Day 4425

Another very cold day. There was no new snow or ice, but very little melted. As I expected, we have a small roof leak caused by heat from the house melting the ice on the roof from the bottom up. There is still a layer of ice on the roof, but it has started to melt underneath. It's way too slippery to climb up on the roof and fix things, so I'll just have to live with this for a while. At least it's a very small leak so far.

Dawn hates the snow, so she went without a walk again today. I should have done the same, but I run out of things to do in the house fairly quickly. I need a long walk to kill time. Janet can't go back to the gym until the roads clear up, so we took another walk together in the park today. I tried some different boots but they were worse than yesterday's boots. I really need to find some of the more comfortable Hoka boots, but they seem to be out of stock nationwide. I'm sure they'll be back in stock this summer when I won't need them anymore. I think we saw one of the eagles in the nest this afternoon, but we couldn't get closer because melting snow has turned the best vantage point into a swamp. It was a nice day for a walk though. The sun was out and there wasn't much of a wind. I just wish it were a little warmer.

I think I've finally figured out how to use the star tracker. Since I was house bound for most of the day, I spent a lot of time trying to master the surprisingly complex gadget. You can't really track stars indoors during the day, but you can see if the camera and tracker are pointed in the right direction using planetarium software on my computer. At any rate, I think I'm making progress. I was able to go back and forth between several targets without the software crashing. I also learned how to use the tracker to create panoramas and time lapse sequences. I still haven't taken the device outside and photographed anything, but that day will come. All in good time.

It's too bad I don't enjoy watching Netflix movies. Snow days are perfect for binge watching something. I'm not sure what I enjoy anymore. Astronomy is a strange hobby to have if you don't feel comfortable going outside at night. Dallas feels too dangerous for astronomy. I love my time out at McDonald Observatory, but it is way too far away for casual observing. The worse my foot gets, the more I dread making a long car trip as well. I'm even starting to feel out of the loop down at Kennedy Space Center. There's a lot going on right now and if you only make one or two trips a year, it's hard to be considered a serious part of the space reporting community. Some of my Florida friends are on site almost every week. Hopefully, I'll still get to cover the Artemis 1 launch later this year, but you never know. I'd better take advantage of any opportunity I get. I'm starting to think my traveling days are numbered.

It looks like I will be traveling to the grocery store tomorrow. The larger roads are almost completely free of ice by now and tomorrow should be even warmer than today. I'm sure prices will continue to get higher.  Almost everything is higher these days. I got a bill from my web hosting company yesterday and the annual rate almost doubled. Do I even need a website anymore? Probably not. You think more about the cost of things when you are retired. When I was working I never gave a second thought to the cost of anything. In retrospect, those days were pretty good.

Duke is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4424

We got ice and a little snow, but our heavily hyped winter storm wasn't nearly as bad as I anticipated. We never lost power, so the house stayed nice and warm. This was important because it was very cold today. I hope our good luck continues because it is supposed to be even colder tomorrow. It's probably good that last night's freezing rain turned to sleet fairly quickly because the trees never got coated with a lot of ice. I didn't see any downed trees in our neighborhood.

Janet and I had planned to just stay in the house all day. That was certainly Dawn's plan as well because it was hard to even get her to go out in the backyard and pee. Some dogs love snow. She isn't one of them. After several hours of doing absolutely nothing Janet and I got bored and decided to go on a walk. It probably wasn't the wisest thing to go walking on ice when the temperature was 20 degrees but we both had cabin fever. I knew I couldn't wear my Hoka shoes on a day like this so I dug out my Dad's old Pivetta hiking boots. These boots are almost 60 years old and they are still better than anything you can buy today. A pair of`Pivetta boots was the gold standard for serious hikers for many years. It's too bad this fine Italian company is no longer in business. Lord knows what a pair of hand made boots like this would cost in today's market. You just can't get things like this anymore.

The sleet and snow made the ground crunchy instead of slippery. Even going downhill felt fairly safe. We stayed away from roads wherever possible and stuck to dirt trails. For the most part there wasn't a wind. That helped a lot. When the wind did pick up near the lake, it was brutal. We didn't set any records today, but we did walk almost four miles. Even though we were both very cold when we returned to the house, the walk was much better than sitting around the house staring out the window. I think we have both become addicted to movement.

I don't know why it is going to be so cold tomorrow. The storm has already moved well beyond us. I'll be glad when it is above freezing again. There's a lot of ice on the roof right now and I hope the pumps still work when the ice starts melting. If memory serves, these type of conditions frequently cause roof leaks. Heat from the house melts the ice from the bottom while the layer on the top is still frozen. the water can't escape and it typically finds a way inside. The pumps froze up fairly quickly last night, so they won't be much help until things get a lot warmer.

We both started our cars this afternoon and kept them running until the engines reached operating temperature. This is a habit we got into during last winter's extended freezing spell. There's nothing worse than the sound of an engine that won't turn over on a really cold morning. I won't drive on ice unless it's absolutely necessary, but I do want a reliable car in the winter. I learned how to drive on ice when I was going to high school in Fairbanks, Alaska. On an empty road I'm generally OK. It's the other cars you have to worry about. Very few Dallas drivers have any idea how to drive on ice and snow.

I feel bad for my friends out at McDonald Observatory. It's five degrees and snowing out there. I think they are essentially trapped until conditions improve. Everyone is well prepared though. They stock up on food ahead of time and if things get really bad they can all move temporarily into the Astronomers Lodge which has a large emergency generator. It's only when gasoline for the generator starts to run low that things start to get dicy. I miss my time out at the observatory. Not in the winter though. Being trapped on a mountain in a snowstorm is not for me.

Dawn is such a lazy dog. She had a good time just lounging on the bed today. She had no interest in going outside whatsoever. Janet finally got her to go outside and poop, but she had to put Dawn on a lash to get her out the back door. Needless to say, Dawn did not join us on our walk today. 

Tomorrow will probably be more of the same. I hope a lot of the sleet and ice blows away or evaporates. I don't think it is going to melt. The temperature tomorrow morning will be nineteen degrees.

Casey is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4423 - Groundhog Day

Things aren't looking good. Milltown New Jersey had to cancel their annual Groundhog Day festivities when their popular groundhog, Milltown Mel, died a few days before he was able to prognosticate the length of this year's Winter. Granted, this wasn't Punxsutawney Phil, but Milltown Mel was still a very popular rodent. I'm not sure if this unfortunate event had any effect on today's weather in Dallas, but it isn't looking good down here either. It's currently 32 degrees and raining hard. The temperature has been steadily dropping all day long and the rain is expected to turn into sleet and ice before midnight.

Janet got groceries today and brought home extra blankets from the storage warehouse. I started the gasoline generator to make sure it worked properly and made sure the smaller solar generator is fully charged. I started my car to make sure the battery was good, but didn't leave the driveway. I don't plan on going anywhere until this winter storm is over. Northerners probably think this is overkill, but ice storms have a way of knocking Dallas out cold. We just aren't prepared for stuff like this. Everyone who has lived here a while has memories of a bad ice storm and nobody wants another one.

We got an early start this morning in anticipation of what was coming. Dawn's sunrise walk was actually the warmest it was going to be all day. I took my long walk right after breakfast and I could feel the cold front arriving. I dressed warmly though and I was fine. I pretty much had the park to myself today. Everyone else was probably out emptying the shelves at every grocery store in town. The empty park turned out to be good for me though. I ended up seeing both eagles today. I saw the female in her nest and the male was sitting atop a nearby tree looking for food. I even had my camera with me. My pictures are definitely getting better. I was pretty pleased with today's results.

The rest of the day was fairly uneventful. I've got the pumps on the roof running to try and get as much water off the roof as possible before everything freezes. Janet and I both did our laundry so we wouldn't have a big pile of dirty clothes if the power goes out. I need to remind myself that this is only a two day event. The freeing rain should stop by tomorrow morning and Friday should just be very cold. By Saturday afternoon, Dallas should be back to normal again. I don't think everyone is nearly as worried about the weather as they are about the power company's inept response to freezing temperatures. We're pretty good at keeping cool in the Summer. Not so good at keeping warm in the Winter.

Dawn definitely won't be getting a sunrise walk tomorrow morning. I won't be taking my long walk either. I may be foolish but I'm not an idiot. An old guy who has balance issues has no business walking on ice. It's kind of a shame that my long streak of 20,000 step days will be broken. Despite the foot pain, I was really making progress.

I guess I've done everything I can get prepared for something that still may turn out to be a non-event. Better safe than sorry though. Just about the only thing I hate worse than cold weather is ice. Ice is something you should put in your drinks. It definitely shouldn't be toppling trees, bringing down power lines, and coating the roads. Forget everything I ever said about hot Texas summers. Texas winters are even worse.

Jasper is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4422

We walked Dawn this morning and then I took Janet to the eye surgery center. The place was huge. It was also crowded. I never dreamed there were so many people in town with eye problems. The surgery center was very efficient. I got text messages every hour updating Janet's progress. The cataract surgery went well and Janet said that I had nothing to worry about when it was my turn.

All our phones seem to be dying. I took another phone to the neighborhood fix-it place today and they put in a new battery in less than thirty minutes. This is so much easier than going to the Apple Store. On the way back home I drove by the eagle's nest and noticed that the area was being fenced off. There didn't appear to be any eagles in the nest, but I can almost guarantee that there will be wrecks along this stretch of road, now that the nest location is common knowledge.

On the other side of the road there now appears to be a growing contingent of eagle watchers.  Some bring lawn chairs and sit there for hours whether the eagles are there or not. This nest must be new. It appears that the whole city discovered it the same day I did.

I don't think I've done a good job preparing for the storm. We haven 't gone to the store and bought extra food, stocked up on batteries, or done any other panic buying. Actually buying extra food doesn't make sense. If the power goes out for any length of time, the food in your refrigerator is just going to go bad anyway. I was going to test my generator to make sure I can still get it started, but I can do that tomorrow. The generator is a little harder to start with a bad shoulder, but I'm pretty sure it still works fine. It's too bad that the power company guys didn't trim our trees near the alley before the storm. They're in the neighborhood now, but they haven't made it to our house yet.

When I took my long walk today, I brought a camera with me. The eagles weren't in their nest unfortunately, but I did see one of them a mile or so down the road. The birds hunt over a fairly wide area, so you never know when they are going to turn up next. Usually when you see one, it is sitting on a branch near the top of a tall tree. One of these days I'll get a good picture, but it probably won't be when I'm taking my long walk. It's too much trouble to carry a DLSR with a telephoto lens while I'm walking and the little pocket camera I had with me today just doesn't take great bird pictures. It does pretty well with squirrels though.

It's weird how dependent we are on electricity. We have a gas furnace, but it doesn't work without electricity. The fan and a lot of switches and sensors all require electricity. It's too bad we don't have a fireplace. A fire in the fireplace makes a long power outage a little less ominous. We do have hot water though. The water heater doesn't seem to require any electricity at all. Maybe this storm won't be that bad. I'm not a very positive person, so I always expect the worst.

Janet has a follow up appointment with her eye doctor tomorrow, but I don't think Dawn will be going to training class tomorrow night. The rain isn't supposed to start until the afternoon. Who knows when it will start turning to ice. I plan on hunkering down and not going anywhere until this is all over. Hopefully, we won't lose power this year.

Myles is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4421

We picked up a new dog at our vet on the way to the kennel today. Peanut is a six month old male owner surrender. He was a little thin, but very healthy and well cared for. I never make judgements about why someone would give up their dog, but it does puzzle me when a dog this nice turns up in the rescue program. Peanut came with a big box of blankets and dog toys, along with a list of what tricks and commands he knew. Peanut knew quite a bit and totally charmed Janet and I, along with the entire kennel staff. We spent quite a while playing with him today because we suspected that this might be the last time we see him. Young dogs like this get adopted incredibly quickly. Don't worry. Charlie and Oliver didn't get left out. We spent a lot of time playing with them as well.

The weather was nice today, but the cold front keeps moving closer and closer. The bad weather isn't supposed to arrive until Wednesday but I can already feel a change in the air. I'm trying to take advantage of the nice weather while I can. I took my long walk early this morning so we'd have plenty of time to visit the kennel. On the way home I finally spotted the eagles nest, along with both eagles. I was totally surprised at where the eagles built the nest. I had always suspected that it was hidden deep in a thick wooded area away from human contact. Nope. These two eagles built their nest right next to a busy road in plain sight of everyone. It's only a few miles from our house. I don't know why I never noticed this before. I drive right by the nest every time I go to the post office. I've heard that the eagles have actually built two nests. I have no idea whether the nest I saw today was the new one or the old one. It was definitely occupied though. The female was sitting in the nest and the male was guarding it from a nearby tree.

The closer the winter storm comes, the more apprehensive I become. Everyone remembers the big fiasco last winter when big chunks of the entire state lost power for days. The cold is bad enough, but this storm comes with freezing rain. Ice storms are the worst because they knock down trees and power lines. I remember a few ice storms where we had to go stay in a hotel for a few days because the power company wasn't making restoring power to our neighborhood a priority. This was back when Janet was still working so we could all go to Janet's office during the day and warm up. Don't have that luxury anymore. I'd be nervous taking Dawn to a hotel anyway. She freaks out about doing anything new. Hopefully, the storm won't be as bad as it already is in my mind. We'll probably be OK. Most things aren't nearly as bad as they are in my mind.

Janet has cataract surgery tomorrow, so I'm the designated driver for a while. I hope the surgery goes smoothly and is as trouble free as most people say it is. I'm next on the list for this same procedure. I'll probably delay my surgery until next year, but I can already tell that I'm going to need it. I've made my living using my eyes for a long time and the thought of a doctor doing anything to them makes me cringe. They say you are back to normal remarkably quickly though. At any rate, I'll be paying close attention to what happens with Janet's procedure.

I took a camera back to the park late in the day to get a picture of the eagles in their nest. Not surprisingly, they were gone. If they went to this much trouble to build the huge nest, they'll probably be back though. I'll keep watching for them. Maybe I'll even have a camera with me. The birds are interesting, but dogs are still much easier to photograph.

Cooper is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4420

We tried to enjoy the nice weather today, because it looks like we've got snow and ice to look forward to later in the week. The forecast looks dismal and I'm dreading the thought of freezing rain. Freezing rain means icy roads and power outages. Winter can't be over soon enough for me.

It's hard to believe that things will change this quickly when the temperature is over 70 degrees. I didn't even need a jacket on my walks today. Actually, I did wear a jacket on our sunrise walk with Dawn, but even then you could tell the day was going to be a good one. We changed our schedule a bit because Janet had plans this morning. I took my long walk after a hearty breakfast of bacon and eggs and ended up seeing both eagles again. I should have brought a camera since one of the eagles was fairly close. It was still a nice walk though. Foot pain wasn't too bad today and the weather was perfect.

Dawn got a rare afternoon Sunday outing and she had a good time. She still isn't comfortable riding in the car though. That's probably not going to change. We usually walk around the perimeter of the Sunday park and one leg of the journey always makes Dawn a little nervous. She does fine until we turn the first corner and then she balks and has to make sure that I am walking nearby. None of this makes any sense. As soon as we make the second turn she is fine again and Dawn and Janet begin pulling ahead of me. It's OK. I just can't keep up with the way my feet are acting. I usually see them making the final turn off in the distance and start heading back to the car as I slowly trudge along. I keep walking though and completed 20,000 steps again today.

We've never been to the ice cream place in the afternoon before. What a difference. Ice cream must be a lot more popular in the afternoon. The nice weather probably helped business as well. At any rate, this was the first time we had to wait in a long line to get to the drive through window. The line moved quickly though. An employee with a laptop walked down the line of cars and took people's orders so that when you arrived at the window, your order was ready. Dawn loves ice cream. I think we do these Sunday outings just to see how happy she gets.

When we got home I upgraded the firmware on the star tracker and gave it a try again. The tracker would still connect to the camera and take pictures, but the calibration was way off. The tracker couldn't even find the sun today. Maybe I'm doing something wrong. Other Kickstarter backers seem to be having success with their trackers, but most of them are using Canon cameras. I don't think the calibration problems I was having today have anything to do with the camera though. When I use the compass on my phone, it finds North pretty accurately. When I use the calibration function on the Polaris app, I get a completely different compass reading. This is still a frustrating work in progress.

The house smelled great today. Janet fixed a pot roast for dinner in the slow cooker and the smell permeated the house for hours. Crock pot meals are easy and almost always delicious. Dawn enjoyed dinner almost as much as we did, because she loves carrots. The pot roast contained lots of carrots and we made sure that Dawn got some. 

We plan to visit Charlie and Oliver at the kennel tomorrow and then pick up a new cold weather sweater we ordered for Dawn on the way home. I hope the bad weather doesn't materialize. Ice storms are the worst. We'll see what happens. When storms approach I always wish we had a whole house generator. We do have a small generator, but it definitely won't heat the house. I guess it makes no sense to worry. I can't change the weather.

Malcolm is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4419

Everyone seems to be playing Wordle and sharing the results as a cryptic series of colored squares. What is this all about? Fads like this are a mystery to me. Maybe I just don't understand games. Or sharing. At any rate, I doubt you'll see me playing this game. I don't even do crossword puzzles. I do like words though and even enjoy arranging them in sentences. I kind of wish I'd set my blogging goal at 4000 Days though, instead of 5000 Days. I'm running out of things to say.

Today was a typical Saturday. I did my grocery shopping, filled the car with gas, and picked up a prescription at the pharmacy. I also needed to get some more printer ink and an accordion file for the 2022 receipts. I don't even know why I save these receipts anymore. My accountant has no use for them and I rarely ever look at them again. Old habits die hard though. I start a new accordion file every year and take the previous year to the storage warehouse.

Prices at the pump and grocery store do keep rising, but I've stopped keeping track of the increases. It is what it is. I'm set in my ways and I doubt that price increases are going to get me scrambling for bargains. I think true bargains are rare. Stores do try to dump inventory at times to get rid of stuff that has been sitting on the shelf too long and there are always inferior products, but you always get what you pay for. I really need to start doing my shopping on a weekday. Weekends are just too crowed now. Where did all these people come from? Too many people are moving to Dallas. If I could make a habit of shopping at 10:30 on a Tuesday morning, or maybe 2:30 in the afternoon, I think I could save myself a lot of trouble. I need to watch what people are doing and then do the opposite. I probably will never do anything as sensible as this though. I am a creature of habit.

Almost every day on my walk someone asks me where the eagles are. Dallas has become obsessed with these two eagles. There have always been a fair amount of birders in the park, but their numbers seem to have doubled recently. Some people drive quite a ways to see the eagles. They must be disappointed that the birds are so elusive.  I walk every day near where the birds live and I've only managed to see them a few times. What is the fascination with these eagles? I still think the American White Pelicans are the most spectacular birds in the park. There are tons of them though, and nobody seems interested.

There is a gully alongside one of the roads leading into the park that I've walked down as long as I have lived here. Water runoff makes the gully grow a little deeper every year and I like to imagine that this is how the Grand Canyon started. Years ago when the gully was still shallow, Spot like to sit in the water at the bottom on hot Summer days.  Today, something much bigger was at the bottom of the gully. A pickup truck had gone off the road and wedged itself in sideways in the deepest part of the trench. There were two tow trucks trying to figure out how to extricate the truck, but it was wedged in tight on it's side. It almost looked like a helicopter has dropped the truck into the hole. This was the second weird accident I've seen in the park recently. Most of these little roads have a 5 MPH speed limit. What were these people thinking?

Dawn will get her Sunday outing a little later tomorrow because Janet has plans in the morning. Maybe this is for the best though. Afternoons have been really nice lately. The mornings are still really cold. I'm so glad we aren't getting mountains of snow like people in the Northeast. It's good to be in Texas.

Spirit is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4418

Today was busy. I fixed the other toilet after breakfast and then I finally bleached the rust stains in the living room ceiling where the worst water leak was. The ceiling looks much better now. I'm tempted to get some drywall mud and finish repairing the ceiling but I need to remember that I never found where the water was getting in on the roof. It might be worth repairing things even if it is a temporary fix. I'm getting tired of looking at the crack in the ceiling.

I hope the toilet repairs last a while this time. Little by little, everything on my to-do list is getting done. Janet wanted me to change the battery on the key fob to her car today. I followed the directions, but couldn't get the key fob to open up. Clumsy hands I guess. Janet finally got the key fob to open herself. I think the key fob for my car has a better design. I had to change my key fob battery a few months ago and it opened up in less than a minute. It doesn't take long to learn that there are some things on modern cars that are better to do yourself. All it takes is a two dollar watch battery to fix a key fob. The dealership wanted to charge me twenty dollars.

I keep putting off upgrading the firmware on my star tracker. For now I'm content to just read the user forum and see what the other Kickstarter backers are doing. Maybe I'll feel more like using this thing when the power line tree crews arrive in our neighborhood. Right now two big trees block my view of the southern horizon from the back yard. The utility company has eminent domain and about every six years they come and butcher these trees so they don't get too close to the power lines that run down the alley. After decades of doing this the trees look really ugly now. 

Janet and I decided to just ask the crew to cut the trees down this time. It would be easier for them in the long run and it would also make it easier for us to reroute our driveway to the back yard someday. Backyard astronomy might become easier as well. I don't know if the utility company will remove the trees though. I've been watching the crews inch their way toward us in the neighborhood and it looks like they are only doing minimal cutting this time. The last time these guys were here they made such a mess of everybody's trees that the entire neighborhood rose up against them. There were lots of threats of lawsuits, although I don't know if any were actually filed. Eminent domain laws are pretty powerful. If you have a power line running next to your property the utility company can pretty much do whatever they want to any trees that are in the way.

I keep getting 20,000 steps a day despite my foot problems. My pace has slowed quite a bit though. Now my right knee is starting to bother me as well. I feel like I'm slowly falling apart. Unfortunately, the alternative is falling apart much more quickly if I became less active. I still think it is important to keep moving. I think Dawn wishes I moved a lot faster. Her natural pace is a lot quicker than mine. Hey, I'm doing the best I can. I'm kind of amazed that I used to walk two young, strong Dalmatians at the same time. I couldn't do that anymore.

It's time to make a grocery list again. I wonder how expensive things are going to be this week. It's easy to forget that there have been high gas prices and rampant inflation before. I remember gas lines in the Jimmy Carter era and the first time I bought a house, interest rates were over 11%. There have always been problems. You expect things to get better though. It's disappointing when we keep making the same mistakes over and over again.

Molly is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4417

My teeth are in good shape. My dental hygienist always complements me on how well I take care of my teeth and gums. I try. The last thing I want at this stage of my life are implants or more crowns. I kind of wish that I'd had braces when I was younger, but that ship has sailed. My teeth are a little crooked but I have very few fillings. I still have three of my four wisdom teeth, with none of the dental problems that both of my parents endured. Hopefully I'm done with medical and dental appointments for a while. I think I've had more than my share this Winter.

When I returned from the dentist, I went to the good plumbing supply store and got the parts I needed to repair both toilets. I got high quality parts with brass fittings instead of the plastic stuff you find at Home Depot. I hate masquerading as a plumber so maybe this will help minimize future repairs. You never know though. Something else may break tomorrow. 

I'd never make a good plumber. The work is way too messy for me. I'm always very methodical and careful, but somehow I always end up making a mess. It's almost impossible to disconnect the supply lines to a toilet and remove all the internal parts without spilling a little water. At least I didn't try to remove the supply line without turning off the water to the house at the meter. I think I learned that lesson on a previous repair. The shut off valve on one of the toilets doesn't completely close and water sprays everywhere if you don't shut off water to the house first. The good news is that my first repair worked perfectly. The bad news is that I got tired of being a plumber and I still have to fix the other toilet. At least Janet's toilet is fixed. I'll deal with mine later.

I could tell on our sunrise walk with Dawn that this wasn't going to be a good day for my feet. I still can't figure out why some days are relatively pain free and other days are terrible. It doesn't seem to be the humidity because I've had good and bad days when the weather was exactly the same. It doesn't seem to be the result of too much exercise either. I've been able to go on long walks multiple days in a row without a problem. On a bad day I have trouble just walking around the house. I probably need to make another appointment with the orthopedic surgeon. I need to make sure that I'm not inadvertently damaging my feet. If walking doesn't really make things any worse, I can probably live with the pain.

The park has been virtually empty for the past several days. There hasn't been as much traffic on the roads either. Is something going on that I don't know about? I don't have a clue. Maybe it's just the weather. It has been cold and nasty lately. Maybe it's Covid. There are a ton of people who've gotten the virus recently. I can't says that I don't know anyone who's caught Covid anymore. I know quite a few people who've come down with it. It's kind of amazing that Janet and I haven't caught the virus. The test Janet had to take to see her doctor was negative and I've had several negative tests recently. So far, so good anyway.

There is new firmware available for the Polaris star tracker. I'm kind of nervous to install it though. It's always a mixed bag whenever there's an upgrade. Some people on the user forum report better results after an upgrade while others report that their tracker doesn't work anymore. I'm tempted not to bother with every upgrade and just keep watching the user forum until everyone seems happy. I think that day is still a long way away. I'm not sure I would have backed this project if I knew I was going to be a Beta tester. I just want things to work when I turn them on. Finding bugs and solving problems isn't exactly my cup of tea. Being a Beta tester isn't as messy as being a plumber, but it's almost as bad.

It seemed really cold when I took the trash out to the curb this evening. That means it will be even colder in the morning. If Dawn could overcome her fears and learn to walk with me without Janet nearby, we could do her morning walk a lot later. I have no schedule and actually like to sleep in. Dawn doesn't know what she's missing.

Sophie is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4416

Another slow day. I had been planning on practicing with the star tracker again but got bogged down with a variety of irritating little tasks. Now we've got two running toilets. Both should be easy to fix, but I hesitate to mess with either of them. The last time I tried to install a new toilet kit, the fit was poor and I ended up with a leak at the base of the tank. At least the second toilet uses commonly available parts you can find at any Home Depot. The weird French toilet uses hard to find, expensive parts that are only available at one plumbing supply store in town. What do you do? I can buy a ten dollar toilet kit at Home Depot or pay a plumber a hundred dollars to install the same thing. Plumbers won't even touch the French toilet. I have to handle that myself anyway. I hate things that break all the time, but that doesn't stop them from breaking.

I had trouble getting my accounts to balance in Quickbooks today as well. This is irritating because the problem is always a data entry mistake I've made and never noticed. It's surprisingly hard to find a small mistake you made over a month ago. I eventually found the error and everything balances again but it took a while. It would be a lot easier to just make a journal entry and adjust the Quickbooks files to match what the bank says is correct. Mistakes always bother me though and in the long run it is always easier to take the time to find them.

I was surprised to learn that two more pieces of my model train collection have sold. Sales dropped off dramatically when Covid started and my dealer friend hasn't sold anything in over a year. I'm glad he's still in business. Maybe things are starting to look up again. Over half the collection has already sold, but a lot still remains. I may need to put this collection in my will. How did I ever acquire so many electric trains and construction models?

Today was a nice day for walking. I managed to get 20,000 steps without a lot of foot pain. Walking slower seems to help. I didn't see the eagles today but someone asked me about them. The word had gotten out about these birds and it appears like the entire city is out looking for them. I've heard that the park department might build a fence around their nesting area to keep people away. This is probably a good idea. Keeping the nesting area a secret didn't seem to work. You can't really keep anything a secret these days.

Janet said that Dawn did really well in training class tonight. She is much less fearful now and is a quick learner. I guess patience pays off. Dawn is even a lot friendlier with me now. I don't think she completely trusts me but we are definitely making progress. It's important that she learns to trust me because Janet wants to travel again. One of these days it's just going to be me and Dawn in the house for a while. I really don't want her to feel afraid while Janet is away.

I need to remember I've got a dental appointment tomorrow. It's just a cleaning but I've finally realized that dental hygiene is important. This cleaning was originally scheduled for weeks ago, but someone in the dentist's office got Covid and they had to close down for a while. Everyone seems to be catching Covid now. It's kind of amazing that Janet and I have managed to avoid it this long.

Jazz is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4415

Some days are eventful. Other days nothing happens at all. One of the downsides of writing a daily blog is that you have to account for all the days. I wouldn't be offended if you just skipped today's post. The big event of the day was driving a few miles to the pharmacy to pick up some prescriptions. Some days I wonder how the days go so quickly even when nothing happens. You'd think I'd feel bored or fidgety when nothing happens, but it just seemed like a normal day to me.

Time goes by quickly when you are naturally slow. I spend a lot of time eating breakfast, switching back and forth between the news and business channels on TV as I sip my coffee. I spent more time with breakfast when I drank my enormous smoothie, but it still shouldn't take hours to eat a bowl of shredded wheat. I've grown to depend on our sunrise walk with Dawn to wake up in the morning. When I hear Janet say "we're leaving in ten minutes," I get out of bed and get dressed. Janet and Dawn are faster than me and the brisk morning walk ensures that I'm wide awake when we return and I don't just go back to bed again.

I used to spend a lot of time answering work related e-mail after breakfast, but now I just wade through a mountain of spam. It's rare that anything in my inbox even needs a response. Old habits die hard though. Without a lot of writing and editing jobs to keep me busy, I just waste time on Facebook and bookmark various camera and astronomy sites for future reading. I'm so used to sitting in front of a computer that I don't know what I'd do without it.

The weather was beautiful today. Yesterday's dismal drizzle turned into clear blue skies and nice moderate temperatures. One of the reasons I take my long walk every day is that it is an excellent way to kill time. I purposely walked slower than usual today and it seemed to help my foot pain. I think I saw one of the eagles sitting atop a distant tree but it was too far aways to be certain. Usually I know the eagle is around when I see a bunch of photographers with long telephoto lenses all pointed in a specific direction. I did see all the resident ducks and geese. There are way too many White Pelicans, Mallards, Coots, and Double Crested Cormorants to count, but I always look for the ten Domestic Geese, the two Canadian Geese, and the two Muscovy Ducks.

I've temporarily lost interest in the star tracker. I've already determined that the product kind of works and I don't think there are going to be any improvements until the next firmware upgrade. It seems pointless to take the Polaris out in our yard. The front yard isn't level and I'm always scared that a speeding car or truck is going to come careening through the yard again. It's happened before. There is a slight bend in the road just before it reaches our house and people, especially drunk people, have been known to miss the turn. The back yard is safe from traffic, but it is too hard to turn off all the security lights. There are nearby streetlights as well. Basically the neighborhood isn't very conducive to astronomy.

I paid the rest of the January bills today and noticed that these recurring expenses keep going up as well. It's a shame that the stock market us headed down again. I was feeling good for a while. Hey, at least I didn't succumb to buying Bitcoin. Crypto is taking a tumble as well. When I was working I was never concerned about fluctuations in the market. I always knew it was easy enough to earn more money. Retirement is a bit different. No matter what you've managed to save, it never seems like enough. 

Bones is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4414

Oliver and Charlie were playful today. We had plenty of time to spend with each of them because they are currently the only Dalmatians at the kennel. We've decided that Oliver should have been named Goofy because he acts like a giant clumsy puppy. He can't catch anything, but he sure has fun trying. He loves tug toys though. Playing tug is his favorite game. Charlie seems to be mellowing out a bit. He was content to just sit with us and let us pet him for a while this afternoon. You can't really relax with Charile though. He's not a lap dog. He can go from calm to chaotic in less than a second.

On the way home from the kennel we missed one of our regular turns and ended up getting lost in Richardson. It's weird to think that we have lived here over forty years and there are still many parts of the city and its surrounding suburbs that we have never even driven through. We had to set the GPS in the car for home to find our way out of the suburban maze.

I am continuing to do little chores around the house that I should have taken care of years ago. This morning I bought several hundred pounds of river rock and filled in a big rut in the driveway that was causing the suspension on my car to scrape against the pavement when I was backing out of the driveway. I have been able to avoid fixing the hole for quite a while because my car has a hydraulic suspension and I can raise the car up while I drive over the obstacle. Since I was doing this every time I left the house I began to worry that I might get a leak in the hydraulic system that would cost a lot more to repair than a load of river gravel. The rocks were heavy and kind of a mess to transport, but my repair was a success and I can now get the car into the carport without scraping anything.

On the way to get the river gravel, I stopped at an AT&T store and asked about the iPhone Mini for a dollar a month promotion I'd been getting notices about. "Oh, that promotion ended two days ago," the sales guy told me. Snooze, you lose I guess. I asked why they had been practically giving these phones away. "This was an iPhone 12 and we're practically up to 14 already," he told me. He also added that no one wanted this model because it was too small. "But I wanted one," I said. Too late. The promotion was over.

It was a rainy day today so I didn't even attempt to walk very far. We did manage to get Dawn walked this morning before the drizzle started but the rest of the day was a mess. I found a little dry spell on the weather radar after we got back from the kennel, but it didn't seem like it would stay dry for long. I only walked two miles today and my feet are probably thanking the weather gods. The weather was dismal, but I did see the eagle again. I didn't have my camera with me and didn't particularly care. Hey, I've already got a picture of the bird.

Janet has to get a Covid test before she can go see her doctor. It's weird. When we went out for Thanksgiving Dinner last November I was convinced that the pandemic was just about over. Now it's back  with a vengeance and everyone is scared of Omicron. You have to wonder if we will be stuck with this mess for the rest of our lives. So many things have been done wrong fighting the pandemic and now the disease has become completely politicized. Common sense certainly doesn't prevail anymore. Do you take the red pill or the blue pill. It's a tough choice sometimes.

I have no idea what I'm going to do tomorrow. I'm sure I'll come up with something. The weather forecast says it will be sunny. I'll take that with a grain of salt. It was supposed to be sunny today.

Holly is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4413

Life is full of surprises. I had to take Janet to the ER this evening because she had unusually high blood pressure. A systolic reading of over 200 seems alarming to me. The ER doctors did a lot of tests but didn't seem nearly as alarmed as we were. Something is wrong though. It doesn't seem right for blood pressure to dramatically spike overnight. We quickly discovered that Sunday night is not the best time to have a medical problem. Doctors rarely give you their personal cell phone number and a lot of the little neighborhood ER clinics that have sprung up all over town aren't even open. The first place we went to had a sign on the door saying that they closed at 5 PM. Too bad it was 6:15. 

We ended up going to a small hospital that rarely gets trauma patients. If we had gone to one of the large hospitals we would have been waiting for hours. Gunshot wounds and car accidents take priority over high blood pressure. I'm really glad now that my gallbladder problem happened during regular working hours. My doctor helped me bypass all the red tape and get admitted to the hospital very quickly. On the weekend, you are on your own. Janet is home now and seems fine. She'll go see her regular doctor in the morning. I've always thought it was a lot easier to find an emergency vet for your dog at night than to deal with your own after hours emergencies. Tonight's experience did nothing to change my mind.

The rest of our day was pretty normal. The weather was pleasant and Dawn got a nice Sunday outing. I had trouble keeping up with Dawn and Janet because this wasn't a good foot day for me. Janet tried a new "Calming Collar" on Dawn during the ride to the park. I didn't think it would work, and sure enough it didn't. They probably just infused the collar with Lavender Oil or other new age gimmick. Lets face it. Dawn is always going to freak out in the car. She's fine when we get to our destination and I guess that's all that counts. Ice cream actually works a lot better than the Calming Collar with Dawn. Ice cream cones do a great job of calming her down.

When I took my long walk later in the afternoon my feet hurt so bad that I wasn't able to complete my regular route. This hasn't happened in a long time. It's just as well that I took a shorter walk today. The park was so crowded that it wasn't even enjoyable. A Springlike day in the middle of Winter brings the people out in droves. I enjoy walking in inclement weather more because I have the place to myself. I think the eagles had the same idea. They were nowhere to be found this afternoon.

I made a feeble effort to clean out the office today. I threw away a bunch of empty boxes and old mail. I need to continue throwing away empty boxes in the storage warehouse as well. I always used to save these things in case we moved. We're not going to move though. I should have realized that years ago.  I also tried to dust a few shelves that held the remains of my model train collection. Most of the trains went to my dealer friend who's been trying to sell them for several years, but a few slipped through the cracks. There was a thick layer of dust on the models and they were surprisingly difficult to clean. I spent several hours on this futile effort and only managed to clean a single shelf. Unfortunately, dozens of dusty shelves still remain.

When Janet was checking her blood pressure at home, I got out my wireless blood pressure monitor to compare with Janet's monitor to see if hers might be faulty. It turns out that mine was the faulty one. The cuff wouldn't pump up anymore. I changed the batteries, but the cuff still wouldn't inflate properly. One more broken thing to fix now. I think the old fashioned mechanical blood pressure monitors were much more reliable. You just can't depend on batteries or devices that require a cell phone app to work.

I'm not sure if we'll be visiting the Dalmatians tomorrow. I guess it depends on when Janet can get a doctor's appointment. I'm not sure if I'll be doing much walking either. Today's walk wasn't very auspicious. Maybe I need to rest for a few days. Maybe we all need to rest for a few days.

Chloe is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4412

It's kind of amazing that prices at the grocery store keep going up every single week. I essentially buy the same things week after week and my bill keeps getting higher. Gas prices are higher as well. I kind of think that stores kept prices artificially low during the holiday season and now they're trying to make up for lost time. I'm not really alarmed by the price increases yet, but it makes you wonder what things will be like this summer.

We took a sunrise walk again this morning and Dawn didn't seem to mind the cold. I thought getting an early start would help me get my shopping done before the stores got crowded, but it didn't make any difference. I got a slow start and didn't leave the house until 11 AM. I'm glad I only do this once a week. The traffic in Dallas has really gotten irritating.

We took Dawn on another walk later in the day and then I continued on my regular long walk. I carried a small camera with me again in hope of seeing the eagles. No eagles today, but I did see a nice Red Shouldered Hawk. I guess I'll continue taking the camera with me for a while. I'm not as dedicated as the serious birders, but I am out in the park a lot. Maybe I'll get some good eagle pictures in the weeks ahead. The little camera I'm taking with me leaves a lot to be desired, but you don't need high resolution pictures for the blog. The camera is so small that it's easy to forget that I have it with me.

We heard that Jack got adopted today, so now it's just Charlie and Oliver again. The two puppies must have gotten adopted immediately because we never saw them at the kennel at all. I have a feeling that Oliver will get adopted soon as well. He's young, smart, and good looking. He's also very strong. Hopefully someone young will adopt him who can give him the exercise he needs.

My walk took longer than usual today because I stopped to talk with some of the birders. Most of these guys use full frame Nikon or Canon cameras with huge telephoto lenses. They remind me of the rocket photographers at Kennedy Space Center. The equipment is certainly the same. I still like my smaller micro 4/3 cameras. They are much smaller and lighter and still take great pictures. Maybe I'm just lazy. The birders drag these huge cameras out in the woods every day and all I can manage is a little point-and-shoot camera I can put in my pocket.

I got an e-mail from AT&T today saying that I could get an iPhone 12 for only a dollar a month. There must be a catch. I usually keep a phone around three years before it becomes obsolete. That would only be $36 for the phone. I may need to go check this out. I don't really need a new phone, but if it only added a dollar a month to my bill, why not. The newer phone camera would certainly be better than the one I've got now.

My foot pain was worse today. I slathered my foot with Voltaren before I took my walk, but it didn't help much. I don't think it actually helped at all. The fact that I can still walk makes me think that I've just got a garden variety case of arthritis. I've been to the doctor and I definitely don't want to get hooked on pain killers. I guess I'll just continue doing nothing for a while.

The weather is supposed to be warmer tomorrow, so Dawn should have a nice Sunday outing. We do the same things week after week, but that's not a bad thing. Everyone needs a little continuity in their life.

Raider is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4411

I'm getting better at finding the eagles. It helps to look for them late in the day. You almost never see them in the morning. Today I took a little point-and-shoot camers with a zoom lens with me on my walk. The picture still wasn't great, but it was better than yesterday's iPhone attempt. Too bad I didn't have the little camera with me yesterday. I was much closer then. This time the eagle was in a distant tree on the other side of a swampy area. I couldn't get any closer. I have better cameras, but this pocket sized one will have to do for now. The larger cameras are too cumbersome to hike with and driving to the woods where the eagles live isn't practical. Traffic is so bad on our street that I can't even get out of the driveway during the evening rush hour.

The temperature was even colder than yesterday when we woke up this morning. There was no point in making Dawn miserable, so we skipped the sunrise walk and took her on another walk after lunch. I waited until later to take my long walk as well, which is probably why I saw the eagle again. It was a clear day with no wind, so it got warmer fairly quickly. Twenty-three degrees seemed way too cold. Forty-three degrees seemed just about right. 

I didn't do a lot this morning. There was a ULA Space Force launch to watch on my computer that a lot of my Florida friends got to see in person. I got invited, but it's much too expensive to make a trip down to Titusville every time there's a rocket launch. I didn't set up the star tracker today, but I did try to trouble shoot my camera in case there were settings enabled that would cause the camera to shut off automatically when it was under control by the tracker. Another Kickstarter backer suggested that maybe there was an auto shutdown feature enabled on the camera. I actually found several settings that would automatically shut down the camera or put it to sleep if it was idle for a certain amount of time. Maybe this was the problem I was having the other day. I'll test everything again in a few days.

My editor at Sky & Telescope wrote and told me that he didn't think readers of the magazine would be interested in an article about my troubles with the star tracker. He seemed to indicate that they were more interested in products that actually worked. I beg to differ, but what do I know. This strange saga seems much more interesting than an ordinary product review.

I ordered our free Covid test kits from the post office today. Maybe Janet will need them when she goes on a cruise with her sisters later this Spring. It seems a little late for the free test kits and masks. If you haven't caught the virus after all this time, you are probably pretty safe. I still think the simplest and best way to avoid the virus is to stay away from other people. Works for me anyway. I don't want to be smug though. I'm a very superstitious person. If I ever bragged about being immune from the virus, I'd probably catch it the next day.

Dawn is slowly getting friendlier with me. When I returned from my long walk today, she started barking and came out in the back yard to greet me wagging her tail. She also comes out to supervise when I'm making her dinner now. We've still got a ways to go though. She still doesn't like to share the bed with me. If I take a nap during the day, she will usually get up and go to her dog bed in the kitchen. I don't think we're buddies yet, but she has decided that I'm a pretty good kennel attendant.

Is it already time to make a grocery list again? Where did this week go? I think it's supposed to be warmer tomorrow. That's something to look forward to.

Molly is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4410

I saw both eagles together for the first time today. They were perched high in a tree that was very close to the trail. Of course I didn't have my camera with me. I did have my phone though, so I got as close to the tree as I could and took a fairly terrible picture. One of the eagles flew away as I approached the tree, but you can still see the other if you look carefully. The eagle that flew away had something long and thin in its talons. Maybe it was building material for the nest, or perhaps it was a snake. I'm pretty sure that eagles would eat a snake. They appear to eat just about anything. I know they like fish. That's why they hang out at the lake. Several of the birders have seen them catch fish at Sunset Bay. 

The fact that the eagles were so close to the trail this afternoon makes me want to figure out how to carry a camera with me. I'm bound to see these eagles again. I do have a light weight pocket camera with a telephoto lens that collapses into the camera body when the camera is off. It's not an ideal solution, but it would be a lot better than a phone with no telephoto lens at all. Today's picture is probably the worst that I have ever uploaded to the blog. Hey, maybe it will inspire me to do better.

It was bitterly cold this morning and didn't really warm up much throughout the day. We waited until later to take Dawn on her morning walk, but the wait didn't help much. It was still 25 degrees. I didn't attempt my long walk until after lunch in hopes that things would warm up. Nope. The temperature never got above freezing. The wind wasn't terrible today, but there was enough of a wind chill to make me feel like an arctic explorer again. I didn't get 20,000 steps today, but who's counting. At least my feet didn't hurt much today. It was a pretty good walk and I did see the eagles.

I made some progress with the star tracker this morning. While I was waiting for the temperature to warm up, I upgraded the app on my phone and downloaded the new firmware to the Polaris tracker. The two upgrades made some things better and other things worse. This is still a work in progress. For the first time I was able to calibrate the unit accurately so that when I asked it to go to a star or planet, it was at least pointing in the general direction. The tracking seems to work smoothly now. It's hard to tell how accurate the tracking is since I'm doing all this during the day inside my office. I have Stellarium on my computer and I use this powerful planetarium software to confirm that the Polaris is pointing in the right direction. The tracker actually seems to work as promised. At least it works for a while. Inevitably the Polaris will crash if I use it long enough. Once it starts crashing, I have trouble getting it to work again. As I said, this is still a work in progress.

I'm really glad the gas company was able to get the leak fixed yesterday. It would have been dangerously cold last night without the furnace running. This cold weather makes me wonder if we're going to have another power generation fiasco like we did last winter. There has been a lot of talk, but I don't think the state has actually done much to ensure that an extended freeze won't curtail natural gas deliveries to power plants again. Last winter was a huge mess and some people were without power for days.

It was very cold when I took the trash out to the curb this evening. The freezing weather made me think of one of my favorite stories from childhood. If you've never read "A Pail of Air" by Fritz Lieber you ought to look it up. The story was published in Galaxy Science Fiction magazine in December 1951 and I still remember it after all these years. It is a young boy's recollection of living on a world that was pulled out of the solar system by a passing dark star and is now lost in deep space with a frozen atmosphere and a small handful of people who survive by melting the frozen oxygen over a constantly burning fire in a small room insulated by many layers of blankets. Not sure how plausible this scenario is, but it made an impression on me.

April is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 4409

Yay. We've got heat again. Our gas was shut off for most of the day while a work crew repaired a gas leak in the alley behind our house. I didn't give the outage much thought at first because the repair people had already told me that they would be finished before the end of the day and that service would be restored. As the day progressed and the cold front got closer and closer I started to get nervous. The house was starting to get cold and the two things you need the most during freezing weather are a working furnace and hot water.

Toward the end of the day a gas company technician arrived and hooked up our gas meter again. I asked if he could come in the house and start the water heater and furnace again. He said he wasn't allowed to come inside. What? "But that's where the gas appliances are," I said. He said it was gas company policy and he could get fired for violating it. He did call me a plumber though and said I wouldn't be charged. Very weird. Why was it OK for a plumber to come inside, but not a gas company technician. I'm pretty sure that I could have restarted everything myself, but I didn't want to screw up and burn down the house. I've always had a healthy respect for flames. 

Surprisingly, the plumber arrived quickly and restarted the old and cranky water heater. I actually restarted the furnace myself because I was cold and impatient. I was a lot more familiar with the furnace as well. I've had to restart it numerous times to clean the flame sensor. The furnace has sophisticated shut-off features as well. I wasn't so sure about the water heater. Oddly, the water heater flame has never gone out before. The water heater has been one of the few totally reliable things in the house. 

I still don't know what was wrong with the gas line. Whatever they fixed was buried at least four feet underground. How did they even know the pipe was leaking that far underground? I don't know why they replaced my gas meter either. I suspect that the new meter allows them to read the meter remotely and I was due for a replacement anyway. All is well though. We are headed for one of the coldest nights of the year and the house is nice and warm again.

I really didn't get a lot done today. I took my long walk in a light mist, but didn't get very wet. My feet were terrible today, so maybe the foot pain does have something to do with the humidity. The weather is definitely getting nasty. Janet and Dawn didn't even go to training class tonight. I'm tired of winter already although I know that the worst is yet to come. Often February is our coldest month. At least we haven't gotten snow yet. I hope we don't. A winter without snow would be a blessing.

I was going to resume testing the star tracker today since there has been another update to the software. I decided to wait however, because I didn't want to be aggravated by two things at the same time. Dealing with the natural gas outage was enough for one day. I have absolutely no faith that things will go as planned anymore, so I was actually expecting to be sleeping under a big pile of blankets in a very cold house. The gas company actually did pretty well today. Much better than I expected.

I hope tomorrow goes smoothly.  I don't like surprises and I've grown weary of dealing with problems. A boring day is a good day as far as I'm concerned. Dawn is a good role model for me. All she does is eat, sleep and walk. Basically, that's all I do as well.

Daisy is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day