Day 2399

I didn't pick a good day to clean the roof. This morning, the skies were clear and it looked like a typical July day. By mid afternoon, the skies had turned dark and ominous and we had another unexpected thunderstorm. My efforts to remove the water from the roof were totally wasted and I had to race to get a bunch of rugs I had drying in the back yard indoors again.

You can probably guess why there were three large rugs drying out in the back yard. I'm beginning to hate weekends because any deviation from Dot's usual schedule is usually a disaster. I tried to get her outside as soon as she woke up this morning, but I wasn't fast enough. When I got her out the back door, I looked behind me and there was a trail of poop all the way from her bed to the door. This wasn't firm, easy to clean poop either. It was a runny mess. The rugs needed to be treated with the enzyme that breaks down the organic material and then sprayed with a pressure hose. These type of accidents happen frequently enough that we have several spare rugs that can be placed on the floor while the wet rugs dry. This cleanup ritual is not one of my favorite things, especially when I'm only half awake and haven't had my morning coffee yet.

I don't know why I decided to get an early start on my Saturday errands today. I filled the car with gas, picked up some prescriptions, and finished my grocery shopping well before noon. That left plenty of time to clear the water off the roof and try to catch up on the sleep that eluded me last night. I was tired and a ten minute cat nap turned into a two hour snooze. When I woke up, I turned on the TV and it appeared like the city was in lockdown again. There was apparently a suspicious person inside the police headquarters garage along with a verbal threat delivered over the police radio system by someone that was not on the force. How could a stranger gain access to the police radio system? Your guess is as good as mine.

I'm thinking about buying a steam cleaner to deal with accidents on the rugs. I looked at a few on Amazon this afternoon, but the reviews didn't inspire me with much confidence. It appeared that these machines were more difficult to use and don't typically perform as well as most people expect. I used to depend on online reviews but I've learned recently that some manufactures have started to give their products away for free to a select group of people in exchange for a good review. It doesn't take long for money to corrupt the system, does it? I've got to do some more research, but a steam cleaner still seems like a better alternative to the cleaning methods I'm using now.

These weeks go by so quickly now. I guess I'll go to the gym tomorrow. It all depends on how much unexpected cleaning Dot adds to the agenda. Today's Dalmatian of the Day was one of ours. Greta was very sick when we adopted her, but we did the best we could and managed to give her two good years. That was all the time she had. I measure time by the number of little urns on our coffee table now.

Greta is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2398

It's a sad day in Dallas. I learned about the shootings just before I went to bed last night and watched the unfolding carnage on TV for several hours before I drifted off to sleep. The next morning I woke to find myself in a city that was coming to grips with a massacre. At breakfast and later at the grocery store I overheard people talking about the shootings. I'm sure there was anger, but the prevailing sentiment seemed to be profound sadness. What have we become? When I think about recent events, I feel like I'm witnessing the decline and fall of civilization itself.

It wasn't always this way. There was a time not all that long ago when Americans genuinely thought of our country as a great melting pot. People came here from all walks of life and were proud to adopt a commonly held sets of values and call themselves Americans. Assimilation was not only regarded as a good thing, it was the only thing.

All that has changed. Somewhere along the line, we have abandoned the concept of our country as a great melting pot and started worshiping diversity and multiculturalism instead. In my opinion, the results have been disastrous. We no longer have a common set of shared values. We have reverted to a strange kind of tribalism where people's loyalties are only to their own tribe. I've been around a while and I've never seen the country more divided. We may talk a good game about how American society is different, but when you look what is happening, are we really that different from the Israelis and the Palestinians or the Shiites and Sunnis? Basically, we all hate each other.

It was a slow, very hot day. Dot pooped in the house. I paid a few bills. And I spend way too much time trying to convince the U-Verse people to remove the non-return fee from my statement and credit the $150 back to my account. Eventually, some help desk people on the opposite side of the world told me that the situation had been resolved and that I should just pay my normal monthly bill. On the plus side of things, the sink doesn't leak anymore.

I'm hoping that the water on the roof has evaporated. I'm getting really tired of removing it every time it rains. At least we didn't have any downed trees during our recent thunderstorms. High winds blew over one of our neighbor's trees, creating a real mess and blocking a city street for two days. I always worry that one of our old Oak trees is going to come crashing down, but so far all they are doing is killing the grass. I need to think of something more exciting than vacuuming and going to the gym this weekend. We'll see how it goes. I've been so tired lately that whenever I find myself with free time, I just take a nap.

Trevor is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2397

I thought the plumber would only be here about five minutes. I mean, how long could it take to tighten a few loose bolts? I was wrong again. After a lengthy investigation, the plumber determined that there were several defective parts in the brand new faucet. "Since you bought the faucet, we can't pay for these parts," the plumber told me. "Your other plumber was right with me when I bought it," I told him. "I only paid for the parts myself, so you guys wouldn't mark them up 40% on my bill." This apparently didn't matter. Neither did the fact that the first plumber should have noticed that he was installing defective parts. I got the plumbing supply store to exchange the parts for free, but today's plumber still insisted that he had to charge me for today's service call. He said he was going to give me a big discount since this never should have happened, but my bill was still over $150.

As you might expect, Dot freaked out when the plumber arrived and pooped all over the place. After I got the mess cleaned up and managed to calm Dot down, the plumber had to leave to pick up the replacement parts from the plumbing supply store. When he returned an hour later, Dot acted like she'd never seen the plumber before and pooped again. It's been a long day. Sadly, it's also been a fairly typical day. Nothing seems to go as expected anymore.

As I was working today, I watched portions of the the hearing where FBI Director James Comey was testifying before congress about their recently concluded investigation of Hillary Clinton. It sure looked like the fix is in to me. In one astounding exchange, Comey openly admitted that Clinton had lied numerous times. He then admitted that lying to Congress under oath was a federal crime that you could go to prison for. He completely failed to connect the dots however and defended his decision not to prosecute Clinton, saying only that nobody had asked the FBI to investigate Clinton for perjury. He also said that Clinton wasn't under oath when she testified to the FBI and that their conversation with her wasn't even recorded. Unbelievable.

Watching this spectacle this morning just reinforces my belief that our country is hopelessly broken. We have become so divided that I don't think anyone will be able to fix it. The Democrats on the committee kept trying to divert the hearing into a conversation about police shootings. The Republicans just seemed dumbfounded that the FBI Director kept saying things like the Secretary of State might not have been sophisticated enough to recognize security designations on an e-mail message. I have a feeling that this isn't over yet.

I hope that the bathroom sink never leaks again. Truthfully, I'd rather live with a leak than deal with plumbers. I'm so tired of dealing with things that don't work the way I've been promised. It doesn't matter whether it's an expensive car repair that should have been covered under the vehicle warranty, a broadband router that the cable company managed to ruin during their testing procedure, or a brand new faucet that was full of defective parts. Nothing works properly anymore and everyone keeps trying to make excuses for their own incompetence. Maybe in this context, today's congressional hearings weren't strange at all. Maybe this is just the way things are in an increasingly dystopian world.

Delaney is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2396

I wonder why it is so hard to take a dog's blood pressure? Dot's physical therapy vet tried to get a good reading today and didn't have any more success than the oncologist did last Friday. Dot always becomes alarmed when the technicians place the blood pressure cuff around one of her legs and starts to struggle. You need to be relaxed to get a good reading, so her blood pressure is always elevated. It's hard to tell whether the abnormally high reading is caused by hypertension or stress. We were hoping to get a more accurate relaxed reading by taking her blood pressure while she was having acupuncture today. That didn't work.

Vets seem to like the doppler ultrasound technique for taking an animal's blood pressure. A small crystal is placed over an artery which converts the blood flow into audible sound. When the cuff is inflated to a pressure greater than that of the blood pressure, the audible sound goes away. The pressure in the cuff is then slowly released and when the audible flow signal returns, this is considered the animal's systolic pressure. There is definitely an art to doing this well. I have watched vets use the doppler technique many times and it only seems to work about half the time. Modern multi-function surgical monitors tend to provide more reliable results than the older Parks Doppler machines, but these very expensive Oscillometers are usually only found in surgery suites and are used to monitor animals under anesthesia. I don't know if we are ever going to get an accurate reading with Dot. She definitely doesn't like people messing with her.

I don't know if I'll ever be able to get her to therapy again without having to deal with poop in the car either. She's had an accident for the past three weeks in a row. Again, this is probably caused by stress. I took her out in the back yard for fifteen minutes before we left for our therapy session and she did nothing. Within three blocks after backing the car out of the driveway, she pooped. It's hopeless.

I had to call the plumber again today. The new faucets they installed in the bathroom sink are already leaking. I think they just didn't tighten things properly, but who knows. Maybe the faucets themselves are defective. Since this is Janet's sink, I can't just ignore the problem like I could if it were my sink. I'm anticipating another fun day that probably involves a lot of barking and poop all over the place. The dogs really don't like plumbers very well.

One day after I returned the defective router to AT&T, I receive a bill from them with a late charge of $150 for not returning the equipment soon enough. Give me a break. They should have known that I would be forced to upgrade the router eventually. This definitely isn't the first time that U-verse equipment has broken. I had my reasons for not installing the new router immediately and I still think they were good reasons. I'm sure I'll eventually be reimbursed for the late charges, but it was just one more small irritation in what has already been a very irritating month.

It didn't rain today. I guess that's a good thing, but the rain did cool things down a bit. I'm going to just have to live with the fact that I'm stuck in Texas and it's going to be very hot for the rest of the Summer.

Cisco is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2395

Independence Day ended as it began, with a horrendous thunderstorm that lasted for the rest of the night. I didn't get much sleep. Dot got so upset that I thought she was going to have a stroke. Dash was pretty upset too. This was some of the most intense thunder and lightening I've ever seen. The storm went on for hours and this morning I heard that some parts of town had gotten up to four inches of rain.

The U-Verse TV didn't work when we woke up this morning. Rebooting the receiver didn't fix things. Rebooting the router didn't help either. Nothing worked. Oddly, the U-Verse land line phone and the WiFi network were just fine. I called technical support and they said they needed to do some tests. After they tried to reboot the router remotely, everything went dead. Somehow they fried the entire gateway. The tech support guy claimed that last night's storm had damaged the router, but I think they ruined it themselves. Luckily, I had a spare router that AT&T sent me last month. I had been reluctant to install it because I knew I would have to re-pair every single wireless device on the network.

Since the router I'd been using was toast, I really had no choice. I spent the rest of the day configuring the gateway and then painstakingly reattaching all the devices on the network. Some devices were easy to reattach, but others were insanely difficult. A wireless office is convenient when it's working, but it can drive you crazy when something goes wrong. If I had it all to do over again, I'd just hook everything up with Ethernet cables.

After I finally got everything working again, I heard something on the weather report saying that there were more thunderstorms in the forecast for tonight. That's all I need. After spending all day getting my network running again, I certainly don't want to fry my new router tonight. I don't want to deal with two storm phobic dogs either. If the storm is bad enough, I really worry about Dot and Dash. When they go into panic mode, it feels like I'm only inches away from a medical emergency. Hopefully, things will be a bit calmer tonight. I really need some sleep.

I did manage to update some websites today, but I don't remember much about the assignments. All I remember is struggling to get the wireless thermostat working again and cleaning up dog poop. When I watched the Juno orbit insertion maneuver last night on NASA TV, I couldn't help feeling a bit envious of the folks I was watching at the Jet Propulsion Lab. I felt the same way when I watched the New Horizons spacecraft rendezvous with Pluto and as I held my breath watching Spirit, Opportunity, and Curiosity make successful landings on Mars. Ad people often think they are doing something important, but it's all just smoke and mirrors. These scientists at JPL actually are doing something important.

I don't expect to get a lot done tomorrow. It's Dot's physical therapy day and each week these sessions seem to take longer and longer. There are things I'd rather do, but the therapy is important. Maybe the weather will be nice tomorrow. Maybe Dot's won't poop in my car. A little good news tomorrow could go a long way.

Isabella is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2394 - Independance Day

My favorite Fourth of July memories took place in Alaska. I lived there when I was growing up and there was a magic about the place that could not be duplicated today. I remember that family and friends gathered together on the Fourth for a large picnic in an abandoned gravel pit that usually involved a fish fry with freshly caught salmon. Fireworks weren't regulated then and teenage boys like myself came to these parties armed with large paper bags filled with cherry bombs and M-80's.

It's a miracle that I still have both arms. We would place cherry bombs in the center of toilet paper rolls and throw them in the air to watch them explode. We made a makeshift cannon from a length of cast iron sewer pipe and fired shells made from aluminum cans filled with sand. The procedure involved putting the can in the tube, throwing a lit M-80 behind it, and then quickly blocking the end of the tube with a large rock. The sand filled cans could easily travel the length of a football field. I'm glad we never hit anybody because these were not harmless projectiles. Thinking back on these occasions, the amazing thing was that none of the parents in attendance did anything to stop us from this mayhem. Of course we were driven to these picnics in cars without seat belts and most of our parents smoked cigarettes. It was a different time and there was a naive innocence to the way we all lived. We were just kids having fun.

Things are much quieter now. I haven't bought fireworks in years and you couldn't pay me to go to a public fireworks show. We used to barbecue in the back yard on the Fourth, but eventually we realized that it wasn't much fun sharing your dinner with fire ants and mosquitoes. This evening, Janet picked up a pre-cooked rotisserie chicken along with some potato salad and baked beans. The older we get, the less we cook. I'm convinced that tonight's meal wouldn't have tasted any better if we cooked it ourselves. Sometimes the easy way is the best way.

Mother nature started her own fireworks show shortly after midnight. Less than an hour after we all went to sleep, a major thunderstorm rolled through town and woke everyone up again. Dot was scared, so I grabbed a blanket and slept on the floor with her for the rest of the night. Storms worry Dot even more than they used to, because she can't quickly run to her safe place under my desk. Things calmed down a bit when I blocked her view of the window. She can't hear the thunder very well anymore, and when she could no longer see the lightning, she eventually went back to sleep. I was a bit nervous sleeping next to Dot, since I thought she might poop on me. We got lucky though and made it through the rest of the night without any accidents. When the rain finally stopped around 9 AM it was twenty degrees cooler. With the cooler air and cloudy skies, we actually had a very pleasant walk this morning.

When I went to pick up the prescription I had forgotten about yesterday, I was disappointed to see that the price had gone up. This happens all too frequently. Healthcare is so expensive already that I hate to think what it's going to be like ten years from now. Truthfully, I hate to think what anything is going to be like ten years from now. We are not headed in the right direction.

Instead of watching fireworks this evening, I'm going to watch the Juno spacecraft being placed into orbit around Jupiter on NASA TV. Talk about pressure. It took five years for the spacecraft to reach Jupiter and if everything doesn't go perfectly about an hour from now, the entire mission will have been for nothing. I'm an unapologetic space geek. This little bit of engineering drama is actually exciting to me.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2393

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I forget things. I watered the Wax Myrtle tree in the front yard, but left the hose running for hours because I'd forgotten about it. Later, I did the same thing with the sprinkler in the back yard. I renewed a prescription by phone, but forgot to go pick it up. I remembered to wash the sheets on the bed, but forgot to throw them in the dryer after they were clean. I can spend entire days this way. I'm continually looking for my reading glasses or the dog's leashes. I don't think I forgot anything important today, because there wasn't much important going on. Maybe it's bad to be so absent minded, but I've gotten used to it. I've been this way for most of my life.

We should have gotten up earlier this morning, because by the time we got the dogs ready for their morning walk, it was already too hot. I'm not sure that getting up early even helps anymore. Occasionally, I have to take one of the dogs outside in the middle of the night and it's still warm at 3 AM. At least there was a breeze this morning. A breeze always helps.

Usually, I don't go to the gym on Sunday until mid-afternoon, but today I went right after breakfast. Working out seemed preferable to wandering aimlessly around the house forgetting things. Even though my workout seldom varies, I must make more of an effort on some days than others. It's interesting that although I always spend the same amount of time using the machines, I don't always burn the same amount of calories. Today, I must have been slacking off. My twenty minutes on the treadmill didn't burn many calories at all.

Maybe I was slow today because I'd just finished breakfast. We always have a hearty, old-fashioned breakfast on Sunday's. Today's meal consisted of fried eggs, Southern biscuits, and lots of bacon. I like to make an egg sandwich with my biscuits. By the time I've carefully place my egg in the center of the biscuit, added stacked strips of bacon on top of it, and topped everything off with Pico de Gallo, Janet has usually finished her entire meal.

I've started to see Passionflowers blooming on our morning walks. These exotic looking flowers look like they belong in a tropical rain forest, but they are actually quite common in the South. I think they are the state flower of Tennessee. I only see these oddly beautiful things a few times a year. They bloom in the Summer, but they don't seem to like the heat. I only see Passionflowers very early in the morning, usually after a heavy rain. Supposedly, Spanish Christian missionaries thought this plant represented the last days of Jesus and the crucifixion. I guess some people might see a crown of thorns, but it looks more like a jellyfish to me. I bet the flowers I saw today are gone tomorrow. They don't last long.

I'm already starting to hear fireworks off in the distance. Although fireworks are illegal in the city, lots of people shoot them off in the park at night anyway. The noise used to really bother Dot, but she's so deaf by now that she doesn't hear a thing. A few people are flying flags on our street. A lot more are having barbecues.

Bob Hope is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2392

Sign of the times. When I went to the bank this morning, I noticed that they had replaced some of the teller windows with ATM machines. There was only one teller working and everybody was lined up to see her. Nobody was using the automated machines, even though there was a video running in the lobby explaining how cool they were. A woman ahead of me in line told the other customers that she never used ATM machines because she was afraid of getting mugged. You could almost see the one overworked teller roll his eyes. I know he wanted to say "Lady, why do you think we moved these machines inside the bank." I knew the real reason had nothing to do with safety. Companies will do virtually anything to avoid hiring people these days. They'd replace everyone with a robot if they could get away with it.

Companies are training us to make our transactions without human intervention. I almost never talk to a receptionist when I make a business call. The phone system is automated. Heaven help you if you actually need to talk with a real person. My grocery store uses an automated checkout system. You scan the items yourself, put your credit card into the machine, and you're on your way. There is even a local restaurant that is experimenting with replacing waiters with touch screen terminals at each table. This is the future. When I hear politicians talks about creating jobs, I want to laugh. Where are these jobs going to come from? Factory floors are automated and use robots to assemble things. Customer service is becoming automated. Cars are learning to drive themselves. If this is happening today, just think what the world is going to be like forty years from now. You may have a job now, but it's going away.

One of the things I dislike the most about an automated world is the concept of auto-renewal. If you ever subscribe to anything on the Internet, you will keep getting charged for it forever unless you make a Herculean effort to remove yourself from the company's database. Netflix, Hulu, Angie's List, domain name registries, software subscriptions, tolltags for your car, and other services too numerous to name will keep renewing you automatically, once they've gotten your credit card number. There's usually something buried away in the fine print about how to cancel your subscription, but who reads the fine print. I thought I had canceled my subscription to Angie's List two years ago, but I keep getting auto-renewal notices. It's frustrating. I'll have to call an automated phone system on Tuesday and express my displeasure.

I'm glad that I mowed the grass yesterday. It was even hotter today. Almost every Summer I wonder why I ever moved here from Seattle. Temperatures were so mild in Seattle that I could easily forgive the continual rain. Hey, that was over thirty years ago though. I can't remember why I did anything thirty years ago. Since we can't magically transport ourselves to Colorado or Seattle, we do the best we can to deal with the heat. We walk the dogs very early now. It's interesting to watch how plants and animals react to dawn. Birds start singing well before sunrise. Some flowers close their petals when the sun hits them, and others open. There is a patch of Bindweed on our way home that is almost as accurate as a light meter. If we're early and it's still dark, the petals are closed. If we're late and the sun is getting hot, the petals close again. Today, we walked by at exactly the right time.

Bud is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2391

Vet appointments are taking longer and longer. A procedure that used to take thirty to forty-five minutes took us three hours today. Part of the problem was that it was a holiday weekend and a lot of people needed to have their dogs examined before the cancer center closed for the Fourth of July. The other problem was that the technicians wanted to wait until Dot calmed down before taking her blood pressure. She never did calm down. I can't complain though. Every time I spend any time in the cancer center lobby, I meet other people who have traveled for hours, just so their dogs can see one of the center's oncologists. I met someone who drove all the way from Louisiana today for their appointment. I only had to spend fifteen minutes on the road. You meet the nicest people at a specialty veterinary clinic. These people make all sorts of personal sacrifices so their pets can get the care they need. I admire these people. We trade stories about dealing with cancer while we wait for our turn with the oncologist. It's kind of humbling. I realize quickly that the problems I'm having with Dot's incontinence and neurological issues are minor compared to what others are dealing with. We try to give each other encouragement, but cancer can be a tough adversary.

I don't know why I returned to my original breakfast restaurant this morning. I thought I was over that place. I guess I was hoping that it would rise like a Phoenix and return to its former glory. Nope. I think they are going to survive, but it's not the same place anymore. I've ordered each item on the menu so many times that I can tell they are cutting corners now. Instead of cubing fresh potatoes and making their own hash browns, they appear to be buying a prepared, frozen product from a food service provider. The sauces taste a bit different. I don't recognize any of the staff anymore. I think they've got a new chef too. Don't get me wrong. The food isn't bad, but it's not something you'd get addicted to like I did before. I'm not sure if I'll be back again.

I tried to get a head start on the weekend chores by mowing the grass today. When I was mowing the front lawn, I noticed some tire tracks in the yard. Probably some drunk driver jumped the curb again and plowed through the yard after the bars closed. This used to happen with alarming regularity, until the city finally installed some warning signs just before a gentle curve in the road about 300 yards away. People would fall asleep at the wheel and miss the turn, sending their car on a trajectory that sent them straight through our yard. The damage was minor this time, but there have been some serious accidents in the past. Once, a car hit our neighbor's house. Another time, a car drove straight into a tree.

If you have a dog that is frightened of fireworks, I sympathize. The Fourth of July isn't a holiday that a lot of dog owners look forward to. Dot used to be terrified of fireworks, but they aren't much of a problem anymore since she's almost deaf now. We haven't gone out and watched a fireworks show for a long time. The noise doesn't bother me, but the mosquitoes and chiggers do. Why anyone would want to sit outside getting bitten by mosquitoes while watching some minor explosions off in the distance is beyond me.

The year is half over. The dogs had their monthly heartworm pill this morning. I'll need to get my car safety inspected soon. I hope this month is uneventful with no financial surprises. Some cooler weather would be nice too. Dot is having a tough time with this heat.

Bentley is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2390

If I told you that there was a blog that only talked about eating breakfast, dog poop, and the hidden dangers of globalism, would you read it? I didn't think so. Sometimes I feel like apologizing about the monotonous state of my life. I could make this narrative a lot more interesting if I just started making things up. Alternately, I could just post something whenever I had a fascinating insight. Life isn't always full of fascinating insights though. I guess that was my point when I started this. I wanted to show what life was like on a day-to-day basis when you didn't edit out the uneventful and insignificant days. Like it or not, there are a lot of days just like today.

I managed to get Dot outside this morning before she peed on the floor, but my luck ended there. She came back inside and proceeded to poop while she was eating her breakfast. This happens so frequently that the area around her food bowl is well protected. I took the waterproof mat under her bowl outside, hosed it down, threw it in the washing machine, and replaced it with a fresh clean mat. If she could have only waited five more minutes, we would have been on our way, taking our morning walk.

When I ate my own breakfast after we returned, I noticed that the bananas were getting mushy and there were were a few bad spots in the strawberries. The fruit still tasted fine, but it had seen better days. Thursday is the end of the road for my morning smoothies. Tomorrow, I go out for breakfast, and this weekend I start all over again with the freshest looking fruit I can find. This routine is kind of monotonous, but it is also delicious. I wouldn't change a thing.

Work consisted of a series of conversations where my client would tell me that their website wasn't working and after running some tests, I would tell them that everything was fine and that the website worked perfectly. We went back and forth like this for hours and I'm still not sure what their problem was. There was nothing wrong with the code on the site, but there could have been all sorts of other problems. Maybe something was wrong with their network. Maybe they were looking at the site using an out-of-date browser. Maybe they just didn't understand what I was telling them.

I went up on the roof this afternoon to remove the standing water that had accumulated after our recent thunderstorms. It's been so hot that a lot of the water had already evaporated. The water that remained had started to turn green. This meant that little things were growing in it. One day, I'm going to find tadpoles swimming around in this water. Nature is a beautiful thing, but I'd just as soon not have so much nature up on my roof.

While I was walking Dash this evening, I watched a squirrel carry a large horse apple that must have weighed more than he did up a tree and then proceeded to eat the entire thing. I guess humans aren't the only greedy animals.

Tucker is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2389

Do you feel like you are inundated with an onslaught of spam and phishing scams? I do. Everyday my inbox is filled with e-mail spam and bogus offers. My land line is worthless. Nobody calls the land line anymore except for telemarketers and scammers. Today I received a voicemail that implied that I was in big trouble and needed to return the call immediately to avoid being called before a grand jury. This seemed highly unlikely, so I entered the phone number in the Bad Numbers website and sure enough it was a scam. Hundreds of other people had received exactly the same message today. The older I get, the more I find myself a target of these scams. Scammers target older people because they are more vulnerable. I don't understand the mentality of a scammer. Some scams are very elaborate and require a lot of thought. Wouldn't it be easier to just get a real job and work for a living?

I could tell that Dot was tired today at our physical therapy session. Part of the problem was that she was stressed from riding in the car. When Dot is stressed, she always poops in the car, which makes me stressed as well. It also didn't help that the water in the treadmill tank was too warm. Dot likes the water cold, although most of the other dogs apparently like it warm. At any rate, she didn't bring her A Game to therapy today. When she got home, she pooped in her bed and made another big mess. She's fine now, but it's been a long day for both of us.

I wonder if the new fiber optic lines in the neighborhood are working? I haven't seen the AT&T installation crews for weeks and everything looks finished, but my Internet speed hasn't improved a bit. If anything, it has gotten slower. I'm not even sure who to ask about this. It's not surprising that the AT&T technical support people in India or Indonesia don't know anything about the fiber optic line. Why would they? I thought the folks at the AT&T store a few miles down the road could give me some answers, but they didn't know anything about the new lines either. If I hadn't seen the men laying the cable with my own eyes, there would be no reason to believe that anything had happened at all.

It's amazing how polarized our society has become. I'm a channel flipper and I compulsively use the remote to switch back and forth between channels while I eat breakfast. Sometimes I'll see exactly the same news story explained in three completely different ways. If you only listen to one account, you'd probably believe what you were hearing was true. When you hear competing views presented in real time as fact, it can get confusing. I think we've gotten truth and belief all mixed up. The Internet is even worse. People go to elaborate lengths to make up false stories and present them as true. I'm not talking about obvious satire or websites like The Onion. There are some serious efforts to deceive out there. Why? I'm a simple person and I'd like to know what's really going on without having to check Snopes.com all the time. What if what I'm reading on Snopes isn't even true? That would be really disorienting.

I've got a day of rest tomorrow and then on Friday, I've got to load Dot in the car again and take her to another vet appointment. She's due for her monthly re-check at the cancer center. This time we'll be doing a chest x-ray in addition to the usual Ultrasound scan and blood work. Sometimes I wonder if this extensive monitoring is even necessary, and then I remember how some of our first dogs died suddenly and painfully when nobody realized that they had cancer. It's always good to know what's going on. There will always be a lot that I don't know, but I do make an effort.

Sparky is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2388

They say if you don't like the weather in Texas, just wait five minutes. I can see where that saying came from today. We got an early start on our morning walk and it was really quite pleasant outside. There was a cool breeze and the ground was covered with dew. It was definitely worth the effort to get up early. Dot had more energy and so did I. The sun peeked over the horizon just as we arrived home and almost immediately, the humidity started to rise. By the time I finished breakfast, it was hot and muggy. I was listening to the Cicadas and getting ready to water the grass when I heard thunder off in the distance. Within an hour, the sky darkened and the wind started to rise. The sudden thunderstorm caused some wind damage a few miles away and left a lot of water on the ground. Then it was hot and sunny again. The abrupt changes kept the day interesting, because there certainly wasn't much else going on.

On days like this I tend to get lost in the Internet. One idle search leads to another and all the sudden I'm reading a strange forum where people are talking about the accuracy of home A1C meters. I guess it makes sense that I would be thinking about blood sugar levels and diabetes. I'm not a diabetic, but have been in a high risk group for many years. I like the idea of monitoring my own glucose and A1C levels, but hate the idea of continually pricking my finger to draw blood. Maybe I'll wait a while to start testing myself. The consensus on the forum I was reading was that that home A1C meters were notoriously inaccurate. They say that you can significantly improve your chances of avoiding diabetes with a low carb diet that emphasizes fresh vegetables and eliminates bread and wheat products. I tried this once and it works, but there was only one problem. I love bread.

I also watched some videos of today's final qualification test of the new Space Launch System booster in Promontory, Utah. NASA invited some people to view this test and I probably could have gone myself if I had the time and money. I've quit applying for NASA press credentials for the time being. Dot is too fragile to leave for any extended period of time and it's quite expensive to get to remote places like Promontory, Utah anyway. At some point in the future, I would like to return to being a NASA groupie. There are actually quite a few opportunities for people who are active on social media to observe and write about NASA's many space related activities. I still get e-mails about opportunities to cover upcoming launches and tests, but now is not the time. I only mention this for folks who worry that I'm becoming a house bound hermit. It's not true. When the time is right, I could easily see myself going to four or five of these events a year.

It was sad to hear about the attack at the Istanbul airport today. This seemed so similar to the attack in the Brussels airport earlier in the year. I'm glad I had an opportunity to visit Europe in more peaceful times. I've been to Turkey before, but I doubt that I'll ever find myself there again. The world has become far too volatile. I remember my travels in Greece and Turkey well. I never dreamed back then that it would come to this.

Patch is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2387

When I picked up my tape recorder at the repair shop, it occurred to me that I hadn't picked the best time to restore and refurbish my old studio. This was an ambitious project and I should have waited until all the unexpected expenses and emergencies subsided. Of course, when are unexpected things ever going to quit happening. If I waited until life was calm again, I'd be waiting forever. At any rate, there are still many things to fix, but I now have two functioning old school multi-track tape recorders again.

As most of you know, I'm fascinated with gadgets. Ever since we began having power outages in our neighborhood, I've been looking for the perfect emergency power source. Backup batteries don't last long enough to be really useful. Gasoline generators get the job done, but they are noisy, heavy, and you've got to keep them outside because of the exhaust. Lately, I've discovered solar powered generators. Even the largest of these devices won't power your entire house, but they seem perfect if you just need some LED lights, a laptop, a few cell phones, and a small portable refrigerator to keep you going. The only drawback I can see is that they are ridiculously expensive. Oh, and you need a lot of sunlight too. I was looking at the Goal Zero generators today. Very cool. All I need are a couple of these, an Airstream trailer, a satellite phone, and some acreage up in the mountains and I'm all set. Hey, there's nothing wrong with dreaming is there. My fantasy has always been complete self sufficiency. When I hear someone say "It takes a village," or "We've all got to work together as a team," it just makes me want to vomit.

The weather was weird today. When we woke up, the air was still and the humidity was oppressive. This was not the best environment for Dot. She got tired on her morning walk and we had to walk even slower than usual to make it back home again. I was a little worried about her at first, but she's back to normal now after a nice long nap. As the day progressed, it got darker and darker and by mid-afternoon we were in the path of a raging thunderstorm. Not surprisingly, the dogs got frightened by the thunder and lightning and I had to spend the rest of the afternoon calming them down. The only good thing about all this was that the temperature dropped twenty degrees. I won't have to water the grass tomorrow either.

I need to think of some better passive income ideas. With interest rates near zero, the stock market has been a big disappointment. The stock photography market has been an even bigger disappointment. I'm a good photographer, but you literally have to have thousands and thousands of images in circulation to make any significant income. Ditto for running ads on my websites. All these things showed promise and were even occasionally lucrative for me twenty years ago. I blame it all on globalization. When you are competing with billions of people instead of a few thousand, prices come down dramatically. Some bloggers started writing books when blogging fell out of favor. I don't think my life is weird enough to use it as the basis for a novel. I'm certainly not going to write a motivational or self help book. I've got nothing in the motivational department. Don't expect me to lift you up. If you're enjoying this, you're probably happy already.

Rascal is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2386

I got an REI gift card for my birthday, so I stopped by the store on my way to the gym today and got a jacket. Did I need a jacket in June? Not really, but I will when things get cold again. It makes sense to me to buy clothing out of season. You get some great bargains, and when the need does arise, I'm way ahead of the game. In a way, I do everything in life this way. I try not to be out on the roads until everyone else is at work. I go to restaurants that aren't particularly popular. I rarely read books while they are on the best seller list. The more out of sync I am with the rest of the world, the more peaceful my own world becomes.

This desire to find the alternate realities that are hidden in plain sight is probably why I picked a gym that nobody goes to. It always amazes me that a gym this nice and well equipped is so empty. If my gym were an LA Fitness franchise, it would have gone out of business long ago. The gym is owned by a major hospital though, and can probably operate at a loss forever. Today, there were only four other people working out with me. I quietly went through my routines like I always do. The first ten minutes I feel like quitting and going home. Then my body loosens up and I get a second wind. By the time I eventually finish, I feel pretty good.

Working out at a gym is certainly more enjoyable than vacuuming. The Dyson Animal may be a marvel of engineering, but it is murder on your hands if you suffer from carpal tunnel syndrome. My wrists aren't very flexible anymore and I struggle sometimes to turn the unwieldy machine and maneuver it in tight spaces. Although the Dyson does an admirable job of picking up dirt and dog hair, it is not very easy to clean. I have to take the canister outside after I'm done and clean it using a leaf blower. That's something you never see in those slick looking Dyson commercials. It just doesn't seem right that you would have to clean a vacuum using a leaf blower. Vacuum bags were so much easier.

It's getting too hot to walk the dogs. The days are so long in June that it's hard to get up early enough to beat the heat. We were a little late today and it was already pretty warm. At least there was a little breeze. The instant the sun is above the horizon the temperature seems to jump ten degrees. These Summer days are hard on Dot, so we need to make an effort to get up earlier. Tomorrow will be better. Janet always gets up very early to get ready for work and we are usually on our way well before sunrise. By the time it is cold enough to wear my new jacket, we will be walking under starlight.

I guess I'll go pick up my tape recorder at the audio repair shop tomorrow. Maybe it will inspire me to put the studio back together again. Truthfully, about the only thing these old analog machines are good for is transferring my old songs to Pro Tools. I started to do this once and after some critical listening, quickly realized that most of the old songs weren't that good and that the arduous process wasn't worth the effort.

This is the challenge these days. What exactly is worth the effort?  I think that keeping Dot as healthy and happy as I can is a worthy cause, but I don't have much to prove in the advertising world anymore. So much of what used to seem so important to me just seems silly now.

Derrick is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2385

Janet asked me whether I'd ever heard of GoPro cameras the other day and of course I answered "Oh sure, I've had one for years." When I said this, I realized that I hadn't actually used the camera in years either. Today, I found the thing gathering dust in a drawer and fired it up to see if it still worked. Since I tend to be an early adopter, this was one of the first GoPro's ever made. There was no WiFi, it had a cryptic menu, and I'd lost the software for it a long time ago. Getting this ancient thing going again was a natural weekend project.

You may wonder why I bought the GoPro in the first place, since I don't snowboard, water ski, or ride bicycles down mountains. I think my original intent was to mount the camera on one of the dogs and film them while they were running around at the dog park. The dog camera never happened. There were a few ugly dog fights at the park we usually went to and we quit taking our dogs to public dog parks. Then both dogs got cancer and our lives changed dramatically. GoPro cameras are still a cool concept though. If they had been invented thirty years ago, I would have used them a lot.

Do you ever think about all the repetitive things you do everyday? Every time I brush my teeth, make the bed, clean out the lint trap in the dryer, tie my shoes, check to make sure I have my keys before I leave the house, and turn off the computer each night, some kind of muscle memory kicks in and I realize that I have done these things exactly the same way thousands and thousands of times. Weekend chores are repetitive by nature and I sometimes think that I go through entire days repeating actions I have done for so long that I don't even think about them. I don't decide to brush my teeth or make the bed each day. It just happens.

Cleaning up Dot's poop is rapidly becoming one more of those automatic muscle memory things I do everyday without even thinking. I've gotten so much better at dealing with the mess since her incontinence started. Now, there are poop bags, enzyme cleaners, and disposable pads pre-positoned everywhere. I've learned to recognized the breathing changes and telltale motion in her tail that indicates an accident is about to happen. I don't have to do nearly as much laundry as I did in the beginning, because I've learned what to expect. It's kind of amazing how adaptable people can be when it is necessary. This is why I continue to faithfully do the shoulder strengthening exercises my physical therapist recommended several years ago. I understand how easy it would be to get lazy and just adapt to using one arm instead.

I don't want to get lazy. That's why I'm going to the gym tomorrow, even though I'd probably rather just read a book. I don't want to get sick either. I saw something on TV today that said the third leading case of death in the United States is medical mistakes. I'm sure this is true. Questionable medical procedures killed my Mom. I had a close call myself when I was given two medications that should have never been taken together. How was I to know. You trust that your doctor knows what they are prescribing. We live in a world where we don't trust our politicians, have lost faith in our drinking water, and worry that our doctor is going to replace the wrong knee. I'm not sure there is a solution for this, but it does explain why some people smoke a lot of weed.

Shiner is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2384

I was surprisingly upbeat today. While the pundits on the morning TV shows were talking doom and gloom as a result of yesterday's Brexit vote, I just felt like a little sanity had returned to the world. Dot seemed to agree. For the first time in weeks, she slept through the night and pooped outside in the morning like a normal dog. It was a nice Summer day with a light breeze and we all had a nice morning walk.

After Janet went to work, I returned to the slightly upscale restaurant that I'd initially made fun of. Maybe this place is my new favorite now. It's clean and quiet and there's a lot of variety on the menu. After only three visits, the guy that serves me already remembers my name and preferences. I think my guilt about abandoning my original favorite restaurant is starting to fade.

I kept thinking that the panic in the financial markets might be a buying opportunity, so I called my broker to see if he agreed. Instead of shorting stocks, which seemed too risky for me, I sold some Put Options on positions I was thinking about buying anyway. If prices rise, I keep the option fee and no harm is done. If prices fall to the strike price, I own the stock at a discount. Maybe this strategy is still a little risky if Armageddon is looming on the horizon, but I don't think the world is going to end because Britain left the European Union. I may be wrong, but today's panic just seemed like a buying opportunity.

Work is still slow, so I washed the car and mowed the grass in the back yard. I contacted the roofer to see if he'd forgotten me and he said that he'd be over to patch my roof soon. It's about time. The audio repair shop called and said that the second tape deck I'd taken in for repairs was ready. That repair has been taking a long time too. I forgot to call the shop back, but I didn't really feel like picking up the unwieldy machine today anyway. I'll deal with that on Monday.

This month has flown by. It's going to be July before you know it. Living with a sick dog has changed things so much that I've almost forgotten what I used to do in the Summer. I wonder how I used to get everything done when my company was still active and busy. Now, taking care of Dot eats up so much time that when I add one or two minor tasks, the day is gone. I still feel as busy as I ever was. It's just a very different kind of busy.

I'm looking forward to a calm and uneventful weekend. The uneventful part won't be much of a problem. The calm part will probably depend on the dogs.

Rio is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 2383

I wrote a letter to my Luddite sister today. There's something oddly satisfying about writing a letter on paper, putting a stamp on the envelope, and taking it to the post office. I used to regularly correspond with dozens of people by mail, but this recalcitrant sister is the only one left. I miss the days when writing a good letter was still a skill that mattered. There is something tactile about putting a message on paper that just isn't there with e-mail. Sometimes I wrote letters in longhand and other times I used my faithful IBM Selectric typewriter. The fact that you often waited weeks for a reply added to the allure. The immediacy of e-mail, digital photography, and Google searches leaves me cold. I put more thought into things when I edited audio tape with a razor blade, developed film in a darkroom, and wrote letters without the help of spellcheck. Sadly, those days are gone forever.

I really think that the slower pace of an analog world was better for everyone. Now, we measure progress by how big and fast we can make something. The inevitable result of this type of thinking is globalization. In a global economy, successful companies get bigger and bigger, gobbling up all their smaller competitors. A few people become enormously rich, and very gradually there are fewer and fewer choices for the rest of us. Instead of hundreds of small airlines and auto manufacturers, there are just a handful of giant global companies, pumping out standardized products and services for the entire world. I would love to see a reversal of this trend. Even though the odds are against it, I would like to see the UK leave the European Union. I would like to see the Euro disappear and see the return of the Deutsche Mark and the French Franc. I wouldn't even mind seeing the United States split into several smaller countries. Small is good. Small problems are self limiting and can't spread to consume the entire world. The world was more interesting when small self-sufficient countries developed their own unique style and culture. Sure there were still lots of wars and conflicts when city states like Venice and Florence flourished at the end of the Middle Ages, but these states were too small to do much permanent damage to the earth. The whole idea of the Internet is based on the idea of thousands of independent nodes that make it impossible to take down the entire system. We like the redundancy that the Internet provides, but can't seem to grasp that the rest of the world should operate the same way. Globalization and instant gratification have made it too easy to destroy everything. I think these things whenever I write a letter. I might have similar thoughts if I were driving around in a Packard or a Studebaker, but I can't do that anymore.

I had my reasons to be disdainful of e-mail today. One of my clients kept saying that they never received anything from me even after I sent them what they requested three different times. The message wasn't even that important, but it ended up wasting a huge amount of time. I was pretty sure that the problem was on their end, but I ended up having to extensively test my own e-mail account just to make sure that I wasn't the source of the problem. Electronic problems are tricky this way. I should have just sent them a letter, but I know they never would have had the patience to wait for it. Patience has become just as much of a lost art as writing letters.

I've been watching the Brexit referendum returns on TV as I write this and it looks like I may get my wish. It's still too early to call, but there are a lot more votes to leave the EU than most people anticipated. The downside to all this is that my stocks will probably take a big tumble tomorrow morning. Oh, well. If it wasn't this, it would probably be something else. If the trend continues, people who shorted stocks will make money, but like me, most traders will wake up very surprised. I still think dissolving the EU and a return to sovereignty is a good thing in the long run, but I never would have predicted that it could actually happen.

Boo is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day