There were other calls as well. I was perplexed when I got another bill today for auto insurance that I'd already paid for less than a month ago. I sold a car recently, so I thought it was reasonable that I should be getting some money back. Nope! When I called my agent, he told me that I lost my multi-car discount when I sold the second car, so my rate had actually increased. Go figure. You really can't win these days.

I like repairing things, so I was delighted to pick up my favorite winter jacket from the tailor this afternoon and discover that it was good as new again. Earlier this Winter, the neighbor's dog had ripped the arm of the jacket when it tried to bite me. This is a very weird dog. It likes Janet, but always tries to bite me when I am unlucky enough to encounter it without a leash in the back alley. It should never be off a leash, but occasionally it gets loose. The dog is well trained and if I am quick enough to say "sit" or "stay" before it bites me, it always obeys. Sometimes I'm not quick enough though. To their credit, the neighbors offered to pay for the jacket, but I told them to forget about it and just try to keep the dog inside their fence when I walk Dot and Dash down the alley.

I paid a bunch of bills today and it got me wondering about what I was going to cut back on when I finally did retire. A social security check isn't even going to begin to pay these bills. I'm not sure what I could live without either. On some days, I could toss it all. Other days, I feel like hanging on to everything. I used to think that my IRA account would take care of me pretty well, but that was before the big financial meltdown of 2008. One more big crash like this and all bets are off. I'm pretty frugal, but I'm terrible at predicting the future. Even though I'm a very pessimistic person, I always think the future is going to be better than it actually turns out to be.

If the weather is nice tomorrow, we'll go back to dog training class again. I've moved Dot's acupuncture and water therapy session from Wednesday to Thursday, so the underwater treadmill workout won't make her too tired for class. She was pretty slow when we took her back to class a few weeks ago, but I think she still enjoys going. Dot and Dash are still active and energetic on their early morning walks, but go to sleep again as soon as they return home. I worry that I may have overworked them until I get out their dinner bowls. As soon as they hear food related noises, they both instantly spring to life again.

Maybe I'll go to the gym tomorrow. If today was any indication, there certainly isn't much reason to sit at this computer all day.

Freckles is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1630

The long awaited SXSW Cookbook arrived in today's mail. The book was printed in China, which might explain why it took so long to be published. The well designed, hard cover cookbook looked absolutely beautiful. It was well worth waiting for and I was proud to be included. I am without a doubt, the least famous person in the star studded book, which seemed to include recipes by every millionaire start-up tycoon in Silicon Valley. My recipe is simple and unpretentious. So were my talks when I was asked to be a presenter at SXSW back in the 90's. I'm still kind of amazed to be included among this compilation of A-list multimedia luminaries. I need to save this book. It proves that for a brief moment in time, I was a mover and shaker too.

Today was certainly simple and unpretentious. I wrote two press releases, balanced my checkbook, and picked up some more phenobarbital for Dash at the vet. I got up early to take advantage of the still cool mornings. It's getting too hot for long walks in the afternoons, but I like to make sure that Dot and Dash get at least one good outing before the park turns into a humid furnace.

I read an article today that said Leptospirosis vaccinations for dogs were not effective and maybe even dangerous. This was unsettling, because Dash just got his annual Leptospirosis shot last week. I am increasingly frustrated by a lack of consensus about just about everything in this world. You can pick just about any subject and find well reasoned, but radically diverging viewpoints. Nobody agrees about anything these days, especially when it comes to medicine. I have yet to read the definitive article about what causes diabetes. People can't even agree on whether sugar is the culprit. Nobody can agree on the best food to feed your dog, whether eating wheat and grains is OK, or whether vitamins and supplements do anything at all. I know vegans, people who swear by a Paleo diet, and people who eat whatever they want. All of them think they're right. It's even worse when the subject is politics. I'm convinced that this once great melting pot of a country will remain hopelessly divided for the rest of my life.

I've completely given up on people, but I do wish that everyone could agree on what is best for dogs. Dogs don't get to choose their own healthcare plan, so I think we owe it to them to look out for their best interests. I always want to do what is best for my dogs, but occasionally it occurs to me that everything I know about dogs is just somebody else's opinion. Vets used to says that dogs needed rabies shots every year. Now, it's every three, or in some cases, five years. Is this why Spot got cancer?  I'll probably never know for sure. Doctors will probably never completely agree about my own health either. The playing field is always changing.

In an uncertain world, I would appreciate a calm and uneventful Tuesday. I've grown tired of all the drama and disagreement. To get this uneventful day off to a good start, a big bowl of oatmeal would be just fine.

Abby is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1629

I saw a dead possum in the neighbor's yard while I was mowing the grass this morning. I wonder what killed it? It didn't look like it had gotten run over by a car, so I began to suspect poison. I'm always worried about the dogs getting into something poisonous. Lots of the neighbors put out rat poison and insecticide. Others use powerful herbicides to control weeds. The park maintenance crews often use herbicides themselves. The park has its share of crazy people as well. I wouldn't be surprised to discover that someone had put out poison just to harm animals. At any rate, I try my best to make sure the dogs don't eat anything in the park. I can keep them away from most things, but I'm having trouble with all the horse poop in the park. Horse poop is disgusting, but I guess it's pretty safe. Especially if you see it come out of the horse. Dash loves to eat horse poop. It is a never ending battle to keep him away from the stuff.

The yard looks nice now. I mowed both the front and the back today. I've been postponing mowing the back yard until the roots on the new St. Augustine grass got fully established. The grass needed to be mowed however, since it had already grown taller than the Liriope ground cover. If the roots aren't firmly established by now, they probably never will be. After the grass was looking nice, I tried to find the remaining creeping vines that almost strangled the trees last summer. These vines are everywhere and wrap around tree trunks and branches, creeping up the tree until they have totally taken over. I think I've ripped up most of the vines, but they'll all be back by July.

Today turned out to be a good day to go to the gym. Most of the machines I typically use were empty and there was nobody using the basketball court. I think there were only five other people in the entire gym. I've gotten back to the point where where I can do my full workout again. Next step is to try and do this more than once a week. Three times a week would be ideal, but I'm still too busy for that. Work has slowed down a bit though, so twice a week ought to be pretty easy now. Maybe this Wednesday would be a good day to start.

I got gas today and noticed that the price had gone up again. I got a letter yesterday telling me that the rent on my storage warehouse will be going up again when my contract comes up for renewal. Prices for everything keep going up and up, but I get nothing but grief when I try to raise my own prices. Probably this just proves that people need gasoline for their cars and warehouse space a lot more than they need writing. The storage warehouse folks could probably charge whatever they want. I think I'm the only long term customer they have. Just about everyone else rents for a month or two when they're desperate for space. People that just moved to town or just got divorced seemed to like storage warehouses. I've had my space forever though. There have been five different managers of the warehouse since I first started storing stuff away that I couldn't bear to part with.

It's hard to believe that it's June already. The dogs got their monthly heartworm pill this morning. The air has started to turn hot and muggy and insects abound. The Summer heat is brutal and lots of things break. You always hope that your air conditioner keeps working during the Summer months though. The air conditioner is essential.

Charlie is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1628

Sometimes I wonder what is going to happen on Day 2000, or Day 5000. On any given day, what I write is trivial, but I keep on writing for the same reason I keep doing a lot of things. I always think that if I just continue doing what I'm doing a little longer, it will eventually add up to something. Maybe it will in this case. How many people have even attempted to document every single day of their life? Probably not many. I've only been doing this for about five years and I'm already starting to see subtle changes in the way I think and act. Maybe you are too.

Aging is a tricky business. At first you deny it. Then you fight it. Finally, you embrace it. I spent so many years in advertising that I probably held on to my youth for much longer than I should have. It's a business where youth is worshiped and age is discarded. In my early thirties, we always used to wonder where they put the 40 year old ad guys out to pasture. We never saw any. If you wanted to keep your job and prosper, you needed to figure out how to stay young.

I find that I no longer care what people think of me or how old I might appear. I've become one of those people who talks back to the television, drives slower than the rest of the traffic, and feels no shame in wearing the same shirt for days at a time. In the beginning I briefly thought that having a blog might help my business. Later, I entertained the idea that I was a humor writer who always saw the glass as half empty. Now, I realize that what I'm doing is accurately describing the aging process, one day at a time. If you only read the blog sporadically, it probably seems like an Andy Warhol movie. Nothing seems to happen. If you started reading on Day 1 and continue reading until the end, you might discover something quite remarkable. On the other hand, you might discover nothing at all. Like I said, aging is a tricky business.

Today, I opened a check from a client and discovered that it wasn't all there. I'd been shortchanged. Either this client is having money problems and couldn't send me any more this month, or they're just fucking with me. Either way, it's not a good sign. I wish money was no longer an issue, but I'm afraid it always will be. Globalization has changed everything. A few people have been able to make the transition and everyone else is fighting over table scraps. The way I see things, if you don't lose your job to someone in a third world country who is willing to work for pennies, you will be replaced by a robot.

I will never be replaced by a robot, but my writing and photography efforts have certainly been marginalized by a sea of people who have turned my profession into their own hobby. Everyone is creative these days. It's hard to compete with that. I shouldn't complain though. I'm much healthier than I ever though I'd be five years ago. I've got two great dogs. Janet seems to tolerate me. And even though the market is terrible, my financial advisor tells me that I still stand a reasonable chance of outliving my savings.

I don't believe him of course, because I know he always sees the glass as half full. Who knows what will really happen? It's all a crap shoot as far as I'm concerned. I guess you'll have to keep reading to find out.

Amy is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1627

The day started out well. We had a nice walk this morning and there were even patches of blue sky, instead of the predicted rain. I had a fabulous breakfast at my favorite restaurant, got groceries for the weekend, and then returned home to begin the day's work. I made surprisingly good progress on several writing assignment and even thought I might have time to go to the gym this afternoon. Then I hit the save button in my open Microsoft Word document and nothing happened. I kept getting a message saying that I didn't have the right permissions to save anything to my own hard drive.

This has happened before. For a computer system that is supposed to be as effortless and trouble free as a Mac, permissions problems are surprisingly frequent. It's a lot harder to repair a drive or a volume than it used to be too. Life was so much easier when you could just slap the appropriate CD in a slot and repair your drive locally. Now you have to re-boot your computer holding the option key down and select a special online disk repair utility. When you re-boot this way, the computer doesn't recognize any of your stored passwords, so I had to search all over the office for my WiFi password before I could even access the handy fix-it tools hidden away in the cloud. It took me forever to find this unnecessarily long and extremely easy to forget password, but eventually I was able to get online, find the repair utility and repair my hard drive. I never did figure out why my disk permissions had gone bad in the first place, but I wouldn't be surprised if Google or Amazon had something to do with it. According to my Little Snitch application,  these two snoopy companies are constantly trying to access my data. By the time I finally managed to repair and save my hastily written Microsoft Word file, it was pointless to go to the gym. It was almost time to feed the dogs again.

I'm seeing a lot more bunnies and baby ducks this Spring. I suspect this means that the neighborhood coyote pack has moved on to greener pastures. One year the coyotes had their den in a dense grove of trees near our house and they decimated the small animal population in the park. I would see duck and bunny carcasses almost every morning. Sometimes the pack would wake me up in the middle of the night when they were making a kill. It was kind of spooky. I like that the owls and hawks feed on the ubiquitous mice and rats in the park, but I would just as soon see the coyotes go elsewhere. If the new neighborhood cat knew about the coyotes, it would definitely want to be an indoor cat.

It seems like it should be a holiday weekend since is so near the end of the month, but I guess that was last weekend. I'm not sure what I'll do tomorrow. I could always clean the house, pull weeds, or stock up on toilet paper at Sam's Club, but I hope I find something more exciting to do.

Ollie is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1626

We all keep getting healthier. Dot had dental x-rays today and got years of tartar removed from her teeth. There were no abscesses and no teeth needed to be pulled. Now that Dot and Dash both have clean, pretty teeth, I'm the only one who still needs to go to the dentist. I'm always a little worried when Dot needs to go under anesthesia, since she's so old, but she did fine. She even took a walk this evening.

I got a call from one of the nurses at the liver center saying that my hemoglobin and blood platelet levels had all returned to normal. I won't need another blood test until July. Now that Dot's seizures and muscle atrophy has been stabilized, Dash's cancer is either in remission or entirely gone, and I have been cured of Hepatitis C, my faith in doctors and veterinarians has been renewed. It's really been a pretty remarkable Spring.

I managed to get quite a bit done today while I was waiting for Dot's dental procedure to be completed. I finished a rather lengthy article, retouched some images for a client in Photoshop, and did several loads of laundry. You notice how I lump my creative efforts in with doing the laundry? It's all the same to me. I do think I'm a good commercial writer, but my work appears on cereal boxes and in the junk mail you receive. You can't really take it too seriously.

I think I've figured out why the new cat in the neighborhood wants to spend so much time in our yard. This morning while I was walking Dash, I saw one of the regular neighborhood alley cats chase the new cat at full speed all the way down the alley, hissing all the way. Apparently all the existing alley cats have their own territories and don't tolerate interlopers well. They don't like the new cat and want to keep all the mice and rats to themselves. The new cat apparently thinks our yard is a safe zone, since the alley cats don't come here. The little cat should have asked the alley cats why they don't come here. Sorry, little cat. No safe zone here either. Your new owners need to keep you indoors.

The weather forecast has been wrong every day this week. Severe weather and thunderstorms have been predicted every single day, but so far we've only had a few light showers. This has been great news for me. I managed to get all my important out-of-the office errands completed without the worry of hail damage to my car, or a stray tornado hitting the house. If we can just keep this dry streak going for one more day, I might be able to enjoy my regular Friday breakfast outing as well.

I'm not sure what I'll be working on tomorrow. I'm just sure it's going to be Friday. That's enough for me.

Emmitt is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1625

Medicine gives my life structure. The doctors, veterinarians, pharmacists, and technicians have become my equivalent of co-workers. I've seen some of these people periodically for many years. A few have even become clients. These people know me by name and we exchange the same kind of banter that regular co-workers do on a coffee break. The blood tests are becoming less frequent now. Dash and I have both moved on. I had a routine blood test at the liver center this morning, just to make sure my hemoglobin levels were returning to normal. Pretty soon, these tests will cease completely. You'd think I'd be delighted to put this all behind me, but even though I'm delighted that Dash and I are getting better, I'm going to miss the interaction. I like asking questions and learning something new. That's what you do with doctors and pharmacists. You ask lots of questions.

The neighbor's cat returned to our yard again today and drove the dogs crazy. Our neighborhood is filled with feral cats. Most of them learned to avoid dogs years ago, so it's still rare to actually have a cat in the yard. You'd think that one little cat couldn't cause so much chaos, but Dot and Dash have always seen a cat as a sign of the apocalypse. I had to remove the cat from the yard three times before it decided to look for mice elsewhere. It's a friendly little cat and I don't want the dogs to hurt it. I wish the neighbors wanted to keep their new pet indoors, but they obviously don't. You can't really convince people that having a barn cat in the city isn't right. If they think their cat is happier outdoors, you're not going to convince them otherwise. These outdoor/indoor cats do seem to enjoy roaming around and catching mice and birds. Unfortunately, my dogs enjoy catching cats. Dalmatians seem slow to learn that the cat usually has the upper hand in a confrontation. I had to take Spot, our first Dalmatian, to the vet several times when he got too close to a cat and it scratched him on the nose.

I'm pretty much caught up with work again. I checked the article I wrote yesterday for spelling errors and submitted it for publication. I made some minor website updates and uploaded them to the server. That was about it. The remainder of the day was spent going to the bank, picking up prescriptions, and dealing with the curious cat in the yard.

Although the forecast predicted rain again, it was actually pretty dry today. There were lots of dark clouds, but most of the thunderstorms went either to the North or the South of us. Since it was pretty dry, I went up on the roof and removed the standing water. This almost guarantees that it will rain again tomorrow, but I can't leave the water up there too long. Standing water is a breeding ground for mosquitoes and I don't want my house to become a source for West Nile Virus in the neighborhood.

Dot gets her teeth cleaned tomorrow. This means she has to fast tonight and won't get the usually treats just before bed. We'll drop her off at the vet early tomorrow morning and if things go well, she'll return with sparkling white teeth by mid-afternoon. Hopefully, this will be the last vet procedure that either dog will need for a while.

Sam is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1624

I got up early to walk the dogs before Dash's 8:30 AM vet appointment. Although the skies looked dark and foreboding during the entire walk, we hardly got wet at all. Just a few sprinkles. No rain during the trip to the vet either. We got lucky. Dash is now current on all his vaccinations and should only have to go to the vet once a month for routine chemotherapy blood tests.

Today was busier than I expected. I completed a big website revision and returned to writing again, completing my first new article in over a week. It's good to stay busy as long as you're not too busy. Today was just about right.

Sometimes I wonder whether the Internet is increasing knowledge and awareness at all. Lately, it seems that our interconnected world is just providing a forum for idiots to find their soulmates. Today, I followed two different threads on Facebook that would have been hard to take seriously if it weren't for the hundreds of people who fervently seemed to believe them. One thread was filled with people claiming that airplanes never crashed into the world trade center towers and that the entire event was an elaborate illusion created by the CIA using holographic projections of commercial aircraft coordinated by a nearby invisible B2 bomber. I'm not making this stuff up. Next was an old thread that resurfaces every once in a while, claiming that the moon landings were a hoax and that Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin never went to the moon at all. Why do people love conspiracies so much?  It's been around forever. Kennedy was assassinated by the mafia. All new advances in technology have been reverse engineered from wreckage found in the Roswell flying saucer. I was shocked to read recently that almost 40% of the world's population don't even believe the Holocaust ever happened. I guess it's not surprising that Duck Dynasty, The Kardashians, and monster truck shows are so popular. We're doomed.

I try not to get involved in arguments about whether we went to the moon, or if there were dinosaurs on Noah's ark. It's just not worth it. If I can't even convince the dogs that the cat they're obsessed with had left the yard, how am I going to convince someone that there's nothing worth looking at in Area-51? The ironic thing is that conspiracies do exist. We just don't seem to care about the real ones. I'm sure that the NSA knows much, much more about all of us than we could ever imagine. We did go to the moon though.

If I don't make an appointment to go to the dentist within the next month, I need to have my head examined. Despite brushing several times a day and using a water pic, I've still got a tooth that bothers me. I've also got a persistent metallic taste in my mouth, but I don't think that has anything to do with dental hygiene. The metallic taste is probably a side effect of the Metformin I take to control blood sugar. I wonder if I even need to take Metformin anymore? I've dramatically cut back on my sugar intake during the past year. Who knows if I am even at risk for developing diabetes? My blood chemistry is close to perfect now. I am at risk for needing a root canal though. Remind me to make a dental appointment soon.

Libby is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1623 - Memorial Day

It was not an eventful day. It rained sporadically, but not nearly as much as I expected. Janet ignored the holiday and went in to work. I tried to ignore the fact that I didn't have much work. I added some new cats an animal rescue website, but that was about it. This task only took a couple of hours, so there was still plenty of time to wonder what to do with the day.

At one point, I got so bored that I took a camera out in the back yard and photographed squirrels. They looked exactly the same as all the other squirrels I've photographed though. Nothing new here. I thought about getting the guitar out of the closet and seeing what I remembered, but the dogs were restless, so I took them on a surprise mid-day walk instead. Since the weather was cool, they both enjoyed the additional activity. Even Dot seemed strong today.

It would have been a good day to go to the gym, if I hadn't just been yesterday. Any time I've gone two days in a row, I usually regret it the next morning. Exercise is great, but the last thing I want to do now is dislocate my shoulder or throw my back out again. If work doesn't pick up again soon, they'll be plenty of time to return to the gym later this week.

I kind of wish we'd had our severe weather today, since I was prepared for it. The bad weather isn't over yet, unfortunately. The rain just got postponed and should arrive tomorrow or Wednesday. If it's going to rain tomorrow, I hope it waits until I get Dash back from the vet. He's got an early appointment tomorrow morning.

I thought that the park would be packed with picnickers since today was a holiday. It was relatively empty though. Maybe everybody else was expecting severe weather as well. If you listened to last night's weather report on TV, the last thing you'd probably want to plan today was a barbecue in the park.

We'll see what happens tomorrow. Dash gets a Leptospirosis vaccination. I'll probably just get oatmeal. If it does rain, I hope there's no thunder and lightning. Dot doesn't need that kind of stress at her age. Whatever happens, we'll work on making it a calm, peaceful day. I've learned that when the dogs are happy, I'm a lot happier too.

Chief is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1622

On my way to the gym on Sunday, I often listen to the TED Radio Hour in the car. The show starts at 2 PM, and by coincidence, that's usually when I leave for the gym. TED talks are one of the few things I continually find interesting. TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, and Design, but these wide ranging talks can be about virtually anything. I always learn something. I wish there was a station that ran these talks non-stop, because they are a lot more interesting than listing to Hip Hop, old 80's rock, or ads from mattress stores. Today's talk was about fear and I listened to a fascinating conversation with astronaut Chris Hadfield as he explained what it was like to be strapped to the top of a rocket when the odds were about 1 in 35 that it would explode.

The odds were much better that I'd have a good workout today. I'm getting stronger now. I'm sure that having a fully functioning liver again helps. If I can manage to find the time to get back to my goal of three good workouts a week, I imagine I'll really start seeing some progress. Something is always better than nothing though, so for the moment, I'm trying to make the most of my once a week schedule.

I wrote my monthly essay for my writers group this afternoon. Why this afternoon? Well, the deadline was today. Like I've said many times, I'm very deadline oriented. Without a deadline, I'd probably do nothing. I'm skeptical of people who tell me that they are motivated by simply loving what they are doing. That isn't enough for me. I need a deadline, combined with the fear of public humiliation, to find the motivation I need.

The neighbor's new cat returned to our yard this morning. It's a shame that Dot has such a strong prey drive, since the little cat is very friendly. I think it has decided that it would rather live with us than with the people next door who adopted it. I've got to figure out how to convince the neighbors to keep their new cat indoors. If this is going to be an outdoor cat that is attracted to our yard, Dot will eventually hurt the cat, or hurt herself. She is much too old and frail to be chasing cats.

We had burgers and home made potato salad for dinner. It seemed like a perfect meal for a three-day weekend. I'll be the first to admit that I've led a fairly sheltered life. Like many baby boomers, I spent my life living between major wars and never served in the armed services. The period between the Vietnam War and the post-9/11 wars in Iraq and Afghanistan was probably the longest period of extended peace in our country's history. It's easy for people like me to forget what this Memorial Day holiday really means. My parents both served proudly in World War II. They had something most of my own generation lacks. Patriotism wasn't just a word to them, it was a way of life. In honor of their service and of the service of the thousands who continued to fight and die after them, I hope that we can all agree to start treating our veterans better. It is simply unbelievable to me that prisoners at Guantanamo Bay receive better medical care than many of our own veterans. Maybe this Memorial Day holiday, we can finally decide as a country that the time has come to do much, much better.

Ranger is today's Dalmatian of the Day

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