Day 4029

Good grief. My watch dialed 911 in my sleep last night. That was a surprise. I woke up to this voice saying "This is Dallas 911, can we help you." What? It took me a moment to realize what was going on, but when I noticed that the voice was coming from my watch, I knew. I spoke into the watch and told the lady that I was sorry, but the call was a mistake. "That's OK," the dispatcher said and hung up. How did this happen? I didn't even know that my watch had this capability. I definitely didn't want this to happen again, so I took the watch off and put it in the office before I went back to bed.

This morning I opened up the Apple Watch app on my phone and looked carefully at all the settings. Sure enough, there was an SOS setting that would summon an emergency response if you fell and didn't immediately press the "I'm OK" button on the watch face. You could also place an emergency call if you held down the flat side button on the side of the watch for a certain length of time. Maybe this button got pressed in my sleep. I certainly didn't fall, although this watch has done strange things before. I disabled the SOS function because I didn't want to wake up later this week with an ambulance in the driveway and EMT technicians knocking on my door. I guess it's a good thing that your watch can call 911 in an emergency, but I wouldn't call having a dream much of an emergency. It wouldn't take long to get classified as a nuisance caller if your watch did this very often. Nice idea Apple, but I don't think this feature is quite ready for prime time.

The watch incident reminded me that I still had a free offer to upgrade to Fitbit Premium. My health insurance provider recently added Fitbit integration to it's gym membership program. The letter that explained the offer had been sitting on my desk for weeks, but I'd never bothered to follow the instructions for the Fitbit upgrade. Fitbit Premium seems harmless enough. I like tracking fitness stats and I don't think there is any way that my Fitbit will call 911 in my sleep. The Fitbit upgrade is probably like that sensor that monitors our electric wiring. A year from now I'll probably regret signing up for both services.

I tried to call the dehumidifier manufacturer and ask some questions about the strange behavior of the replacement unit I received. The company still seems to be closed for the holidays. Nobody answered my call or the e-mail I subsequently sent. Something is clearly wrong with the replacement dehumidifier. I still think they sent me a refurbished unit instead of a new machine.

Since it's Monday, Janet and I went up to visit the kennel Dalmatians this afternoon. The kennel was quiet and most of the holiday boarding dogs were gone. There are currently three Dalmatians at the kennel and I think a fourth might be coming next week. I still need to take pictures of Cooper, but since he is still dealing with a few health issues, he is not ready for adoption yet. I'll take my camera when we visit next week. There might be two dogs to photograph.

When we walked Dawn this morning, she only walked one mile, just like yesterday. We wondered if she'd like to try another walk when we returned from the Dalmatian kennel. She seemed enthusiastic, but froze again after she had traveled one mile. One mile seems to be her limit these days. Nothing is wrong with Dawn. As soon as she sees that we have turned around and are headed home, she resumes walking briskly toward the house. Instead of training Dawn, I think she is training us.

I'm curious when Janet and I will get the vaccine. Several people I know have already been vaccinated. Since we are older and in a high priority group, I don't imagine that the wait will be all that long. I'll take the vaccine, but I'm in no hurry. I'd like to see if the people ahead of me in line have any serious side effects. Will life return to normal when Janet and I have been vaccinated? Somehow, I doubt it.

Hunter is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4028

Dawn only walked a mile today. Janet walked all the way around the lake. I kind of split the difference and I walked about eight miles. I don't know why Dawn didn't want to walk further. It was a really nice day. There is still no rhyme or reason to when Dawn will freeze and refuse to continue walking. Today she was having fun walking along the shoreline, wagging her tail and smelling everything. All of the sudden she just stopped and let us know she was done for the day. As soon as we turned around, she started walking normally again. It would make sense if she was tired, but she sure doesn't appear to be tired when we start heading home.

Janet and I have been wondering for a long time if we could make it all the way around the lake. For some reason she had always thought the distance was 26 miles and I thought it was 16 miles. We've lived here for ages, but neither of us had ever looked up the actual distance. A few days ago I did a Google search and discovered that it was only slightly more than 9.5 miles around the lake. That was a surprise. Janet thought she could do that distance easy and she did. I could probably do it as well as long as my new shoes keep the foot pain at bay. Maybe I'll give it a try one of these days. The park was really crowded today. I guess it makes sense. The holidays are almost over and it was a really nice day. I continue to be surprised that so many people like to gather together in large groups. People like to walk together, jog together, have picnics together, and even string their hammocks together. I'm convinced that this is why the pandemic still persists. This thing would have disappeared months ago if people just kept to themselves like I do. Is it really that hard to be alone? I find it peaceful.

It bothers me that Dawn doesn't really like me. Dogs always seem to like me. Dawn lets me feed and walk her, but she treats me more like a kennel attendant than a friend. Janet is her best buddy though. She follows Janet around from the moment we wake up until we go to bed again. Janet really wants Dawn to bond with me so she can feel free to travel again. We don't know what it's going to take though. The only thing we can think of is that I somehow remind her of the old men who mistreated her. 
 

While Janet was walking around the lake, I continued to tweak my new website. I keep finding mistakes and fixing them, only to find a new mistake a few minutes later. I must have uploaded the site ten times this afternoon. I'll probably find some more mistakes and omissions tomorrow, but the site is getting better.   I'm not striving for perfection here. I just don't want to embarrass myself. It's probably a good thing that I've decided to reinvent myself as a space and astronomy journalist. Writing is easy for me. Coding websites is hard.

It's getting harder and harder for me to post the blog every day. I have to convert each days post to a JPEG image for it to even show up on Facebook. Now Blogger has changed their interface again, making it much more difficult to insert pictures in a post. It took me forever to get today's three small pictures looking the way they usually do. Add this to the frustrations I'm having with updating my company website and I'm just about ready to chuck online media entirely. Give me a real magazine with a real flesh and blood editor any day. It's so much easier dealing with a real person and so much more satisfying to be able to hold the end result in your hand. I'm not quite as much of a Luddite as my sister, but I'm getting there.

Petey is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4027

They had Clorox wipes at the grocery store this morning. I guess that's a good sign. The clouds cleared and there were blue skies this afternoon. That was an even better sign. We're still waiting until later in the day to walk Dawn. What's the hurry. Neither of us have a lot to do these days.

I actually got quite a bit done today. I made a few more tweaks to my new website, wrote a letter to my sister, went to the bank, and finished all my grocery shopping before noon. By the time we got ready to walk Dawn, it had warmed up quite a bit and we were feeling optimistic. Dawn actually did well today. She walked three miles, which was much better than yesterday. When she refused to walk further, we just turned around and let her lead the way home. There is no sense to push her too hard. Dawn is not a young dog and there are probably dozens of good reasons why she doesn't want to walk as far as she used to. She's been to the vet recently and there don't seem to be any serious medical issues. Hopefully, we'll eventually figure out what is going on.

I finally installed the sensor that is supposed to monitor our electric wiring. I've been reluctant to do this because our house is old and I was afraid that the sensor would find a problem immediately. So far, so good. The sensor has been running most of the day and it says everything is normal. We'll see what happens the next time one of the pumps on the roof shorts out.

Yesterday the replacement dehumidifier that the manufacturer sent me was making a loud rattling noise. It sounded like something was coming loose internally. I was convinced that the manufacturer had sent me a factory second, but today the sound disappeared. The machine has been running quietly all day. Did the part that was rattling fall off, or are these dehumidifiers just noisy when you are breaking them in? Who knows? I think I'll call these guys on Monday. I have a lot of questions.

I'm already losing interest in my website revisions. There really isn't much sense in having a company website anymore, since I am more or less retired. I wouldn't turn down a job, but I'm not actively looking for work either. I'd probably be irritated if I got a big website development project. Creating a website that works flawlessly across a wide variety of different platforms has become quite complex. I've got the new website working fine on my desktop computer, but it doesn't look right on my iPad. This means that it probably won't look right on most phones either. What a pain. Once I get this mess figured out, I probably won't look at this site again for several years. As I said, you don't really need a business website when you don't have a business.

I haven't taken the Christmas tree down yet. I guess it's time, but I don't see any need to hurry. The tree is pretty and I am lazy. I imagine that I'll take the tree down sometime next week. I've noticed when we are out walking that most of the neighbors trees are gone already. The Christmas tree is only a diversion. I really need to focus on clearing out the storage warehouse and my office next year. I'm sure this is a year long project. There is so much to do.

Why did I have a pizza tonight? Janet and both I love pizza, but pizza doesn't love me. I can already tell that I am going to have a bad case of heartburn this evening. 

Dash is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4026 - New Year's Day

It didn't really feel like a holiday. I've completely lost track of the days. All the familiar reference points seems to have disappeared. There was no Friday morning trash pickup today. The Rose Bowl is being played at Texas Stadium instead of in California. Were there other bowl games today? I'm not sure. Most of these games are named after corporate sponsors now. Janet's gym was open today, but Walmart and Costco are closed. Dawn doesn't even like to walk in the mornings anymore. It's all very disorientating.

I slept in late and had my usual smoothie for breakfast. I was surprised that I slept well. We stayed up late last night and drank Bellinis and nibbled on a cheese tray while we watched a surprisingly elaborate fireworks show on TV. Why did Dallas even have a fireworks show this year? It was cold and raining outside and crowds weren't allowed to attend anyway. 

At least it wasn't raining today. We were hoping that delaying our walk until about 1 PM would keep Dawn interested. She hates damp weather though and we were out of luck. We walked about a third of a mile and then Dawn froze and refused to walk further. I couldn't really blame her for wanting to go home. It was very cold and damp outside. As soon as we returned home, Dawn jumped on the bed and went to sleep. Janet and I should have done the same, but we have both become addicted to movement. We continued walking.

Yesterday I hardly walked at all because it was raining all day. Even though it was cold and dismal, we walked our usual five miles. It's too bad that Dawn wouldn't join us. We started doing all this walking for her. Maybe Dawn knew that the open meadows she enjoys were all muddy today. Some were covered with water and even had ducks swimming in them. We got a lot of rain yesterday.

When we returned home I was determined to figure out what had gone wrong with my website update yesterday. I basically screwed everything up and ruined my site. Why did everything work on the development site I use, but not on my own server. Eventually, I discovered that some of the server side code I used wasn't supported by my hosting company and didn't do anything at all. So much for all the fancy stuff. I could either abandon my update and upload my old site again, or figure out how to make the new site a little less complex. None of this was my idea of fun, but what else did I have to do today.

I made incremental small changes and uploaded them to see if they worked. I did this over and over again. It took a long time because I really didn't know what I was doing. The more fancy animation I discarded, the better the site seemed to work. After uploading a half a dozen different versions, I finally came up with something that wasn't totally embarrassing. I should accept my limitations. I still like old fashioned static sites and hate all the extra steps you have to take to make a modern website mobile and tablet friendly. I guess what I came up with today will have to do for a while. The website doesn't have many visitors. Very few people will even notice that anything has changed.

I don't know how we're going to get Dawn excited about life again. She seems depressed. I'm certainly no motivation expert. On most mornings I have a hard time getting out of bed myself. Maybe there is nothing wrong with Dawn at all. I tend to overthink things. We'll see how things go in the new year. Janet would like to take Dawn to the training class that Dot and Dash seemed to enjoy. Of course that class has been canceled because of Covid. Can we move beyond Covid this year? I certainly hope so.

Jasper is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4025

Today was a fitting end to 2020. The weather was absolutely miserable. There was a heavy all day rain and the temparature was in the mid thirties. It felt even colder with a wind chill in the twenties. Needless to say, Dawn didn't get a walk today. She wouldn't have wanted one anyway. It was hard enought to get her to go out in the back yard and pee. Yesterday and today have broken my Fitbit streak. The only steps I got today were walking back and forth between the office and the kitchen to get more snacks.

It's too bad I don't like watching television. Today was tailor-made for watching movies on Netflix or binge watching a new series on Amazon Prime. Without our long morning walk, the day seemed impossibly long. I looked at Facebook for a while, watched some astronomy videos on YouTube, and kept checking on the pumps to make sure that they weren't clogged. I can turn on the pumps from indoors now, but unfortunately I can't see if water is coming out the hoses. To do that I have to go out in the back yard and look around the side of the house. It still beats climbing up on the roof though.

Eventually I got bored enough to start building the new company website I've been postponing forever.  I deconstructed a few websites I like and examined their code to see how they accomplished all their fancy tricks. Once I figured out how these things worked, I started building something similar myself. I didn't really think I'd make much progress, but I had all day. By dinnertime, I had the outline of a pretty nice site. I'm pretty sure I can finish this over the weekend. I don't really expect the new site to bring me any business.  It's just a way to keep my hand in the game.

I'm not really sure who visits my existing website anymore. There was a time when it was considered somewhat innovative and I remember that it used to bring me business. That's ancient history now. It's literally been decades since one of my sites was nominated for Website of the Year and even longer since another site I designed was included in a Ryder Publications book called The World Wide Web Top 1000. I was a very early adopter and did pretty well designing very simple static sites. When Google decided that websites needed to be mobile friendly to be included in their search results, it was time for me to pack it in and pass the torch to a younger generation. To this day I have never looked at a website on my phone.

New Year's Eve is one more thing that never changed for us during the pandemic. Many years ago my band used to routinely play New Year's Eve parties, but it has been a long, long time since Janet and I have left the house to celebrate. We struggle to stay awake until midnight. We'll have a glass of champagne and eat some cheese and crackers as we watch the ball drop on TV. That's what we'll do tonight if we don't fall asleep watching Perry Mason. 

I hope that 2021 ushers in a return to normalcy, but I have my doubts. Realistically, things will probably get worse for a while. Many people are starting to say that Covid will become like the flu and never really go away. Society has already changed so dramatically that there isn't going to be a return to normal. Whatever was normal a few years ago is gone. Have you seen that Boston Dynamics video with the dancing robots? When robots can dance better than you can, you can probably kiss your jobs goodbye. Companies have already learned to operate with a lot fewer people during the Covid lockdowns. I'm convinced that this trend will continue. All things considered, this is a good time to be retired.

Dot is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4024

It was cold and wet today. Dawn was smart. She quickly went outside and did her business after we woke up and then didn't want to leave the house for the rest of the day. I foolishly thought I could take advantage of a break in the weather and get some steps in. It didn't take long for the rain to start again and I ended up getting wet after I finished my first mile. Janet was smarter. She went to the gym to get her exercise.

Nothing gives you cabin fever like a cold all day rain. I made sure the pumps on the roof were working, but there were very few projects I felt like starting today. After drying my wet clothes, finishing my morning smoothie and wasting as much time as I could on the computer, I eventually became so bored that I decided to go to the grocery store in the rain. I would have waited until tomorrow, but it is supposed to rain all day tomorrow too.

I was surprised at how much traffic there was on this cold dismal day. Were all these other people bored like me or did they actually have important things to do? I got the things I needed and came home again. Of course I had to wash the car because I can't stand a muddy car.

I think the dehumidifier company sent me a factory second. The unit seems to work fine, but it makes a strange rattling noise that sounds like something is loose inside. The other dehumidifiers never made this noise. There is something strange about the mechanism that shuts the unit off when the tank is full as well. It doesn't seem to be connected to anything electrically, so I don't know how it can turn the unit off after the water bucket becomes full. How do I test this thing without flooding the house? For now, I'm just turning it off at night. Better safe than sorry. I hate to complain to the manufacturer because they did give me this thing for free.

I hate the fact that the virus appears to be getting worse even though many states are completely shut down. When is this thing going to end? I'm really hesitant to travel now. It would probably be foolish to go anywhere. So much for following rocket launches for a while. I keep reading that hospitals in Dallas are filling up again, but I still don't know anyone in town who had become sick. It's all very strange. It's easy to become paranoid when you turn on the news. There's always a story about some young, healthy athlete who got the virus and died a few days later. I try to stay safe, but part of me thinks that everyone is going to get this virus eventually.

I've started following a few astrophotography groups on the Internet. It's become pretty apparent that this is all about accumulating as much gear as you can and then trying to figure out how to hook it all together. There is a lot more talk about gadgets on these groups than about objects in the sky. It was pretty much the same when I collected watches or even model trains. Time will tell whether I have the patience to take hundreds of pictures of the same object, call the resulting photographs "data," and then meticulously stack them all together along with dark, flat, and bias frames to produce an image that would be impossible to see with your eye. I love looking at the night sky, but I also like getting a good night's sleep and am not a terribly patient person.

I'm not looking forward to tomorrow. Every forecast I've looked at says there's a 100% chance of rain for most of the day. The best thing about tomorrow is that 2020 will be over. Let's hope that 2021 turns out a little better.

Penny is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4023

I tried my best to be productive today. I started by defrosting the little refrigerator. This doesn't sound like much, but it's kind of a pain. I need to wait until the big refrigerator is empty enough that I can transfer everything temporarily while I unplug the unit, open the door, and let all the ice melt. This little dorm room size refrigerator was never meant to be permanent, but somehow we need it now. It is very basic and doesn't even have automatic defrost. Every few months I take out the glass shelves, fill the interior with old towels and let the ice melt. All is good now. I probably won't have to do this again until March.

Since I needed to take out the trash today anyway, I thought I'd try to shred a bunch of old mail and useless documents in the office. I managed to fill a large black leaf bag with paper confetti and almost overheated the shredder. Shredding these documents took a long time because I needed to read everything to make sure I wasn't destroying anything important. I think it's pretty safe to say that nothing important was lost today. Some of the envelopes even had hand written notes on the outside saying "must be shredded." The contents were usually a credit card that had expired in 2016, or an insurance claim that had been settled decades ago. I even found all the paperwork for a JC Penny lifetime battery for a car I hadn't owned in ages. I think these lifetime batteries almost put JC Penny out of business because they were good for as long as you owned the car. I tend to keep cars for a very long time.

When I saw the full bag of shredded confetti, I thought I'd made some real progress. Why did the office not look any different? This is what is so discouraging about decluttering. It's really hard to make a dent in  a room full of stuff that took thirty years to accumulate. I could continue to do this day after day and month after month until I went stark raving mad.

Dawn continues to be a work in progress. She's more enthusiastic about walking when we wait until later in the day. She prefers open fields to trails. Maybe this is why we've started seeing ticks on her. I even found a tick on me this morning which is very rare. She's due for another Frontline pill very soon, so maybe the coverage is starting to wear out. At any rate, we had a good walk today, although I wish we had stayed on the trails. My new shoes aren't nearly as effective at preventing foot pain when walking on uneven ground. We might have walked Dawn a little too far today. She was really tired when we returned home. She'll have plenty of time to rest tomorrow. It's supposed to rain all day.

I started using the second dehumidifier in one of the bathrooms today. The house may actually be too dry now because I've been waking up with nosebleeds in the morning lately. It's still amazing to me that large buckets of water can be extracted from the air every single day. The house is much drier since we started using dehumidifiers. There is no dampness in the closets anymore and the air feels better. The machines are noisy though. You can't have everything I guess.

I still have a few errands I need to run before the end of the year. I should have done my errands today, because the forecast says there is a 100% chance of rain on Wednesday and Thursday. You know how I feel about driving in the rain. Forecasts are frequently wrong though. We'll try to get Dawn walked first and then see what happens.

Allie is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4022

We found a couple of ticks on Dawn while she was sitting on the bed this morning. Since the last thing you want is ticks in your bed, we washed all the bedding. It takes quite a few loads to wash the sheets, the blankets, the comforter, and whatever else was on the bed at the time. We did take Dawn outside and brushed her too but didn't find any additional ticks. When I remade the bed later in the day, I realized that it was a lot harder to put on a fitted sheet than it used to be. My shoulder has really gotten worse. It's not so easy to lift up the mattress and tuck everything in anymore.

We've quit taking a walk before breakfast. With very little evidence to back up our decision, we decided that it's going to be easier to walk Dawn later in the day when it is warmer. It didn't actually get warmer today, but that wasn't our fault. Dawn did well today. We took an old familiar route and she only froze once for a very short amount of time. For the most part, she was back to her old self today. Maybe Dawn knows what happened yesterday, but she sure isn't talking.

It's still hard to remember what day it is. We started getting mail again today and I fixed a smoothie for breakfast. It must be Monday. It was a good thing we walked Dawn when we did, because the sky kept getting darker as the day progressed. It wasn't supposed to rain until tomorrow, but I should have known better than to trust the forecast. It started raining right about when I was getting ready to take my afternoon walk.

Since I couldn't walk and I'd already finished cleaning all the bedding, I decided up upgrade the firmware on my new camera. I'm always a bit apprehensive about upgrading firmware on electronic equipment. There were all sorts of warnings in the camera's instruction book that if you didn't follow the instructions for firmware upgrades exactly, there was a good chance that you could brick your camera. Hey, nothing ventured, nothing gained. The entire procedure took about fifteen minutes and I kept thinking that something might go wrong the entire time. If the Internet went out during the procedure you bricked the camera. If the power went out, same thing. Japanese camera companies don't always do a great job of translating their manuals into English either. The instructions I was supposed to follow to the letter weren't entirely clear. The upgrade went smoothly though, even if it did take a long time. I now have a camera that will do even more things that I will probably never find a use for.

I've decided that it wouldn't be smart to go out to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory for the Perseverance landing in February. The situation in California keeps getting worse and worse. To get to JPL, I'd have to fly into Los Angeles which seems to be leading the nation in new virus cases. Hospitals are full. The city seems to be in full lockdown. Oh, well. Space adventures can wait. I"m sure there will be something else the magazine might be interested in later. With the way things are going, I doubt that I'd be welcome at JPL anyway.

I really need to remember to take out the trash tomorrow evening. The trucks come by on Wednesday morning during the holidays. I forgot about the holiday schedule last week and the trash is stacking up. Maybe this is why Facebook finds my blog offensive. I'm always talking trash.

Petey and Dot are Dalmatians of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4021

Houston, we have a problem. We found a new route for Dawn this morning and after several miles we found ourselves on the other side of the lake. Dawn was doing great. She was walking without any hesitation and was enjoying herself. When we decided it was time to go home, Dawn had other ideas. She wanted to keep going. It was way too far to circle the entire lake and come home the long way. We had to turn around. Dawn refused to budge. We tried everything. The cheese didn't work. Getting her over to a road that ran parallel to the trail we took didn't work. She wanted to keep going, but we could tell she was getting tired. We went a little further, hoping that we could convince her to turn around but that didn't work either. The dog was way too heavy to carry home.

This certainly wasn't what we expected today. We found a good place to rest and I walked back home to get the car to come and retrieve Dawn and Janet. I told her that this might take a while. If Janet managed to get Dawn turned around and headed in the right directions again, I told her to text me. When I got back home again, there was no message. I put Dawn's blanket in the car and went back to the other side of the lake to find them. When I arrived where I had left them, they weren't there. I drove to the next place the road intersected the trail and they weren't there either. Eventually, I reached Janet on the phone and she said they were almost home. Evidently Dawn refused to move for about twenty minutes and then she decided she wanted to follow two Vizslas who were heading in the right direction. 

Did Dawn have a seizure or was she just being very stubborn? We'll probably never know. Janet did say that Dawn's eyes looked very strange while they were waiting for me at the rest area. Once Dawn began moving again, she and Janet made it home without incident. She didn't hesitate at all. We've been walking together in the park for ages and Dawn never used to act like this. It's a shame that we probably won't be able to take this route again. We kind of need a shortcut home now in case of emergencies.

Once we were all back home the day was uneventful. My feet hurt because I tried to make the return trip to get the car as quickly as I could. After a short nap, I started thinking about updating my company website. I've been wanting to do this for a while because the site is sadly out of date. I'm apparently sadly out of date as well. I used to be fairly adept at coding, but I couldn't figure out how to duplicate some of the fancy new things I've been seeing on other modern sites. Before I got too discouraged, I decided to watch a video on how to edit deep sky photographs instead. I got about halfway through the video before I became bored with the very technical steps that were outlined and decided to call it a day.

I went up on the roof this afternoon and was pleased to discover that all the water had completely evaporated. Most of the leaves had blown away as well. This was good because we have more rain in the forecast next week. There is even a chance of snow on Thursday. I'm definitely not looking forward to snow. We'll see what happens. I just take things one day at a time now.

I finally figured out whey I have been unable to syndicate the blog to Facebook. Facebook algorithms still find the blog offensive. Any of you who have been reading the blog for a while know that this is ridiculous, but it is impossible to talk to Facebook about anything. Facebook is a one way street. I'm kind of disgusted with social media in general. If it all disappeared tomorrow it would be fine by me. I'd just go back to keeping my journal in a little leather book and life would go on. 

Taylor is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4020

I thought I'd go grocery shopping early this morning to let the weather warm up before our second attempt to take Dawn on a normal walk. The store was only open to Plus Card members between 8 and 9 AM. I don't even know what a Plus Card is, but they let me in anyway. It actually was a pretty good time to shop. The store was virtually empty.

After I returned, we had breakfast and then we took Dawn for a walk. Janet and I were both curious to see if Dawn would freeze again. We let her lead the way and things went pretty well for a while. We accidentally crossed one of our old familiar paths and Dawn froze again. She just doesn't want to walk on this road anymore. Luckily, Janet brought some cheese with her and we were able to lure Dawn down to the shoreline where we continued walking. We had to use the cheese again to get Dawn to cross two familiar bridges, but we ended up having a pretty decent walk. We walked through a lot of big open fields and along the edges of wooded areas. As long as there were new and different things to smell, Dawn was fine. At one point Janet got too far ahead and Dawn started walking faster to catch up with her. I can't run anymore. She tried to jump a small ravine and I couldn't keep up with her and fell. I skinned my knee but I didn't let go of the leash. I'm not sure where Dawn would have gone if I did. When we reached the halfway point and turned to return home, I was pretty sure there would be no further problems. Dawn walked on a lot of familiar trails on the return trip and never hesitated at all. Her goal was to get back to the house where she could sit on the bed again.

I was going to clean up the broken glass in the greenhouse today and take it out to the curb for bulky trash day. As luck would have it, the trash trucks came while I was at the grocery store. Why did I think they were going to come on Monday? Oh, well. I cleaned up the glass anyway and put it in a box. Now I just need to remember to set the box out at the curb next month.

It was hard to get motivated today. I didn't feel like starting any new projects or cleaning up the office. I vacuumed the bedrooms, did a load of wash, and that was about it. Maybe yesterday's huge meal made me feel sluggish. All I really wanted to do today was sleep.

We've noticed that there are way more police and fire sirens than there used to be. We hear these sirens every time we walk Dawn. They wake us up when we are sleeping. We hear sirens every few hours now at all times of day and night. I guess this is just part of living in a city these days. It definitely wasn't like this when I first moved to Dallas. It would be nice to live in a place with no sirens and nothing to worry about at night. Lots of luck with that. Such places probably don't exist anymore.

I thought I figured out a way to syndicate the blog to Facebook again, but it didn't work. It's probably not worth the effort to spend much time on this. I've gotten pretty fast at making the JPEG image of my post every night anyway. Syndication services that automatically post the blog to various places used to save me a lot of time. I still syndicate the blog to Twitter, so I never have to visit Twitter myself. I used to do the same thing with Facebook until they banned a lot of the syndication services. I guess I'll continue visiting Facebook for the time being. I like seeing all the dog pictures.

I don't know if Dawn's reluctance to travel down a familiar path is temporary or permanent. It makes life a little difficult though. When we leave the house in the morning we've only got two choices. We can either go left or we can go right.

Dash is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4019 - Christmas

It turns out it wasn't Dawn, it was us. We tried an experiment this morning. Instead of having Dawn follow us on a walk, we followed her. She led us over the hills and through the woods on a wild walk to parts of the park we had never even visited before. Luckily, it was a beautiful, dry winter day with no poison ivy, no bugs, and most importantly, no snakes. Dawn had a great time. She was happy, energetic, and didn't freeze in place at all. We ended up walking over five miles and probably could have walked longer. If there is a lesson in all this, it might be that Dawn thinks we are boring people and wishes we would do more interesting things with her.

Dawn's triumphant Christmas walk was the beginning of a very pleasant day. The house was filled with the smells of delicious things in the oven. Janet talked with her family on the phone while I finally figured out how to use my new camera. I've barely scratched the surface of what the camera can do, but I did take some pictures and was pleased with the results. I figured out how to install and pair the phone app that lets me operate the camera remotely and I tried out a couple of lenses that I already own. This camera is going to be very good for astrophotography and future Dalmatian Rescue photo shoots.

Even Facebook was better today. Instead of people arguing about politics, there were just lots of happy pictures of dogs dressed up in Christmas outfits. It's too bad we can't act like it's Christmas all year long. For one day a year, humanity doesn't seem so bad after all.

I took another walk later in the day and some of the larger paved trails were filled with children playing with their Christmas toys. The gifts kids get now are much larger and more expensive than what I used to find under the tree. Janet and I were talking recently about how happy we were to get a ViewMaster for Christmas when we were little. Everything runs on batteries now and will probably break fairly quickly. I saw a parade of children riding on fancy motorized toy cars and scooters. There were motorized skateboards as well. A lot of the older kids on motorized scooters were going way too fast. Luckily, I didn't encounter any serious accidents today. It would have spoiled my Christmas mood.

Our Christmas dinner was delicious. Janet baked a Crown Roast surrounded by root vegetables, all covered by a fabulous spicy glaze. When it came out of the oven it looked like something you'd see in a food magazine. Our side dishes were candied sweet potatoes, Italian sausage dressing, fresh cranberry sauce, and a Brussels Sprout salad. We made Mimosas, got out our best champagne glasses and ate way too much.

Dawn got her first taste of Devon's Doggie Delights for Christmas and she loves the Cheese Chompers. I forget when we first discovered Devon's treats, but Dot and Dash loved them. I'm really happy that Dawn had a good day. It was so nice to see her acting normally again. We'll see how long this lasts. Realistically, it will be impossible to let her drag us through the woods every day. The park isn't that big either. There are only so many undiscovered routes left. Maybe we just have a very stubborn dog instead of a dog with mental problems. We forget sometimes that Dawn is a mama dog who has raised many, many puppies. I think this might explain a lot of her behavior.

A very Merry Christmas to all of you. I hope your day was as nice as ours was. For a short moment in time, I'm feeling fairly optimistic.

Dot is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4018

Dawn is still acting weird. We didn't even try to walk early this morning because it was so cold. Later in the day, Dawn seemed eager to go outside. We walked normally for a while. She smelled things and seemed active and engaged. Then after we had gone about a mile, she froze, just like she did the other day. Janet walked ahead to see if she would eventually follow her. Nope. She wouldn't turn around and go back home either. I had a hard time getting her out of the middle of the road where she was in the way of cars and bicycles. As soon as Dawn saw that Janet was turning around and coming back to us, Dawn turned around and headed home. She kept looking back to make sure that Janet was following us, but she seemed active and happy again. When Janet caught up with us, Dawn was wagging her tail and had a "mission accomplished" look on her face. I have no idea what is going on. Taking long walks used to be one of her favorite activities. I could be easily convinced myself that Dawn is having a seizure when she freezes like this, if it weren't for the fact that she instantly returns to normal as soon as Janet and I turn around and head home again. This evening she ate a small round hole in her favorite blanket. What's that all about? We were right next to her having dinner and we never saw or heard anything.

Dawn may have tired of walking, but I'm still moving. It's disappointing that Dawn doesn't want to accompany me anymore, but I still need to get my steps. I took a long walk by myself and thought about the complexities of understand a dog's behavior. It would be so much easier if they could talk and tell us how they were feeling. Dawn's vital sighs and her recent blood work look excellent. Physically, she seems to be in good health. We're guessing that she might have had a traumatic brain injury earlier in her life. This would at least explain the signs of atrophy we see on the top of her head. It might explain her erratic behavior too. It's all just a guess though. 

I did some accounting this afternoon and couldn't get things to balance again. This never used to happen. I went over my entries in Quickbooks three times and couldn't find any mistakes. Why was I $50 off then?  Somewhere there has to be an easy answer to all of this. Why does a healthy, active dog suddenly refuse to walk? Why can't I balance my books anymore? I have a feeling that if I were younger and more on top of my game, things would start to make sense.

I installed Stellarium on my computer this afternoon and played around with it for an hour or two. There is so much I will never see in the night sky. It's hard to even learn the basics, like where all the constellations are, when you can't see anything due to city light pollution. Even if I found a dark spot in the park with a clear view of the sky, the light pollution would still be there. It's a shame. When I'm out in the Davis Mountains, I can tell that my interest in astronomy is real. It's an uphill battle to maintain that interest though when you live in a city where it's almost impossible to see anything.

I need to read my e-mail more carefully. I was getting ready to take the trash out to the curb tonight and started wondering whether anything would be picked up on Christmas Day. Probably not. Maybe the city sent us a message. Sure enough, I found a message from the sanitation department that was sent last week. It said that trash would be picked up on Wednesday this week. Oops. That was yesterday.

It's hard to believe it's Christmas tomorrow. Where has this year gone? I hope that all of you enjoy the holidays. Christmas is still a hopeful time, even for someone like me. Hey, maybe 2021 will be better.

Dot is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4017

Dawn is still acting weird on her morning walks. She always appears eager to leave the house. We'll walk a little ways and she'll do her business. We'll continue walking and then for no reason, she'll stop and refuse to go any further. She doesn't appear to be in any pain or having a seizure. As soon as we agree to turn around and retrace our steps to the house, she's back to her old self, walking briskly and full of purpose. Is she just being stubborn or is there something wrong? It's hard to tell.

At any rate, Dawn missed out on a nice walk this morning. It was really pretty outside and the weather was just about perfect. Dawn certainly doesn't have any separation anxiety. She could care less if Janet and I go off walking by ourselves. As long as Dawn has our big bed to sleep on, she's a happy camper.

Since it was such a nice day today, Janet and I decided to go to the Dallas Arboretum this afternoon. The arboretum is well endowed and beautifully maintained. We often go during the Christmas season because they have special Christmas displays. I wonder how many gardeners it takes to keep this place looking so nice. This is how probably everyone would want their yard to look if they had an unlimited budget. You can get all sorts of ideas wandering through the acres of perfectly trimmed trees, colorful vegetation, and sparkling water attractions. If we tried to duplicate anything we saw this afternoon it would all probably all die within six months. A garden like this requires constant attention.

At Christmas there are twelve glass gazeboes scattered throughout the park, representing the twelve days of Christmas. There is also a full size Christmas village with little German style buildings, each filled with different types of food or Christmas ornaments you can buy. In a normal year, Christmas at the Arboretum is a very popular attraction. I guess Dallas is back to normal, because the place was packed today. It is very odd to see so many people acting completely normally all over town and then turn on the television and hear that our hospitals are full. Everyone except the small children were wearing masks today, but that was probably just because there were large signs all over the place saying that masks were mandatory. 

When we got home from the arboretum we tried to take Dawn on a walk again. She did much better this time and seemed to be enjoying herself until she abruptly froze and refused to go any further. We had probably gone about a mile when this happened. I would think that she might be having a small seizure if it weren't for the fact that as soon as we turn around, she starts wagging her tail again and begins walking briskly toward the house. 

Janet picked up the Crown Roast we are going to have for Christmas dinner at the butcher today. It looks amazing. We are going to have a quiet little Christmas, but we will eat well. We got some gifts for Dawn, but we don't need anything for ourselves. There is not much point in decluttering if you keep buying more.

Ziggy is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4016

Dawn is still very unpredictable on her walks. She seemed very eager to leave the house this morning. After she pooped, she froze and refused to move for a while. I thought she was done, but suddenly she became playful and started running and jumping around. We continued walking for almost two miles while Dawn smelled trees and bushes and was seemingly in a good mood. Then she abruptly froze again and refused to move forward. We tried to change directions and encourage her with a new path, but she just wanted to go home. She obviously wasn't feeling any discomfort, because she kept up a brisk pace all the way home. Something is wrong, but it all seems to be in her head. We are beginning to wonder if Dawn had a traumatic brain injury at some point in her past.

When we got Dawn home again, Janet went to the gym and I just continued walking. It's a shame that Dawn didn't feel like walking today. It was such a nice day. I didn't set any records, but I got quite a few steps today. It wasn't too hot. It wasn't too cold. It was just enjoyable being outdoors.

I'm really making an effort to declutter. It's such a monumental job that I think it's going to take years. Bulky trash day is tomorrow, so I was determined to add a few things to the pile at the curb. I filled several large black trash bags with useless stuff from the office. I finally took the new dehumidifier out of it's shipping container and threw away the box. I threw away a lot of other empty boxes too. It's hard for me to throw away a good box. Shoeboxes always seem useful to me. You can stack them because they're all about the same size. They are well made compared to other boxes and I always seems to have lots of little stuff to fill them with. All the empty boxes got broken down and went to the curb. There were some broken watch winders I threw away. These things were impossible to repair, but they looked nice, so it has always been hard for me to throw them away. I only threw away no-brainer stuff today, but it was surprising how many trash bags I was able to fill. 

The yard got some attention today as well. I threw away some leaky garden hoses and broken hand tools. It was too big of a job to rake all the leaves, but I did manage to sweep them off the front and back porches. I used the leaf blower to blow away a huge pile of leaves that had been blocking the door to the green house and discovered some more broken glass in the process. I guess the last wind storm had knocked out another pane. The greenhouse is a mess. It will be a big job to repair it and an equally big job to tear it down. 

Evidently the whole world watched the conjunction last night. There were a lot of pictures on Facebook. Some were better than mine and others were worse. I felt a little better about my efforts yesterday when I had something to compare my pictures with. Actually, I did quite well considering that I wasn't using a telescope. Almost all the photos that showed more detail than the ones I took were taken with high quality telescopes. Since there won't be another conjunction like this for hundreds of years, I guess it's time to go back to improving my Milky Way pictures.

The Boca Chica livestream was interesting today. Space X was moving the next Starship out to the launch pad. This sixteen story rocket was just traveling down a public highway on a very large truck. The rocket was upright too. It was an amazing sight. I guess Elon doesn't want to spend a lot of money building a special rail line or dedicated road to transport rockets from the factory to the launch pad. A state highway seems to work just fine.

I hope we can get Dawn walking normally again. She's not a playful dog and her walks are about the only exercise she gets. You don't want to let a Dalmatian get fat. It will almost guarantee that the dog will have problems with their rear legs later in life. In dog years Dawn is about the same age as Janet and I. We've all got to work on staying healthy.

Two sisters are today's Dalmatians of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4015 - Winter Solstice

Dawn refused to walk this morning. Did something hurt? Was she too cold? Or was she just being stubborn? Your guess is as good as mine. I suspect that she was just being stubborn and wanted to go back to bed, because when we returned from visiting the Dalmatians at the kennel this afternoon, she walked just fine. Since Dawn didn't want to go anywhere this morning, Janet and I had to walk by ourselves. We completed our five miles a lot sooner without Dawn. She loves to smell things along the way and I find myself stopping to let her investigate a new smell every thirty or forty feet. These slow walks are fine by me. I'm never in a hurry in the morning anyway.

We spent a little extra time with the kennel dogs today because we won't be able to visit them next week. The kennel is typically completely filled with boarding dogs during the week between Christmas and New Year's when their owners are doing their holiday traveling. There aren't any empty open areas to play with the Dalmatians, so we just wait until the holidays are over. I was a little surprised that there were going to be a lot of boarding dogs this year. Apparently, Covid hadn't slowed down holiday travel in Texas at all.

It was perplexing that Dawn walked so normally with us after we returned from the kennel this afternoon. It was chilly this morning, but it was actually warmer than it was yesterday when Dawn was eager to walk. She might have been sore the first day after getting her rabies vaccine, but she's been acting normally ever since. I have no idea what was going through her head this morning.

The sky was clear this evening, so we got to see the conjunction after all. The two planets did appear as one to the naked eye, but they weren't as bright as I expected. Janet and I walked to a place in he park that had a clear view of the Western horizon. Other people must have had the same idea, because there were quite a few folks looking up at the sky. Most of them didn't even know what to look for. This conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn has gotten so much media attention lately that some folks appeared to be expecting a spectacular show. Nope. It wasn't like the Fourth of July at all. If you brought a pair of binoculars, it was pretty cool to see that there were actually two planets up there near the western horizon. To the naked eye, it was a little underwhelming. You really had to watch the two planets gradually coming closer and closer together during the past month or so to fully appreciate tonight's conjunction.

I got a couple of good photos tonight, but it was still difficult to focus on these objects with the lens I was using. A lot of modern lenses don't have a focus ring on the lens barrel and I guess it is assumed that you will always use auto-focus. I made a bunch of very small manual focus adjustments and hoped that at least one of the images would be perfect. I did get several images where you could clearly see Saturn's rings, but I wasn't very impressed. I was using a camera lens instead of a telescope and Saturn was still very small. Hey, it's a learning experience. When I eventually do get a proper telescope I'll be much better at this.

I hope that Dawn feels like a walk tomorrow morning. We do these walks for her, but Janet and I need our exercise as well. It just works better when all three of us want to go in the same direction.

Willow is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4014

I promised Janet that I'd throw away at least five things if she'd help me sort through stuff at the storage warehouse. We ended up removing a whole carload of useless stuff. The sad thing was that when we were finished the storage space didn't look any different. It will take quite a few trips like this to remove enough stuff so I can move to a smaller space.

I threw away a lot of empty boxes that I'd saved in case we moved someday. That's probably never going to happen. It never occurred to me that even if we did move, the electronic gear that came in the boxes would be obsolete or broken by then. I finally threw away my first computer, an old Osborne-1 that was completely rusted. I tossed a large rug that had been given to me as a gift. The rug had completely disintegrated and had either rotted of been eaten by moths. There were dozens of computer keyboards that probably didn't work anymore. I found a sales sample case filled with carefully mounted photos that I apparently meant to show to someone. The photos were so old though that they had all faded. The strangest thing I threw away was a white chef's uniform. What was I doing with a chef's uniform? 

I need to find a nearby commercial shredding company so I can get rid of a lot of old financial records. My accountant says to keep three years of documentation. I must have at least thirty years of records. There is some cool mid-century modern stuff that I might lend to a real estate friend for staging in houses he's selling. There's bunch of vinyl records that could go to a vintage record store. I'm willing to get rid of all my old computers now, but it's so much trouble to take them apart and remove the hard drives. Truthfully, most of the stuff in the storage warehouse wound up there because it was too much trouble to deal when I ran out of room in the office. I don't have the temperament to sell things on e-Bay or even do the research to see if anything might be valuable. It's a lot easier to just throw stuff in the storage space and forget about it. 

The sky was clear this evening, so I practiced taking pictures of Jupiter and Saturn. The two planets are already quite close together. Photographing them was a little more difficult than I anticipated though. Jupiter is much brighter than Saturn so it is almost impossible to find the correct exposure for both. Jupiter's four brightest moons are clearly visible with even a modest telephoto lens, but they are quite dim.  You could take three different images for Jupiter, Saturn, and the moons and then composite them together in Photoshop, but the color of the sky would be different in each photo. I learned some things tonight, so maybe my photos of the conjunction tomorrow will be better. If you are reading the blog on Blogger, you can enlarge this picture and see more detail. If you're reading on Facebook, you are out of luck, because you are just looking at a JPEG image of the blog post.

My new shoes are still doing a great job of reducing foot pain. Unfortunately, I forgot that I sometimes wake up with foot pain when I sleep in the wrong position. The shoes don't help much when your foot hurts before you even put a shoe on. Maybe there's some sort of lightweight wrap or brace I could wear at night. It's a nuisance when your body starts falling apart, but I still think I'm doing better than most people my age. 

It's hard to believe that Christmas is almost here. Where has this year gone? Janet usually visits her family on Christmas but Covid put an end to that. Hopefully by next Christmas we can all resume our regular routines.

Lexi is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day