Day 1651

We got off to a slow start this morning, due to a passing thunderstorm. As usual, the dogs expected me to make the rain stop, so they could stay on their regular schedule. There's an order to things that must not be violated. Janet feeds them breakfast, goes to work, and then it's time for me to take them on their morning walk. Only after they have returned and gone to sleep on the bed is it OK for me to do something else. I let them outside several times this morning to show them it was raining pretty hard. This apparently wasn't good enough. My plan was to eat my own breakfast first, in hopes that the rain would stop by the time I was finished. Dot and Dash seemed to think I was just doing this to irritate them and barked at me the entire time I was eating. Eventually the rain did stop around 10 AM and the dogs got their walk. After that, everything was normal again.

It's time to renew the storage warehouse for another year. This is another big expense I don't really need. I wish I was motivated enough to start selling the contents of the warehouse one-by-one on eBay. I don't like the whole process of selling things though. The worst part about selling something is that you have to connect with a buyer. I don't like pricing things, boxing things up, or dealing with returns. As a result, I tend to miss the magic moment when something is hot. A lot of things in the warehouse have been collectable at one point or another, but they don't always stay that way. Every time I visit that dusty room, I'm reminded of that well know line from the Anglican Book of Common Prayer; "Ashes to ashes, dust to dust." Ultimately, this stuff just doesn't matter, but I guess I'll still renew the warehouse for another year.

It was time to pay some more bills today. I'm getting tired of getting small checks in the mail and turning right around and writing big checks to pay bills. This can't last forever. I've tried cutting back, but it doesn't seem to work. Being frugal with food, gasoline and luxuries can save a little money, but the big ticket items are much harder to control. Homeowners insurance, property taxes, utility bills, and medical expenses always seem to go up whatever you do. At least I don't have a mortgage or car payments anymore. I don't buy many technology toys these days either. Gadgets just don't give me as much pleasure as they used to. Unfortunately, I don't think I've saved much by hanging on to my computers and cameras for a few more years. When one door shuts, another door inevitably opens. Now, I'm wasting a lot of money on food. When you like to eat, but don't like to cook, you end up spending a lot of time at the chef prepared counter at Central Market.

Dot has her acupuncture and water therapy appointment tomorrow. It was easier when we always did her physical therapy on Wednesday, but she does have more energy at training class, now that I'm moving her session to a different day. I guess we'll continue juggling the schedule for a while. Hopefully, the weather will be nicer tomorrow than it was today. 

Boo is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1650

I don't know why I even bothered to water the lawn yesterday. It rained most of the day today. I don't think I'll ever learn how to predict the weather here in Texas. At any rate, the grass will be fine for a while. Since Dash still refuses to poop in the yard, he got wet on his morning walk. Dot was smarter and quickly did her business in the back yard, so she got to stay home where it was dry.

Hoping that the rain would be over soon, I turned on the computer and updated my animal rescue websites after breakfast. I usually do this during the week, but I certainly didn't have anything better to do this morning. It was still raining after I finished, so I reluctantly took the car out in the rain and did my Sunday errands anyway.

It was a good day to go to the gym. I had time to kill and calories to burn. I guess I was the only one who saw the gym as a refuge from the rain. There were only four other people in the entire cavernous building. I shot five baskets in a row from the free throw line today. This wouldn't be a big deal for many people, but I don't think I've done this before. Shooting baskets is interesting to me. It's all hand/eye coordination. You'd think that after a while it would become easy to replicate your actions and every shot from the free throw line would go in the basket. It doesn't seem to work that way though.

I still haven't watched anything using the Roku Streaming Stick I installed on the TV a few weeks ago. I don't watch very much using Hulu Plus either. I think I just get these things because I like to have options. I don't trust the cable companies, but my viewing needs are really pretty simple. I like to watch things I've already seen. I watch British comedies on PBS over and over again. I watch old Perry Mason and Twilight Zone episodes over and over again. And I watch all the science fiction shows like Torchwood and Dr. Who on the BBC.  I didn't watch anythng at all tonight. I just took a nap with the dogs.

We're already starting to get junk mail with ads for Fourth of July sales. Is is that time of year already?  I can't believe how fast this year has gone by. It doesn't seem like much has happened, but actually it's been a pretty eventful year. Dash has survived his arduous cancer treatments and appears to be a healthy dog again. I am finally free of the Hepatitis C virus. I have applied for social security. And Janet and I are finally starting to think about retirement. I still take things one day at a time, but the days are zooming by pretty darn fast.

Kirby is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1649 - Summer Solstice

It doesn't really seem like the longest day of the year. The sun should be setting right about now, but since it's cloudy outside, it seems like sunset occurred quite a while ago. Solstice is a big deal to some people I know, but it's just another Saturday to me. The only Summer Solstice that seemed very memorable to me was years ago when I was going to high school in Alaska. My family was living in Fairbanks at the time and on June 20, we got in the car and drove north as far as we could. We almost had 24-hour daylight in Fairbanks during the Summer, but not quite. On this particular Solstice I remember climbing up a hill just above the Arctic Circle near midnight with my Dad and watching the sun still shining, low on the northern horizon. Winter skies were pretty cool as well. There were lots and lots of auroras to be seen.

There was nothing that exciting today. I saw a rabbit and a couple of ducks in the park. That was about it. It's amazing how quickly we can go from too much rain to not enough. We're gone a couple weeks without significant rain and the ground is already getting parched and dry. I made sure to water both the front and back lawn today. I'm determined to keep the grass growing as long as I can this year. We don't have an automatic sprinkler system, but I did put mechanical timers on the little oscillating sprinklers attached to the garden hose. I like these timers. There are no batteries or electricity required. The entire thing is just a simple clockwork mechanism that you wind up and then it turns the water off thirty minutes to an hour later.

I called in some prescription renewals this morning and the pharmacist told me that some of them needed doctor approval again. My GP has been renewing these things one month at a time until I go in and have another physical exam. I already made an appointment for an exam next month, but I guess I've actually got to have the exam before my doctor will go back to renewing my meds for a year at a time. I really liked my team of liver doctors. They really believed that a good diet and lots of exercise were the keys to good health. I don't think my general practitioner has ever met a pill he didn't like. He's always trying to prescribe something new for me. I'd really like to find a reputable doctor who could find a way to ween me off of all my meds. I'm tired of taking pills. I guess I shouldn't be too disparaging about the pharmaceutical industry though. As much as I hate pills, I need to remember that it was a pill that cured my Hepatitis C.

I took some stuff over to the storage warehouse today and spent a few minutes looking around. There are a lot of things I should probably just get rid of. It's just not useful anymore. I don't imagine that people are going to start using tape machines again. I still have tape machines from the days when I did a lot of video editing. Everything is file based now though. The tape machines are museum pieces.  Old software is pretty useless too. I have tons of software still in the original boxes from the days when you installed it using floppy disks. Some of this software was pretty cool, but absolutely none of it runs on modern computers. Framed photographs that never sold at gallery shows are taking up a lot of space too. Lord only knows why I have so many electric trains.

I'm not sure what I'll do tomorrow. There's an animal rescue website to update. I need to do some cleaning around the house. Maybe I'll go to the gym. One of these days, I'm sure the dogs would like to go to the dog park again as well.

Barley is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1648

I found out a little more about yesterday's lost Weimaraner puppy. The dog had jumped out of a car window while the car was sitting at a stop light about a mile from my house. It quickly ran away and the owner couldn't find it again after hours of searching. This was one lucky pup. For starters, the puppy got it's leash tangled up in the hedge of a neighbor's who likes dogs. Not everybody would have taken the time to search for the dog's owner. Even worse, the dog could have easily been hit by a car on several busy roads.  If there's a lesson in this, it would be to never travel with dogs when your car windows are open. I see people doing this all the time. They'll be driving down the freeway at 70 miles an hour and their dog is hanging halfway out of the front window. It's just too easy for an accident to happen.

I make sure that the doors are locked and the windows are closed before I go anywhere with Dot and Dash. If they need a breeze, I just turn up the air conditioner really high. Dash always makes me nervous because he would be just like that lost puppy if he ever got the opportunity. Dash could dig a hole under a fence or jump out of a car window in a heartbeat. He wouldn't be trying to run away. In his mind, he's just being playful when he's bad. When I see pictures of dogs playfully running on the beach, I wish there was a place nearby where I could let Dot and Dash do this sort of thing. In a big city there aren't that many choices. Even the city's dog parks aren't completely safe, since there are way too many people who see nothing wrong with bringing their extremely dog aggressive dogs to the parks.

I've never taken Dot to her acupuncture session on a Friday before.  I don't think people work a full day on Friday anymore. At 2 PM this afternoon, the freeways were filled to capacity with rush hour traffic. It seemed like the entire city was taking the afternoon off. We were a little late to our appointment because of the heavy traffic, but our vet worked us in anyway. Dot did pretty well using the underwater treadmill this afternoon, but you can tell the Summer heat is slowing her down a bit. I understand. It's slowing me down too.

I had a nice breakfast at my favorite restaurant this morning and a nice dinner at home this evening. In between was a lot of nothing. Dot had a good physical therapy session today, but I don't think we'll be doing this on a Friday again. The traffic is just too bad. Wednesdays worked well until we started going back to training class again. Now, it's one or the other for Dot. She's too tired to do both. I think we'll try Tuesday for her therapy day next week. Maybe that will work.

The neighborhood Hibiscus tree is in bloom again. These flowers always seem tropical to me, but they're just out in the park behind the house. I wouldn't be surprised to see a snake under the tree.

Alamo is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1647 - My Birthday

I received hundreds of birthday greetings on social media today. At most, I'd met less than ten of these people in real life. I tried to think if I'd seen any of them during the past year and could only come up with a single name: a guy I accidentally bumped into a few months ago at a guitar show. That's the way it is these days. Facebook has become the new neighborhood. Real life is kind of a wasteland. I was delighted to hear from everybody, whether I'd met them of not. Among the strangers who wished me a happy birthday were dedicated people all over the world who do their best to rescue and care for abandoned Dalmatians. There were fellow bloggers, who just like me, continue to tell their stories to a world where fewer and fewer people read. There were people who like wristwatches and probably a few like you, who just like to read this blog. I'm glad I heard from all of you. You keep me connected.

I got an e-mail early this morning from a neighbor up the street, asking me if I knew anyone who had lost a Weimaraner puppy. I haven't seen anyone walking a Weimaraner in the park for a long time, but I sent the lady all the information I had about reuniting lost dogs with their owners. If you find a lost dog without any identification, I hope you check to see if it has been microchipped first. If the dog has been chipped, this is definitely the easiest way to find the owner. When I left to go to the gym later in the day, I happened to see a "Lost Puppy" sign stapled to a telephone pole. I stopped the car and went over to look at the sign. Sure enough, the lost dog was a Weimaraner puppy that matched the description in the e-mail exactly. I called the number on the sign and left a message saying that I thought I knew where the puppy was. When the dog's owner called back a few hours later, she said the puppy had already been found and returned. Evidently there were lots of "Lost Puppy" signs and one of them had been seen by a friend of the lady who'd sent me the e-mail. My neighbors might not agree about politics, or even about what goes on in the park, but they do agree about dogs. I'm lucky to live in a very dog friendly neighborhood.

I didn't stay at the gym very long today. The gym was crowded and Dot had already made me feel guilty for leaving by barking up a storm as I was preparing to leave. I was also worried about the lost dog and wanted to check and see if the dog and its owner had been reunited. There was nothing to worry about. Dot was sleeping soundly when I returned and the Weimaraner puppy was already home again.

When I was walking the dogs this evening, we almost stepped on a huge snake. I need to get better at identifying these neighborhood snakes. Some are harmless and others are poisonous. It would be good to know which was which. In the mean time, we're going to avoid the shoreline and native prairie areas where most of the snakes seem to live. There are also lots of large hawks and owls in these areas. Maybe they'll eat the snakes.

We had Sprinkles cupcakes when Janet got home from work. These tasty little cupcakes have become somewhat of a birthday tradition. At a certain point we discovered that a big birthday cake was too much for two people.  These large, heavily frosted cakes just took up space in the refrigerator and eventually got stale. Cupcakes are much better.  It was a subdued birthday, but a nice one. I look forward to celebrating a few more.

Inky is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1646

When computers eventually control everything and nobody remembers how to control the computers, we're going to be in big trouble. I can already see this starting to happen. Just about all my clients and suppliers have invested in some sort of automation system. Maybe it's a phone system. Maybe it's a database in the cloud somewhere. Whatever it is, nobody really understands how it works. Everyone's happy with the money they're saving until the thing quits working properly and then they're just confused. Generally, they don't even know what went wrong.

Today, my insurance agent called and told me he thought I had a brick house, but that his records said that I now had a wood frame house. "Jeez, you've been over to my house," I told the guy. "You know it's made of brick." "Well, could I come over and take some pictures," he asked me. "I'm having trouble with the underwriters. They want to believe what's in the computer." How do these things happen? My agent had no idea how the bad information had gotten into the database.  He didn't even know when the mix-up had happened. Everything we do these days is in some sort of database. What's amazing to me is how often this information is wrong.

I looked around the house for stray gift cards before I went to pick up Dash at the cancer center this afternoon. Today was one of those days when he got a new supply of chemotherapy meds, so I knew there would be a big bill. I was hoping that we were nearing the end of chemotherapy, but after a consultation with Dash's oncologist, I learned that they want him to continue taking the Palladia medication until the end of August at a minimum. We've got two more months to go, with a possibility of an additional two months after that. The good news is that Dash is responding to the drugs well and there don't appear to be any adverse side effects. The bad news is that this is getting to be very expensive.

I was pleased to see that Dash's tail survived the day at the cancer center, but then it started bleeding again while we were at training class this evening. The healing process is definitely a "three steps forward, two steps back" proposition. The tail is getting better, but there are many small setbacks along the way. It's hard to fault Dash on the slow healing process, however. This is an injury caused by Dash's generally happy disposition. I want him to be happy. I just wish he wouldn't wag his tail so vigorously.

Tomorrow is my birthday. I'm going to do the best I can to look at the day as a glass half full.  There's no sense to being half empty on your birthday.

Rugby is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1645

I've got to come up with a new game plan. Much of what I do these days doesn't even matter. I still like to think that I'm clever and essential, but I've become much more of a convenience than a necessity. If I didn't get out of bed tomorrow, few people would even notice. This bothers me. Shouldn't I be following my dream? I don't know. Following dreams has become a tricky business in a world where dreams and passions have become synonymous. I am a dispassionate person. I like to do useful things. Appealing to your emotions? Not so much. Unfortunately, advertising is all about appealing to your emotions. I probably should have been a physicist or a mathematician instead. Years ago, I used to be a good documentary filmmaker. I didn't have an agenda. I just took pictures of what I saw. Documentaries have changed like everything else though. Most current documentaries are all about emotion. The filmmaker wants to win you over to a certain point of view. Even street photography has an agenda now. I find the only thing that's safe to photograph these days are flowers. Ironically, people seem to like these photographs because they evoke some sort of emotion in them.

So here I am. By rejecting the world of emotional persuasion, I am left with some pretty boring tasks. I don't have to do these things, but I like to stay busy. When I'm busy, I don't have time to think about the nature of existence. I hate questions like "Why am I here" and "What was I meant to do." Maybe that's why Andy Warhol was one of the heroes of my youth. Andy wanted to be a machine. He approached things very mechanically, yet he managed to have a rich and interesting life in the process.

If you have read this far, you already know that I wasn't busy enough today. I didn't question my existence though. I went to the gym. I still can't figure out why the gym is so much busier on weekdays than on weekends. It is counterintuitive. The weights and machines I like were still open though, so I had a good workout. On the way home, I went to the grocery store instead of the guitar store as I had planned. That's where my head is at these days. I can't think much further than dinner.

Dash goes back to the cancer center for a monthly checkup tomorrow. He's just getting some routine blood tests and possibly a chest x-ray, but I'm worried about his tail. Dash got his bloody tail at the cancer center in the first place. He is so happy to see the other dogs that he wags his tail constantly in the doggie day care area where he stays until the staff is ready for him. Since the area is relatively small, he is always banging the tail against a wall or a door.  Now that I'm finally getting his "happy tail" injury to heal, I'd hate to start all over again. Hopefully, he'll be a bit calmer when we drop him off for his exam tomorow.

I could probably go to the gym every day this week if I wanted. That's how slow it has been.

Bali is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1644

So, what did we learn today. For starters, if the dogs don't sleep well, the people don't sleep well either. Dash woke me up three times last night, wanting to go outside. I don't know what goes through this dog's mind when he has to poop, but I wish he was more straightforward about doing his business. The first time he scratched at the door, he just stuck his nose outside and smelled the air. The second time, about ten minutes later, he went outside and stared at the moon for a while. The third time was the charm. I know he means business when he races around the yard four or five times and finally finds the perfect spot. I have to sit outside with him during this entire process or he won't do anything.

Shortly after I'd finally gotten back to sleep again, I was awakened to the sound of my car alarm. A large possum had either fallen or jumped on the car and set the alarm off. Strangely, this has happened before. Our yard is full of critters. Once or twice, racoons or feral cats have fallen out of a tree and landed with a huge thud on our roof. That will wake you up as well. You can tell that the dogs are getting older. Things that go bump in the night used to freak Dot out and cause a frenzy of alarmed barking. Last night, both dogs slept through the entire thing.

Summer has definitely arrived. Every day gets a little warmer and every walk gets a little slower. I try to get up early and make sure that the dogs get at least one decent walk before the sun heats things up, but even these early morning outings are starting to get hot and muggy. Dot tires quickly in the heat, so I have to be careful not to go too far. She still enjoys walking though, so these morning walks are an essential part of our day.

Today definitely lacked focus. I answered some of my e-mail, updated two websites, and at one point, became so bored that I went outside and washed the car. I'd like to be a little busier, but not too much busier. What I'd really like is consistency. The trouble with being a freelancer is that you are totally forgotten about until someone else gets themselves in a bind. This usually creates a feast or famine atmosphere where you are either working long hours trying to get your client out of a jam, or doing nothing at all. Maybe I'm being too picky, but I don't think so. There are times when being in advertising just sucks.

If I was industrious, I'd go to my storage warehouse tomorrow and start throwing away things that are no longer useful. Nah. That isn't very likely. Things just go in the storage unit. They never come out. It would be fun to get started on a brand new website project tomorrow as well. That probably won't happen either. I'm sure I'll design a few more corporate sites before I shut the business down for good, but these jobs are getting harder and harder to find. I've already worked with just about everyone I've ever met in my life and I'm not meeting many new people these days. The way I see it, I can either get depressed about all this, or just go to a guitar store tomorrow instead.

Hershey is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1643 - Father's Day

Sometimes I think I must have been raised by wolves. I look at all the nostalgic pictures and family remembrances I see on days like this and am a little stunned that I have no vivid childhood memories of my own. I do remember my Dad's later years very well when our roles became reversed. I also have vivid memories of my college days and of my first ten years as a working professional. To me, these were my formative years. My actual childhood is a bit murky. I never saved many pictures either. I certainly didn't have a bad childhood. There were lots of Summer car trips to national parks. I remember Swanson's TV dinners, dressing up for church on Sunday, and a black and white television in the living room where we watched Gunsmoke and the Ed Sullivan Show. I'm sure there was more, but those early memories never mutated into nostalgia. They just evaporated.

Maybe my fuzzy memories are for the best. A lack of reverence for the past never seemed to hinder me in life. I'm often amused to hear others extoll the benefits of living in the moment. I think I've spent most of my life living in the moment. It's only recently that I've started thinking about the past at all. I don't even think this is nostalgia. It's just the realization that 2014 is not my favorite point in history. I think I enjoyed the years between 1960 and 1980 a lot better. Those years were great. I hope my Dad enjoyed those years as well, but I'll never know. I wasn't there.

Dogs didn't enter my life until 1987, but they've been the focal point ever since. I remember more about the time I've spent with Spot, Petey, Greta, Dot, and Dash than I do about myself. The Dalmatians aren't a substitute for family, or an escape from family, they are my family. I am thrilled that Dash is winning his battle with cancer. Dot's incredible determination in the face of old age is an inspiration. I worry about them a lot. In an odd way, I'm their Dad.

Yesterday's website design insights proved to be short lived. When I uploaded everything to the server, my solution didn't work the way I expected. I had made a very small mistake yesterday, but it took me a very long time today to discover what I'd done wrong. After wasting three long hours looking for the source of my stupidity, I finally got the site working again. Sure hope my client likes what I've done.

This unexpected website troubleshooting cut my trip to the gym a bit short this afternoon, but I guess a short workout is a lot better than no workout at all. The dogs got a nice walk today and Janet and I had a very enjoyable dinner. I've got no complaints at all. It's been a nice weekend. Maybe the website troubleshooting gave my brain a workout. It could certainly use one.

Shadow is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1642

The grass has been cut. The yard looks nice. The refrigerator has been restocked. There are clean sheets on the bed and all the laundry has been done. This is usually what I do on a Saturday. These small chores are just a way to kill time while avoiding larger more arduous chores. If I was more ambitious, I would rebuilt the rotting greenhouse, fix the leaking shower pan, or paint all the window trim. These multi-day projects are much more difficult that they initially seem. You start to paint and you realize that the wood underneath needs to be replaced first. You pick up a wrench and realize that you don't have the right sized socket. Most of my trips to Home Depot are the result of a poorly planned major project. Once I've started something, I never seems to have the right tools, or even the right skills to finish it properly. When I stick to smaller things like mowing the grass, vacuuming, and changing watch batteries, I can feel like I've accomplished something without getting myself in a lot of trouble.

I finally came up with a solution to the web design problem that has been bothering me all week. I don't know why I had my eureka moment on a Saturday, but I'll take what I can get. I quickly prototyped my idea to make sure it would work and made plans to show the final result to my client sometime next week. It was just a dumb coding problem, but figuring it out without help from anyone else was much more satisfying than mowing the grass.

I occasionally wonder where would be the best place to retire. I don't have the answer, but I know we don't want to stay in a big city like Dallas. Whenever I've done any research, I'm always surprised to discover that cold northern states like North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wyoming have happier people and a better quality of life than southern favorites like Florida and California. Warm weather appears to attract problems. If I could learn to love the cold, Wyoming might be great. Few places are prettier and farmers and ranchers are the best people. Wyoming also has the lowest taxes in the country. On the downside, there's that giant volcano under Yellowstone park getting ready to explode. It that thing blows, you'd probably want to retire as far away as possible. Australia or New Zealand sounds about right.

I've got to get back to the gym tomorrow. I don't know what happened this week, but I never found time to workout at all. I guess mowing the grass counts as exercise, but sitting at the computer working on website problems and eating kolaches and bacon stuffed bagels for breakfast doesn't count for much. To end on a positive note, Dash's tail looks better today. Maybe he's finally learning to leave it alone.

Dai9sy is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1641

I got up early to get my blood tested before breakfast. I walked the dogs first, of course, but I was still at the doctor's office before 8 AM. As you might imagine, I'm getting a bit tired of getting blood tests all the time. Everyone seems to want one. The urologist tests for PSA. My team of liver doctors test for liver enzymes and viral load. My GP seems most interested in cholesterol and blood sugar. Even the dogs get frequent blood tests. Dash gets tested once a month to monitor his chemotherapy drugs. Dot got tested recently before she got her teeth cleaned. I think I should have invested in Labcorp stock. I have a feeling that doing lab work for doctors is a growth industry.

The grocery store was near the doctor's office, so I decided to get my weekend shopping done on the way home. I wanted to put the groceries in the refrigerator before I went out for breakfast, but Dot didn't agree with this plan. She thought I was home for good. When it became apparent that I was going to leave again, she started barking. I checked in on the dogs using the baby monitor when I got to the restaurant and Dot was still barking. I could tell by her tone that she wasn't alarmed at anything, she was just mad. I felt a bit guilty, so I only had two cups of coffee instead of my usual three and went straight home again. One I got home, the barking stopped and the dogs just went to sleep.

When I'm not really busy, I keep trying to improved my knowledge of WordPress. I'm not very fond of WordPress, but increasingly, this is what my clients want me to use. It's easy to understand why I'm not a fan. Easy-to-use WordPress themes are slowly but surely destroying my web design business. You can put together a WordPress site in a couple of hours without any coding knowledge. The themes are dirt cheap to buy and generally include some pretty sophisticated features. What's not to like, you might ask? First of all, it can be difficult to make a WordPress site look truly unique. All the themes look more or less the same to me. My ISP tells me that they are not very secure either. I tried modifying a standard WordPress theme this afternoon to give it my own special style. I wasn't very successful. Using a theme is easy. Changing a theme is hard. Since I'm the one who keeps wanting to change these themes, I suspect I'm wasting my time. My clients don't even care.

Dash did a good job at keeping his tail from bleeding today. I didn't have to bandage or clean it at all. Maybe he just didn't do much wagging today. Whatever he did, I hope he keeps it up. A few more days like this and the tail might actually have a chance of healing.

I didn't make it to the gym this week, but I can't really remember why. Somehow, I managed to go twice last week when I was busier than I am now. I'll probably have time to go workout on Sunday. I'll get the rest of my exercise by mowing the grass and pulling weeds. Father's Day won't be a big deal. I'm not a father.

Marcie is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1640

Today was strange. When I picked up the mail this morning, there was the letter I'd mailed my sister last week. "Return to sender, forwarding address unknown," the letter said. I gave her a call, to see if anything was wrong and discovered that the line had been disconnected. My sister had vanished without a trace. To her credit, if anyone was going to vanish without a trace, this would be the person to do it. She had already retired fifteen years early, moved to a small rural farm in Southern Ohio, and showed absolutely no interest in anything related to the Internet. Basically, she had disappeared a long time ago.

It did rain today, but it wasn't exactly the severe storm that the weather forecasters had predicted. We got a little wet on our morning walk and Dot barked at the thunder once or twice when it started raining harder after we returned home. That was about it. The thunderstorms were basically a non-event. I'm still glad I got most of my errands taken care of yesterday. Without places to go and things to do, I had a pretty relaxing day.

I watched a Torchwood re-run while I was eating breakfast, did some research on how to solve a puzzling website problem that has currently me stumped, and wrote a letter to my direct contact at a company that I probably won't be working with much longer. I just wanted to make sure there were no hard feelings. I enjoyed working with this guy. It's not his fault, or mine, that his miserly boss thinks I'm too expensive.

I'm still having problems keeping Dash's tail from bleeding. I called a couple of vet tech friends today to ask for advice and they admitted that "happy tail" was a problem for them as well. Dogs can wag their tails very hard, as anyone who has had their dog clear everything off the coffee table with a single wag can attest. You can't keep dogs from wagging their tail, and it's pretty hard to keep them from chewing off a bandage too. I'm having trouble even making a bandage that will stick to the tail. Dalmatian tails are thin and slippery. Nothing appears to stick to them.

I need to try to brush Dot's teeth this evening. I promised the vet that I'd try to brush her teeth three times a week. Dot doesn't like her teeth brushed any more than Dash likes me messing with his tail. If I have a bandage or a toothbrush in my hand, the dogs run away. I'm supposed to have another blood test tomorrow. I don't know why, since I've already had dozens of these tests this year.  Too bad that doctors don't have a better way of sharing information. It's not a big deal though.  I'll go early and have the test and then go have a delicious breakfast at my favorite restaurant on the way home. Sounds like a plan to me.

Lucky is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1639

The roofing folks knocked on my door this morning and said they were here to inspect the roof. I had asked them to give me some advance notice before they came, but since I was here anyway, I guess it didn't matter. I went up on the roof with them and they said that considering I lived in a wooded area and the roof didn't drain properly anyway, it was doing pretty well. This was hardly a ringing endorsement. I showed them the spots I thought might be deteriorating. Sometimes they said "We can fix that." and other times they told me that there was nothing wrong. I told the guys to repair any areas that they thought might cause me problems in the future and went back inside to work. Later in the day, I went back up on the roof to see what they'd done. There were a bunch of little repair spots scattered over the roof, but none in the areas that I thought might be a problem. I actually have no idea what the roofers did.

I got a request to add some custom features to a client's WordPress theme today. Many of my clients love WordPress themes because they are cheap and easy to update without any coding skills. Themes are easy to switch too. The problems start when people like their existing theme but just want it to look completely different. You should really just pick a theme and leave it alone. I get requests that would be very easy to implement using HTML. Unfortunately, with my limited knowledge of PHP, it always takes me longer to modify a dynamic site than it would to create an entire static site from scratch. I've grown to hate WordPress, even though many people absolutely love it. I'm trying to keep up with the times though. I'm learning to develop nice looking, full featured dynamic websites, even though I'd really rather still be doing magazine and newspaper ads.

Dot did really well using the underwater treadmill today. We generally do the treadmill workout first, let her rest a bit, and then finish with acupuncture. The acupuncture relaxes Dot, and she almost always leaves her session feeling relaxed and happy. I wish there were something that did the same sort of thing for me. Relaxed and happy is definitely not my normal state. Maybe I ought to just sleep eighteen hours a day like the dogs. It seems to work for them.

We are still supposed to get some severe thunderstorms tomorrow. I sure hope that whatever they put on the roof today dries fast. If there is a downpour tomorrow, it would be just my luck that all the new coating material washes away in the rain. Who knows? Tomorrow might be hot and sunny. I never put much faith in Texas weather forecasts. I'm still glad I got Dot's vet appointment taken care of today. Driving around with Dot in a thunderstorm is not a pleasant experience.

Willa is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

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