Stella Supervises A Busy Friday

It was cold enough Thursday night after midnight that I had to shut the windows while we slept. The hounds don't like 47°. I left the small kitchen window open just for a little air flow. I forgot today was Friday but with cool temps predicted I had a couple of things on my list I wanted to get finished today. It went so smooth that I was finished by 1:30pm.

I guess this is a sign it's near October ??

I do much better with plants buying them after they have grown instead of trying to grow them.

Stella was ready to walk this morning. She woke from her sleep when she heard me about to leave and actually whined with excitement.

Snow boots were in order to keep my feet dry so my cargo shorts could get wet as we walked through the very wet grass. I actually had to break down and put on a sweatshirt for the walk.

Stella was into hunting for deer scat this morning ... but I stopped her from eating it each time she found it.

She follows the path most of the time.

And ... she has not taken off on me while off the leash.

The path is hard to see but she will follow it every walk we take. There are certain spots in the field that she has to go check out something but lately not too far off the path.

You can barely see the water droplets.

This is the exact spot that Heidi was sniffing yesterday. I forgot to post her photos here but I did post them on my Wordpress blog that's on this blog sidebar

I am not sure if it is a cat or a raccoon.

This was the first thing on the list this morning. It is just a small pile to move by hand. Next week I will have him dump a tractor bucket full right on the new pile I make today by the fence.

The picture does not really show the steepness of the erosion. Anyway that is the spot that I am going to put the rip rap rock. Why not use a wheelbarrow to move the stone?? I figured it would be about the same amount of time to move the rock by hand as it would to dig out the wheelbarrow that is in the very back of my small organized carport shed.

Stella assumed her supervisory position.

A good start.

She decided that she would follow me back and forth from the pile of rock to the fence. I didn't think she would last that long ....

And I was right ... a few minutes later she decided sleeping in the sun was the better option.

Asking if I am finished. She had things to do inside, like eat lunch, no matter that it was just a few minutes after 11am.

I started that rock job at 10:50am and finished at 11:12am.

The next thing on my list was washing windows. Not only the inside and outside of the regular windows but the two windows in each storm window. About an hour later when I was down to the last two bedroom windows, here comes Heidi heading for the door to be let outside. She walked across the yard to 'her' spot and soaked up some sunshine for a while.

Believe it or not that mailbox pole is NOT wobbly ... it is solid ... thanks to the great job of the Indiana Highway Dept 13 (joking) years ago when they had to move it further back after they widened the highway shoulder.

By 1:30 I was finished with my window 'washing' project and was enjoying the shade. At first I thought Stella might be exploring new ground in territory she is not allowed. I really don't want her in the front yard just in case there is a rabbit, a stray dog etc ... that she could chase and end up in the highway. All the years living here, Heidi has been the only hound allowed to be in the front yard.

Stella was only sniffing for the best place to take a short nap to catch that early afternoon sun in the western sky.

Once that mum blooms, it's going to be all crimson flowers.

Stella was eventually end up like this on the couch tonight while I watch the UCLA at Colorado football game. This photo was taken last night with my iPhone 8+ in low light. I did not edit any part of the photo.

Around 3:30pm I got some good news. An email from my TV ad on Craig's List and sold my Samsung 46" that was replaced a few months ago with the Sony 55". I added some new batteries for the remote and one HDMI cable to the package. I still had the owners manual in a drawer with all the other owner manuals. The buyer is getting a good deal and I am getting the TV out of the living room, while not being used.

I've rarely had any good luck with Craig's List.

A beautiful day in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.

A Cool And Drizzly Day

Heidi may have been feeling better this morning but that doesn't mean she wanted her photo taken. She had just moved from the dog bed in the bedroom out to the living room to join Stella and I about the time I was getting ready to take the morning walk. More rain was predicted within the next hour right after I published this morning's blog post.

She had no problems eating her morning kibble, even with missing teeth. Of course most of those small bits of kibble are swallowed whole, just some of them are chewed. Either way, after having to skip two meals due to surgery yesterday she was very hungry this morning and told me loud and clear she was hungry as did Stella.

This is one of two blankets scattered on the living room floor. Just yesterday afternoon I had folded them into nice shaped beds only to see her scratch and paw them into the perfect sleeping position.

When Stella and I returned from our short 14 minute walk ... Heidi had moved to blanket #2 and was in the deep sleep mode until lunch was served.

The first sign of rain were drops on the six red blocks we call "Winston's Patio". He would spend a lot of time laying on those blocks enjoying the warm sun, the scenery and thinking about everything during that day. I could barely hear rain drops but didn't see new ones on my arm nor the camera ... we decided the walk would go for as long as it didn't start raining.

Stella started the walk normal ... slower than slow.

Rarely did she move off the path.

In a lot of the field we cannot see our worn path as we have in past summers or falls but she will follow the path catching every slight step around a flower or weed.

Most of the time she will walk without stopping, even stepping on your foot as she walks around you ... IF, you are in her way.

This is her idea of tracking ... entirely different from Sadie.

The neighbor behind us picked his corn last week without telling us nor making a sound. I heard nothing while the field was cleared last week.

For once she is looking around at me to see if I am coming or not. I think these pictures show just how slow she moves.

For as long as I remember since she arrived in August 2015, this is their normal position while I watching tv or reading a book. They might flip positions depending who gets on the couch first or who might get up for water.

I've had my Garmin VivoSmart 3 for 15 months, wearing it all the time except when taking a shower. I cannot think of anything I would have done to cause this but just like that, the band broke. A search on DuckDuckGo, my new search engine since last June, showed me that I wasn't the only one with this problem. Due to the design of the watch, a replacement band is impossible.

So with the attitude of what could I lose if I contacted their support via their email address, I sent them a nice email stating the problem and letting them know that I have loved the performance of the Garmin. Yet I would hate to move to a new Fitbit or even the Apple Watch Series 4 as a replacement.

Within 48 hours after sending that email I had a reply asking for the serial number of the watch, my mailing address and where did the band break in relation to the hardware. The following morning I had an email giving me a shipping number for my new replacement at no cost. Disposing my watch at a qualified electronics recycling center or store was recommended.
 

I took this photo with my iPhone the other night while I was waiting for Stella to decide if she came outside to pee or just stand and sniff the air. A few minutes later as she turned to go back to the house I found out she just wanted to get some fresh air.

With the temps at 60° and intermittent light rain today ... it's was a day of reading books, and watching part of an 8 hour movie I picked up a the library yesterday called 'The Looming Tower', a new limited series. It reminded me of a book I read in 2002 named 'The Cell' by John Miller & Michael Stone. Although there is a book out by the same name 'The Looming Tower'.

For Mac users ... I have both the latest version of the new macOS Mojave and iOS12 on my computers, phone and table. It is very stable, fast and some nice new features. It will take about 6Gb of date to upload so I did my update during my free data period between 2am-8am. It did not take that long, that is just the time period I have free 50Gb of data that I don't pay for.

I will never use all the new features on the phone but it does seem to make my iPhone 8 Plus run faster when I am on the internet. It will be a phone that I keep for quite a while because it has a great camera for low light situations with hardly any editing needed.

I also got tired of the newer Safari version not blocking advertisements even after adding the updated Ad Blocker Plus ... so I moved my default browser back to Firefox. Over the pats couple of months they have worked out their bugs where it run much faster and also works well with the new Mac OS.

I want to say thanks to all that made blog comments or sent emails of support since Sadie's passing.

Not as warm as I like but it was a good day here in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.