Morning Walk with Animals

I’ve been reading Cesar Millan’s book, Cesar’s Way. In the book he talks a lot about how a dog’s formost need is exercise. So, trying to be a responsible pet owner, I’ve begun taking one of our dogs for a daily walk. It turns out that walking a dog correctly requires much more effort and attention from me than I had anticipated, so I’m starting with one dog. Hopefully I can begin to take the other dog on combined or separate walks soon.

Today we were out for a little over an hour. We made our way through the neighborhood, across Main Street, and made a one-mile loop around the city reservoir. We met some interesting animals on the way:

Several humans

Several dogs being walked by the humans (or vice versa)

Some ducks , some geese, and miscellaneous songbirds

A yellow crowned night heron (Nycticorax violaceus)

A giant desert centipede (Scolopendra polymorpha)

Something for my grandkids to think about

I ran across this quote on the web today. It's attributed to Mr Rodgers.

Grandparents are both our past and our future. In some ways they are what has gone before, and in others they are what we will become.



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Better Than New

A few months back one of my favorite watches went on the blink. It was a nice Swiss Army cavalry watch that my eldest daughter gave me more than ten years ago. Needless to say, I was disappointed when replacing the battery didn’t help.

After a quick visit to the very helpful Swiss Army (now Victorinox) web site, I sent the watch with a note to their Authorized Service Center.

Yesterday the UPS guy brought my repaired watch to my door. I couldn’t be happier with the results. Except for the new leather band which matches the original perfectly and which I couldn't find anywhere else, the watch looks just like it did when I sent it away. The character marks (scratches) are still there on the bezel and crystal, so it still looks 10+ years old, but runs like new. To me, having my old favorite back is better than buying a new one – especially at one-fifth the price.

It’s also nice to be able to report that customer service is not a thing of the past!

Bikes and Beans

I like biofuels ... my bicycle runs on them.

I went for an early Sunday morning ride. The air was cool and the wind was nearly calm. Not too much traffic, but I did pass a couple of bicycles. It's good to see that other folks are beginning to ride more. My neighbor, who's in his seventies, came over to borrow my tire pump the other day. He said he plans to begin riding for errands. That's how it starts ... people just need a good reason to begin riding, and before long they find that they kinda like it. The important thing is to remember that the bicycle is not in charge of when and how much you ride. Ride when you want to or need to. It's just another form of transportation. Saving money and achieving physical fitness are bonuses.

Our little vegetable garden experiment continues to surprise me. This morning I picked a mess of green beans (our third, I think) and the plants are still blooming. I'd have thought that the heat would have killed them by now. The peppers are doing well, especially the ones that are partially shaded by the enormous cauliflower and brussels sprouts plants. The tomato plants are much larger than I expected they would be, so they're crowding each other. This week I spotted our first little green tomato. I'll bet that before long we'll be giving tomatoes away.