Day 1763

The rainy season must have started. We had another overnight downpour that ended around daybreak. With the rain came much cooler temperatures. I don't think it got much above sixty degrees all day. I thought the dogs would like the cooler weather, but they didn't like the wind that came with it. The wind blew relentlessly from the West all day. The lights flickered a bit during strong gusts and the Internet connection went dead for a short amount of time, but we never lost power.

Seeing the trees swaying in the back yard provided the incentive I needed to finally read the instruction manual that came with the generator. There were so many things I needed to do before I could actually fire the generator up that I decided to postpone the inaugural run until the weather got warmer. I knew I had to add oil, but I didn't realize that I needed to unscrew and remove the entire left side of the unit to get access to the oil filler tube. I knew I needed to add a special enzyme to the gas to remove the ethanol, but I didn't realize that it was also important for the generator to be grounded before using it. Now I'll have to go back to Home Depot and buy a copper rod and some electrical wire so I can properly ground the unit. In many ways this all seems like more trouble than it's worth, since the small generator will only power a few things at a time anyway. In many ways I'd just as soon get inside a warm sleeping bag with the dogs and just wait till the power came back on.

Since it kept getting colder and colder throughout the day, I finally broke down and turned the furnace on. Amazingly, it started on the first try and the house was warm again in less than an hour. I'm always a little apprehensive the first time I start the furnace for the Winter. Half the time it refuses to start and I have to make a call to the HVAC guys to come out an make a service call. Hopefully, the success I had today is a good omen for the Winter. I'm tired of fixing things and it would be nice to have a warm and trouble free house this year.

Today would have been a good day to get caught up on work, but since I was already caught up, I watched one of the Dr. Who episodes I had recorded on the DVR instead. Kill the Moon was a strange show, based on the idea that the moon was actually a giant egg that was about to hatch. This premise wasn't even remotely believable and I continue to be disappointed in the new season. The production values are fantastic, but the scripts are terrible and Clara and the doctor don't seem like very good companions. Maybe I should give up on this show and start watching The Walking Dead like everyone else.

Dash goes back to the cancer center tomorrow for a chest x-ray and follow-up exam. He has one of these follow-up exams about every three months now and I keep hoping that at some point, his oncologist will declare him officially cured. I bet they'll want to continue the chemotherapy a while longer though. That's just the way doctors are.

Firedogs are our Dalmatians of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1762

As most of you probably know by now, there is a second Ebola victim in Dallas. This time is was an experienced nurse, wearing full protective gear that got infected. And the CDC still says that there is nothing to worry about? Who are they kidding? I'm familiar enough with public relations damage control to recognize today's press conference for what it really is. The CDC doesn't have a clue how to stop this disease from spreading. At this point, they are just trying to say calming things to prevent a general panic.

I can't believe that the CDC is actually trying to blame the nurse for this by saying there was a "breach of protocol." I imagine that the nurse was following the CDC protocols faithfully, right up to the moment she realized she was infected. I think it is outrageous that this poor woman has caught this deadly disease while compassionately treating a man whose family is now suing the same hospital that went to extraordinary lengths in an effort to save his life. The people who are trying to fan the flames and turn this whole mess into a racial issue should be ashamed of themselves.

The guy who brought Ebola to America should never have been allowed to travel here in the first place. He lied to get on a plane out of Liberia and he lied again to the hospital by not revealing that he had prior contact with an Ebola victim. Sure, the guy did say he was from Africa, but according to everything I've read, he did not reveal that he helped carry someone who was already infected with Ebola to a hospital in Liberia. I'm amazed that we haven't already stopped all air travel in and out of West Africa. This is a no brainer. Doesn't anyone remember the Kevin Bacon game and Six Degrees of Separation? If we don't prevent people from traveling to and from infected countries immediately, it is not implausible to imagine that the entire world will be at risk in a very short amount of time.

If you can forget about all the alarming news on local TV stations, today was fairly normal. I washed the car and replaced the backup battery hidden inside the audio recorder. I was going to fill the new generator with gas and give it a trial run, but I ran out of time. I need to start going to the gym again, but I think I'll wait a while. My gym is owned by Presbyterian Hospital and they probably give their staff free membership. I can't think of a better place to catch a deadly disease transmitted by bodily fluids than a gym where people routinely sweat on the equipment.

There is another severe weather warning for early tomorrow morning. Please don't let the power go out again. I'm not even sure that the generator works yet.

Kuuipo is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1761

It started raining just before we went to bed last night and continued until just after sunrise. Ordinarily, a night of heavy rain would upset Dot so much that none of us would get any sleep. Dot slept soundly though. She's starting to lose her hearing and didn't even notice the rain. When we woke up this morning, it was surprisingly cold. I had to look for a heavier coat before we took our morning walk, because my light Fall jacket just wasn't warm enough.

The temperature dropped so much that the plastic gas container I got for the generator fuel looked like it has imploded. I had filled the container with gas yesterday afternoon when it was quite warm and then sealed it. The change in air pressure literally caved in the  sides of the container. I think the same thing happens to your tires in the Winter. Supposedly, I don't need to worry about increasing my tire pressure in cold weather anymore, because the tires are filled with nitrogen now.

I kept busy today, but nothing of any consequence happened. I had to look for an odd sized nickel-metal hydride backup battery I needed for one of my audio recorders. I could have ordered the battery online, but I didn't have anything better to do today anyway. Eventually, I found the illusive battery, filled the car up with gas at a nearby station, and returned home to clear the water off the roof.

The park has gotten so muddy from all the recent rain that I've started walking the dogs through the neighborhood. I've avoided walking through the neighborhood ever since Dash got attacked by a viscous dog at the end of the street. It's been a long time since the attack and the aggressive dog finally got old and died. Two other aggressive dogs I've been worried about have moved out of the neighborhood, so maybe it's safe again. I like walking in the park better, but it's interesting to see how much the neighborhood has changed over the years. As older couples die or move, they are replaced by young couples with children who think the simple frame houses aren't big or fancy enough. On street after street, perfectly good homes are being scraped and replaced by McMansions. The original homeowners, who build here right after World War II, wouldn't even recognize the place anymore.

I'm still taping the new Dr. Who episodes every Saturday night, but haven't had much desire to actually watch the shows. For the most part, the scripts this season have been terrible. For a show where you are regularly expected to suspend disbelief, a lot of the new scenarios are just ridiculous. Clara and the new doctor don't seem to mesh very well either. I still like the 2005 series with Christopher Eccleston and Billie Piper the best.

It's almost time to turn the furnace on. I'm wearing a light jacket around the house because I'm cold, but Janet thinks the temperature is perfect. I never win these thermostat battles, especially when the dogs like the temperature cooler in the house as well. Eventually, everyone will agree that we need the furnace. Until then, I guess I'll have to bundle up.

Katy is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1760

I think I'm up to speed again. A severe weather forecast for tonight and tomorrow provided the excuse I needed to finally go out and buy the generator I've been talking about. It's not the world's greatest generator, but it met my criteria. It was light enough that I could get the box in and out of the car by myself. The box was filled with warning labels. I never realized that there were so many ways a generator could kill you. I promise not to try to run the thing indoors, attempt to hook it up to the house wiring, or  start the engine without first adding engine oil.

Both dogs now have their follow-up appointments confirmed at the cancer center. I kept waiting to be reminded about these appointments, but apparently I was the one who needed to remind them. I've noticed the same thing with my own Hepatitis C treatment. The healthier you get, the less visible you are on the hospital's radar. No complaints though. It's good to be healthy. I keep hoping that the dogs will be declared officially cured at one of their follow-up exams, but that's probably never going to happen. Cancer just doesn't work that way.

The new car finally got a door ding when I went to the grocery store this morning. It was inevitable. You can't drive a car in the city without getting door dings. It's not really a new car anymore anyway, since I've had it more than a year now. It just seems new compared to the Defender 90, which I drove for decades. You never noticed door dings on the Defender. The thing was put together so crudely with sheets of aluminum and rivet guns that I'm sure it came straight from the factory with door dings.

I tried again without success to get some pictures of the Monarch butterflies before they continue their migration South and disappear for another year. I think I got my best animal pictures in 2011 when the dogs were at that perfect age between being wild puppies and grumpy seniors. Back then, I could tell them to sit and stay while I took a picture and they would actually do what I said. Those were the days. The occasional great picture is just a happy accident these days.

I hope the weather forecast is wrong for this weekend. I'd much rather wash the car and do normal weekend chores than console storm phobic dogs and worry about the power going out.  I picked up some Texas style sausage kolaches while I was at the store this morning and there's still some bacon in the refrigerator. Rain or shine, at least the day will start well.

Neo is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1759

We encountered a turtle on our morning walk today. Dot growled at it. Dash wanted to play with it. And I thought it was a good metaphor for the way the day was going. I didn't really have that much to do today, but everything I started seemed to move at a turtle's pace.

I'll sure be glad when allergy season is over. Every time I walk the dogs or work in the yard, it seems to take hours for my nose to return to normal. I spend the day with my eyes watering and my nose dripping. I guess I could take antihistamines, but they seem to leave me feeling even worse than the allergies they are meant to cure. I've been blowing my nose so much lately that I'm beginning to look like Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.

I got a surprise when I went up on the roof today. All the pecan shells and leaves were gone. I guess last week's windstorm blew them away. There was still some standing water from all the rain, but it didn't really take me long at all to clean things up.

Our house must be on the migration path for the Monarch butterflies this year. I've never seen so many in our yard before. They're everywhere. I've tried several times to photograph the butterflies, but they don't stay in one place for very long. The only times I've gotten good photos of butterflies is when I catch them feasting on the nectar from flowers. We don't have many flowers in our yard, but the Monarch's do seem to like to flutter through our Oak trees.

Today's work consisted mostly of answering client's questions and asking a few of my own. Very little got accomplished. I'm glad I bought that slab of bacon yesterday. It sure tasted good with breakfast this morning and seemed to keep me in a good mood despite all the frustrations.

Dot seemed a bit slower than usual in the underwater treadmill at our physical therapy session today. On the other hand, she responded very well to acupuncture, so the visit was still a success. On the way home, I noticed that there was a bad traffic jam on the freeway, so I decided to take the back roads. This wasn't a good idea, because I must have passed at least ten 20 MPH school zones. The crowded freeway probably still would have been faster.

I still haven't gone to Northern Tools to look at generators, but maybe I'll go tomorrow after my breakfast outing. I'm convinced that if I actually do buy a generator, there won't be any more power outages. Janet says that if that is the case, the unused generator would actually be a good investment.

Maverick is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1758

The Ebola patient at Presbyterian Hospital died today and a second person was admitted to the same hospital with symptoms. Everyone is a bit nervous. When I sneezed tonight at dog training class, everyone around me gave me a strange look. One woman asked if I was OK. Jeez, it was just a sneeze. I sneeze all the time. I have seasonal allergies and they're pretty bad during the Fall.

I understand why people are nervous though. I'm nervous. Many mistakes have been made already and more will be made in the future. The guy who was admitted to Presbyterian today was a sheriff's deputy who was ordered by his supervisor to enter the victim's apartment before it was sanitized to get a quarantine order signed. The deputy wore no protective clothing at all. Then, when he began feeling sick, he just walked into a suburban CareNow clinic for treatment instead of calling the CDC. These things just keep happening. I still can't believe that one of the quarantined kids left his house and went back to Dallas public schools the day after he was quarantined. They say that 50 people are at risk, but I bet the true number is several hundred. The guy who was admitted to the hospital today wasn't even on the CDC short list.

I was sad to hear that the dog that belonged to the Spanish nurse that has Ebola has been euthanized. Why couldn't they just have quarantined the dog? We love our dogs here in the United States. I think that once people start to realize that their dogs could be at risk, or even killed by government officials during an Ebola panic, it might change people's opinions about our open borders. I keep hearing that you can't stop people from traveling. Why not? If we denied entry from all West African countries, we could put a stop to Ebola in America. People forget that for much of this country's history, if you were sick when you came through Ellis Island, you were turned away.

Today was another busy day. I finished my writing assignments, made a few website updates, and got my October invoices in the mail. I think I've finally managed to catch up with all of my power outage backlog. I guess this means that tomorrow I'll have to go up on the roof and check out the water situation. I've been avoiding this, since my last trip to the roof involved a lot of work. We've had quite a bit of rain recently and it's not going to evaporate with our cooler Fall weather, so I guess that sweeping and pumping away the standing water is almost inevitable.

I can't stand another day of oatmeal, so I bought some bacon while I was at the grocery store today. A little bacon for breakfast is bound to make Thursday a better day.

Madison is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1757

I kept thinking it was Wednesday today. With so little to differentiate the days anymore, it is an easy mistake to make. Friday's stick in my mind because I go out for a great breakfast. Thursdays I generally remember because I take Dot downtown for her physical therapy session. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday just run together.

I had lots of work to do today, but work doesn't leave the same kind of memories as a good meal. For sanity's sake, I prefer to forget most of the things I work on and depend on my computer to resurrect these projects when it becomes necessary. This is why I take backups and archiving seriously. I have dual backup hard drives and alternate them every other day, just in case. Without these meticulous backups, any garden variety computer crash could ruin me. A lot of people talk about living in the moment, but I really do. The only thing I know about yesterday is that it was very likely exactly the same as today.

Ever since the power outage I've been looking at generators. Most people evaluate generators by their power output, price, and gas tank size. I just look at how heavy they are. With a bad shoulder and carpal tunnel in my wrists, I need something I can lift. I think 60 pounds would be about my limit. This is pitiful, considering the heavy speakers and amplifiers I used to routinely lift when I played in the band, but that's just the way it is. Since your typical generator can weigh several hundred pounds, I am looking at Inverters. This type of design is much lighter and still provides enough power to meet my basic needs. As an added bonus, some types of Inverters can be hooked together in parallel to double the power. Maybe I'll get one tomorrow.

My sister told me recently that she and her husband were going to sell their rural home because of health problems and move to a place where there was better health care. I find this sad, because I know they loved living off the grid and spent years and years building a wonderful retreat in the middle of nowhere. When my parents sold their home and moved to an assisted living facility they really had no choice. Medical issues made the choice for them as well. I think about this from time to time. I'd love to live in the middle of nowhere, but I'd never want to be far away from a good veterinarian. Several of my dogs would have died if a large, full service veterinary hospital wasn't just a few minutes away. It would be nice to have a top quality research hospital nearby for Janet and I as well. I've already seen how much of a difference a good medical team can make. Basically, getting old sucks and there is very little you can do about it.

I must be moving up in the world on Klout. I got a notice today that they were sending me a Honeywell programmable WiFi thermostat for the house. This is certainly fancier than the bag of dog food they sent me last time.

Cupcake is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1756

I awoke this morning to the unmistakable sound of rain pounding on the roof. A few minutes later, a loud thunderclap woke Dot and Dash. The storm phobic dogs didn't want to get out of bed, and frankly, neither did I. On a rainy Monday with lots to do, I'd almost always rather go back to sleep. It was raining so hard at one point that I was afraid we were going to lose our power all over again. Luckily, the downpour was short lived. I postponed walking the dogs while I ate breakfast, in hopes that the skies would clear. By the time I'd finished washing the breakfast dishes, the brief thunderstorm was over and we were on our way.

There are sections of the park we have to avoid these days. The area where the city has torn up our favorite trail to build a concrete bicycle path has become a huge mud pit after the recent rains. Last Thursday's violent windstorm uprooted an enormous number of trees, leaving some areas completely blocked. You have to be careful where you walk. Often trees that were left standing have huge limbs that were broken off and left dangling up in the tree. These branches can come crashing down at any time, so I'm always looking up before walking under a large mature tree. If your tree trimming business isn't doing so well, you might consider moving to Dallas. There is enough tree damage in this city to keep you busy for a very long time.

There was plenty of work to do today. I don't have local versions of some of the websites I manage on my laptop, so I had to wait until power returned before I could deal with the update requests. When I used to travel more, I would keep all my client's sites on the laptop as well, but they changed so frequently that it was a pain to keep the laptop and desktop computers in sync. I probably should start duplicating everything I do on the laptop again. I'm certain that this isn't the last power outage we'll ever experience.

I was pretty well caught on website changes by the end of the day and am working on writing assignments now. There is probably still a good day's work before I'm completely caught up, however. When I get finished, I'll climb up on the roof and see how much water this morning's thunderstorms left behind. Maybe I'll never get caught up. Today, I had to go out and pick up some more thyroid medicine for Dash. Tomorrow, I'll need to go to the grocery store and pick up some food for the rest of the week. Eating fresh produce has certainly increased the amount of time I spend at the grocery store, but I think it's worth it. Fresh is much better than frozen.

The nasty bird that always shits on my car has returned for the Winter. I don't know how long birds typically live, but I'm convinced this is the same bird. At least the spiders in the back yard are starting to disappear. I'm methodically starting to clean up the spiderwebs littering the back windows now. Maybe we'll have sparkling clean windows again by Thanksgiving. There was one good thing about last Thursday's wind storm. The wind blew away all the remaining dead branches that were stuck in our Live Oak trees after the power company left them behind when they trimmed the trees during last Winter's ice storm power outage. Another problem solved. I always like it when doing nothing turns out to be the right thing to do.

Cassie is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1755

Yay! We've got power again. The repair crew arrived in the neighborhood while Janet and I were returning from our Sunday morning walk with Dot and Dash. The five large trucks and twelve man repair crew were greeted like a liberating army. Some neighbors offered the men coffee and others brought donuts. Everybody said a sincere thank you to the crew for not forgetting about us. After we saw the big trucks, we all knew we would have power by the end of the day.

I had no idea how long it would actually take to get power restored, so I drove up the street to pick up a take-out breakfast and some coffee. By the time I returned with the food, the lights were on again and our ordeal was over. You realize very quickly in situations like these that modern society is completely dependent on electricity. Things go downhill very quickly without power. People get grumpy. Store shelves quickly empty of essential items like batteries and food that does not require refrigeration. Knowledge workers are dead in the water without the computers, servers and phone systems they depend on. I'm still wondering what happened on Saturday's new Dr. Who episode. I can't tell you how many people I saw using their cars to recharge their cell phones during the outage. Most people would readily burn several gallons of gas while their car was idling in the driveway than risk their phone going dead. Without our phones, we are lost.

I remember reading once that during the cold war, Russia hardened most of its power grid by burying the electric cables underground. For some reason the United States didn't bother to do the same and now we are paying the price. Our entire power grid is an aging, very insecure, mess. If electric cars like the Tesla ever become popular, there will probably be brownouts every night as the population recharges their cars for the next day. I hope someone in Washington realizes the importance of improving the power grid. ISIS doesn't need to go around chopping off people's heads. All they need to bring the country to its knees is turn off the electricity for a month.

Having power again inspired Janet and I to try to get a grip on the mess that was engulfing the house. We cleaned the refrigerator and started over with fresh food. I bought some new bath towels to replace the old dingy ones that were an embarrassment to take to the laundromat yesterday. I got out the big step ladder and finally summoned the energy to get the big heavy flight case for my synthesizer off a high shelf so I could pack it up and take it to the storage warehouse. The Beta-SP video equipment went to the storage warehouse as well. As important as this stuff was to my business at one time, I know it will never be used again.

I've still got a ton of work to catch up on, but it looks like Monday will just be another normal work day. If you were expecting something from me last Friday, I'm still working on it. I work pretty fast, so with any luck, the backlog will be gone by Wednesday. It's definitely back to oatmeal tomorrow. I think I've gained five pounds by eating out every single day since last Thursday. I really hope that we don't have a repeat of this mess later this Winter. I don't think the nice, dog friendly hotel where we sought refuge during a power outage last Winter will be an option any longer. Dog friendly hotels are usually very clear that if your dog destroys anything, you pay for it. I don't think they would welcome an old dog who has a tendency to pee on the bed.

Lightning is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1754

Our power is still out. We have basically been reduced to camping out in our house. It finally dawned on me today that the dishwasher full of dirty dishes wasn't going to wash itself and the washing machine full of dirty clothes and towels weren't going to get clean by themselves. I found some dish soap and washed the dishes by hand and then I gathered up the dirty clothes and towels in a big duffel bag and went looking for a laundromat.

The only time I ever go to a laundromat is when there is a power outage, or when the washing machine is broken. I wish I could avoid laundromats altogether. This was a fairly typical laundromat. There was a crazy man talking loudly to himself while transferring his clothes from a black garbage bag to one of the washers. There was a very large woman who kept her cell phone, and apparently everything else she owned, in her bra. There were enough rowdy children to start a daycare center. I couldn't get out of there fast enough. Unfortunately, I had to stay quite a while, because someone had forgotten to clean the lint filters on the dryers and it took forever for my towel load to dry.

When I finished doing my laundry, I went to a nearby Home Depot to look at generators. There weren't any. Apparently, the store had completely sold out of all their generators two days ago. When I was still being optimistic about getting the power restored, everyone else was out buying a generator. Every time the power goes out, I think about getting a generator. Unfortunately, I've got no place to keep a decent one. It would either get ruined sitting outside in the weather, or it would get stolen. If you've got a big generator, you need a garage to keep it in. If you've got a little generator, why even bother.

I finally saw someone from the power company in the neighborhood today. These guys weren't fixing anything. They were just the "assessment team," that looks for damage before the repair crews come out later. I asked the guys if the saw the downed power line in my neighbor's yard. They said they hadn't seen any downed lines in the area, so I took them back in the alley and showed them the dangling wire. "Wow. That's the problem," one of the men said. "This is why the lights are out on your street." I'm glad I ran into these guys. They were from out of state and didn't know the area. They may have never found a single downed power line hidden in an obscure alley.

We got the cooler out of the storage warehouse and bought a couple of bags of ice, but the refrigerator ended up being a lost cause anyway. We had waited too long and ended up just throwing everything away. Luckily, the refrigerator and freezer were fairly empty, so we didn't loose much. It was sad to lose all the Gelato in the freezer though. I love Gelato.

Who knows what tomorrow will bring. Probably more of the same. The power outage is so massive that it will be a miracle if our power is restored tomorrow.  I am starting to see a bunch of out of state power company trucks driving around town today though. That's always a good sign.

Jersey is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1753

Today was all about damage control. Yesterday's storm was a lot worse than most people thought. Over 250,000 people are still without power in the Dallas area. I'm one of them. The power came back very briefly about 2 AM this morning and then about two minutes later it went out again with a bang as a transformer in the alley exploded. As I was walking the dogs this morning, I heard at least six other transformers exploding in the distance. Evidently, the power company is having trouble because there are many more downed trees and telephone poles than they expected. If they attempt to restore the power before they find all the downed lines, the circuit shorts out and a transformer explodes. Actually, I think we're losing ground. When I went to breakfast this morning, most of the traffic lights were working. When I went out again later this afternoon to recharge my UPS backup battery at Janet's office, all the lights were out again. I have yet to see any power company trucks in our neighborhood. To tell you the truth, I haven't seen any power company trucks, period. I don't know where they all are.

With limited computer resources and a very dark house, I spent as much time as I could outside. Ironically, the weather was beautiful today. You'll never believe what happened just 24 hours ago. I cleaned up broken branches in the yard and then I went up on the roof where there were many more tree limbs. It was raining so hard yesterday that I didn't even hear most of these branches fall. All I heard was the wind. I was surprised at how many good sized tree limbs were up on the roof. I don't think any damage was done, but it sure was a mess to clean up. Without the help of my trusty electric sump pump to clear the water away, it took hours to remove all the standing water and debris.

You really can't get much done without electricity these days. It seemed like the whole city was just milling around waiting for something to happen. I've never seen my breakfast restaurant so crowded before. It was hard to find a parking place and even harder to find a table. Since the power was out in our entire neighborhood, I think everybody just decided to get out of their house and have a good breakfast.

My backup battery will recharge the laptop once and the phone two times before it goes dead. This give me time to write the blog and answer a few e-mails, but that's about it. The biggest problem with the backup battery is that it takes almost eight hours to fully recharge. My laptop doesn't seem to hold a charge very well any more and neither does the little 4-G hotspot I use for WiFi. Did I ever mention to you how much I hate batteries?

I heard on the news today that the CDC has narrowed yesterday's list of 100 people down to 50 that were thought to have "shared bodily fluids" with the Ebola victim. This amazes me. This guy managed to touch more people in two days than I do in a year. The HazMat team finally came today to sanitize the guys house. Better late than never, I guess.

It's probably better late than never when it comes to getting our power restored as well. Regular readers might remember that it took over four days to get our power turned back on the last time this happened. We ended up having to stay in a hotel for a few days. At least it's not freezing cold this time. Last Winter's big ice storm still seems worse than this, even though I think more trees and telephone poles were uprooted this time.

I'll have to learn to write faster, because my laptop battery is already getting low again. Given what I've seen today, it will be a miracle if our power comes back on tonight. There's a good chance we'll be sitting in the dark until next Monday.

Hobbs is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1752

As if an Ebola outbreak wasn't enough, our fair city is now shrouded in darkness. We are currently experiencing a massive power outage after a severe thunderstorm ripped through town about 4 PM this afternoon. I think that there are over 200,000 outage reports in the general area and one of them is ours. I've heard that the straight line winds were as high as 90 miles an hour at one point. This was certainly enough to uproot trees all over the city and blow a large section of our neighbor's roof off their house. The roof is currently sitting against our back fence. We were very lucky this time. There were no downed trees in our yard and so far, there have been no leaks through the roof. The wind was strong enough to blow water through the bottom of the back door, but that was about it. There is still a downed power line in the alley that was severed by the flying roof. I'm not sure if the wire is touching my metal fence at any point, but I'm definitely not going to touch the fence until the power company comes out and fixes the line. It goes without saying that I'm operating on battery power at this time.

Somehow the number of people in town who have been exposed to Ebola has gone from just a handful, to a dozen, to over 100 in less than 24 hours. This isn't good. I heard on the news today that one of the exposed, and presumably quarantined, kids went back to school yesterday. This in insane. Nobody even noticed the kid was gone until the school notified the CDC. So much for this "self-quarantine" they've been talking about. A judge had to get a court order to keep the people in their house. Now there are armed guards to make sure they don't disappear. The whole thing is a mess. The CDC hasn't even sent a HazMat team to decontaminate the apartment where the guy was staying yet. I've heard that the dirty sheets that the infected man slept on and even vomit are still untouched inside the house.

My vet is worried that nobody has even asked whether these people have a dog. Dogs are known hosts of the disease in Africa. If a dog was exposed and it is still running around around, Lord know what might happen. I'm still worried about poop. Did this guy use the bathroom on the plane? You know how airplane bathrooms work. They just open a little hatch and eject everything in the sky when they're at cruising altitude. There may be a little ticking time bomb in some farmer's field, or in your back yard.

Dot seemed tired and a little nervous during her physical therapy session. I bet she sensed that the storm was coming. Dot is unusually sensitive to weather changes and seems to be able to predict oncoming storms better than our local TV weathermen. Luckily, we made it home from the vet before the storm started. As severe as the winds were, I definitely wouldn't have wanted to be out on the roads during the worst of today's weather.

Who knows what will happen tomorrow in Dallas. The Cowboys are actually winning football games again. There's an Ebola patient who has exposed hundreds of people less than ten miles from my house. I'm sitting here in the dark, wondering if I can get this posted before my laptop battery or my little 4-G hotspot dies. Maybe this is the beginning of the zombie apocalypse. It's certainly been a weird week. I sure hope they've restored power to our neighborhood by morning. I'm going to need a good breakfast after all this and if my power's out, I bet my favorite restaurant is sitting in the dark too.

Bailey is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1751

It was interesting to see how the Ebola news developed today. First you would hear local chatter on Twitter. There are so many people who either work or have friends in health care that news travels quickly. Shortly after rumors start flying on Twitter, local talk radio shows are filled with callers talking about the same thing. A few hours later, the same stories start to appear on prominent local, and even national, media blogs. TV news crews seem to pick up the story very late in the game, and finally, at the end of the entire process, a public official eventually issues a statement. There were Tweets about where the Ebola victim lived, what airline he flew to Dallas on, and where the children he exposed went to school several hours before the same news appeared on the local television stations.

With all the talk about how Ebola is transmitted, there's been a lot of local interest in the safety of the sewage system. Surely the guy pooped after he arrived in town. Where is that poop now? They say the virus can live a long time under moist conditions. At any rate,  I wouldn't want to be a worker at the local sewage treatment plant. I don't think I'd want to be a plumber either. One of the most persistent questions I hear is "If there is nothing to worry about, why are all you guys wearing HazMat suits?" I wonder about this myself.

Other than the occasional worry that Dallas will be where the zombie apocalypse begins, it was a fairly normal day. I spent the day doing the usual mix of website revisions and writing assignments. Some of the website work I did today involved redoing what did yesterday. That's pretty normal too. If I didn't redo a lot of things, I would have very little to do.

When we went to dog training class tonight, the sodium vapor lights that illuminate the field at night unexpectedly went out. Without these lights, it is really dark. I'm surprised that the dogs did as well as they did under these conditions. I could still see Dash pretty well, since he is basically white with a few black spots. The owners of the Labs weren't so lucky. Their dogs just seemed to disappear in the darkness.

I thought my fire ant bites would be gone by now, but they seem to have gotten worse. After doing a little reading, I discovered that this was normal. When the hard red welts caused by the bites start to blister, they can itch intensely. I'm in the itchy stage right now. They say that this can last for up to a week. It helps to keep things in perspective though. An ant bite is no big deal when there's an Ebola outbreak a few miles down the road.

Tori is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1750

Good grief. Flu season is here. The State Fair of Texas just started. And a guy with the Ebola virus was admitted to Presbyterian Hospital after wandering around town for a week. What could possibly go wrong? I guess it was inevitable that Ebola would make it's way to America, but did it have to come to Dallas first? This is a little too close to home. Presbyterian Hospital is only four or five miles from my house. The gym that I go to is actually owned by the Presbyterian healthcare network.

I listened to the press conference held this afternoon by the CDC. The only thing I could think of was that every single post-apocalyptic end-of-the-world movie I've ever seen starts with some government bureaucrat standing in front of a microphone telling people that there's "nothing to worry about." Every time I hear that this disease can't be transmitted through the air, I think of all the other things that couldn't possibly happen, like Fukushima and Chernobyl.

I'm sure for the next week of so, everyone who gets a fever in Dallas will think they've come down with Ebola. It doesn't help that officials are very close-lipped about the whole situation. They won't reveal the airline the guy flew here on. They won't reveal who his family is, or where he was seen in town before he arrived at the hospital feeling sick. Why do they let people from West Africa continue to fly here? This is an uncontrolled pandemic that has already claimed over 3,000 lives in a short amount of time. It is insane to keep pretending that "there is nothing to worry about."

I awoke this morning to the sound of a dog trying to throw up in the bed next to my head. I've heard this sound before, so I immediately picked Dot up and quickly took her outside where she proceeded to throw up on the back porch. It's probably nothing, but when a dog is recovering from cancer you always worry that the cancer may have returned. Both dogs have sensitive stomachs and are prone to eat crap in the park. It's not a good combination. I've been keeping an eye on Dot today and she seems completely normal. All dogs throw up from time to time and hopefully this was just a fluke.

I completed my troublesome website project today and wrote two new articles. I consider this a good day. It would have been an even better day if the stock market hadn't taken a tumble. It's depressing to toil away at the computer to earn a few hundred dollars when you're simultaneously losing thousands in the market.

The yard is rapidly becoming covered with dry, yellowed elm leaves that the dogs and I inevitably track inside. The elm tree loses its leaves first, and then the oaks and pecan trees quickly follow. Fall has definitely arrived.

Thelma is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1749

I wish there was a longer gap between the end of Spring allergies and the beginning of Fall allergies. Fall allergies are back with a vengeance and it seems like I only had a single month of relatively pollen-free peace. With literally hundreds of different plants continually shedding their seeds and spores in the park behind our house, I've just about resigned myself to a lifetime runny nose.

Since antihistamines leave me loopy, I've resorted to using those big, blue rolls of shop towels like Kleenex. It's good that I work alone, because it seems like I spend the entire day blowing my nose. I think the dogs are having seasonal allergy problems too. They've certainly been licking  their coats a lot lately. Allergies usually affect a dog's skin instead of their nasal passages, but I'm sure it is equally irritating. I've got my own skin irritations this week as well. I thought yesterday's fire ant bites would have gone away by now. Instead, the red puffiness around my knee has resolved into dozens and dozens of hard red little bumps. It kind of looks like I have chicken pox. I don't know how long it will take for this mess to go away, but at least the ant bites don't itch as much as chigger bites.

I only had one thing to do today, but the task proved so difficult that I still haven't finished everything. I'm not sure I even want to be a website designer anymore. I initially got interested in doing this type of work because it seemed well suited for a solitary guy like me. I could sit at my computer and create beautiful things without having to deal with printing companies and production managers like my print-based contemporaries. This business model worked for a long time, but lately I find myself spending very little time actually doing graphic design. It's all about Javascript, PHP, and SEO these days. The thrill is definitely gone. I don't like modifying other people's Wordpress themes either. That's what I was doing today.

I often envy the dogs. We like a lot of the same things. They like to eat. So do I. They like to smell every bush while we take our walks. I like to photograph every bush. It works out nicely. When we come home, the dogs go to sleep. I wouldn't mind going back to sleep either, but unlike Dot and Dash, I've got bills to pay. I wonder if they realize how lucky they are.

I hope I can get my website project finished quickly tomorrow, because some new writing assignments came in late in the day. Tuesday is usually when I have to update one of my animal rescue websites as well. No rest for the weary. I'm already looking forward to Friday.

Sweet Pea is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1748

The golf tournament photo shoot ended well, but it certainly didn't get off to a good start. I loaded my gear in a golf cart after I arrived and was just about ready to get in the cart myself when two other golfers commandeered the cart and drove away. I had turned away for just a few seconds to talk with someone and when I turned back, my cart was gone. I told two nearby club pros what had happened and they went looking for the cart. Within five minutes I had all my gear back. No harm was intended. The other golfers just thought the cart was empty and didn't notice the stuff in the back.

About ten minutes later, I kneeled down to get a better angle on a guy teeing off and I stuck my right knee straight into a fire ant mound. Almost instantly I had hundreds of fire ants crawling all over my leg. I knew I shouldn't have worn shorts. Yikes! These little critters can really sting. One of the nearby golfers asked if I needed to worry about anaphylactic shock. Thankfully, no. Luckily, I'm not allergic to bee stings and ant bites because I tend to get stung a lot.

The day ended well and I wound up getting hundreds of nice shots of golfers, Dalmatians, and golfers with their Dalmatians. I did find myself briefly going the wrong way on a one way street while I was driving home from the tournament. It was just that kind of day. I'm glad we left the dogs at home today. As accident prone as I was this afternoon, I probably would have dropped Dash's leash and he would have run off.

It's hard to believe that the rescue group has been having these charity golf tournaments for well over a decade now. I think this year's tournament was our thirteenth. We're all older now and there aren't as many dogs in the program. Dalmatians aren't as popular as they were when the Disney movies made the breed famous. That's a good thing, because far fewer dogs are being abandoned. I doubt that we would have the energy to deal with twenty-five dogs at a time like we used to anyway.

Janet won a gift certificate for 24 Sprinkles cupcakes at the tournament silent auction this evening. At the rate we eat cupcakes, this should keep us in birthday and celebration cupcakes for another year. The birthdays are all finished for this year, unfortunately. We'll have to figure out something else to celebrate, because those cupcakes sure are good!

It looks like next week is going to be busy. I've already got several new projects queued up and it isn't even Monday yet. I could have showed you dozens of people hitting a little white ball off a tee today, but I thought the clouds overhead were more interesting. This was definitely a Texas sized sky.

Spanky is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1747

Today we declared war on fleas. Both dogs have been seen with fleas lately and we suspect that they are probably inside the house. Fleas love to hide in carpet, bedding, dog blankets, and of course on the dogs themselves. Both dogs got a bath this morning, and then to make sure new fleas didn't just crawl back on each dog, I started systematically washing and cleaning everything. I'm still not finished. I think there are enough dog blankets in our house to sink a ship.

The house needed a good cleaning anyway, so hopefully this will help. You might think it would be a lot easier to just use a topical flea preventative like Frontline, but our dogs have sensitive skin and products like these leave their skin red and raw. Personally, I'd rather deal with the fleas than with a bad skin condition.

It took forever to get the dogs washed this morning. The place where we go only has four tubs and they are often filled when we arrive. Today a mother and daughter cut ahead of us in line, saying they had an important school event to attend and were running late. The daughter, who supposedly was in such a hurry, proceeded to text her friends on her phone while she was washing her dog. She was impossibly slow. An employee was grooming a dog in one of the other tanks while we were waiting. This girl left to go on a break, just leaving her wet dog sitting in the tank. She could have easily moved the dog to one of the kennels in the back and let some of the waiting customers bathe their dogs while she took her break. She also could have finished her job before she took her break. That's what I would have done. I'd leave these people a bad review on Yelp if it weren't for the fact that, despite all the problems, it's still the best dog washing place in the neighborhood. The manager is a nice guy and keeps the place very clean. It's his customers and employees who are the problem.

I noticed that Dot's dog bed was wet this afternoon, but I couldn't tell whether she had peed in the bed again or whether she was still a bit wet from her bath. The wet spot didn't really smell like pee, but my sense of smell isn't so good, so I took the cover off the bed and washed it anyway. Once I get in a washing kind of mood, it's hard to stop me. I recorded the new Dr. Who episode on the DVR again this evening because it doesn't look like I'll have time to watch it any time soon. By the time I get all the cleaning done and charge up the camera batteries for tomorrow's photoshoot, it will be time for bed.

I saw our yard possum again this morning. Luckily, the dogs didn't. I have a feeling that the possum lives somewhere in the back of the yard, because it certainly doesn't go far. I don't know why it likes our yard so much, because their are plenty of larger and much grander yards just down the street. Maybe it feels at home here. I'll have to admit now that the St. Augustine grass is dying and the ground cover beds are full of spider webs and weeds, the yard does look like a place a possum might enjoy.

Tomorrow will be busy. I keeping thinking that I have way too many aches and pains to do sports photography anymore. Then I remember that I'm just taking pictures of golfers. It isn't all that strenuous. I just follow the players around in a golf cart and take picture of them teeing off and putting. Occasionally, I get a good shot. I know the golfers are having more fun than I am, because they're drinking beer, while I'm still just drinking water.

Sophie is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day