Sunday, August 16, 2015

Day 2070

Sundays are simple. One glance at my fitness tracker will tell you everything you need to know about Sunday. I don't do a lot of thinking on Sundays, but I do keep moving. 19,000 steps so far today. The dogs got several walks. Dash went to the dog park. I went to the gym. The house got thoroughly vacuumed. And I still had time for a nap. I definitely needed the nap, because I only got about 4 and a half hours of sleep last night.

It takes forever to vacuum the house with all the little throw rugs we have to keep Dot from slipping. The Dyson is too powerful for these flimsy rugs and it keeps wanting to suck them up. I'm constantly having to turn off the vacuum cleaner and pull the edge of these rugs out of the rotating brush. In a way these small rugs are good though. If Dot inadvertently poops on a rug, we can just take it outside and hose it off. If things are particularly messy, we can just throw the rug away. Life would be a lot more difficult, and probably smellier, with wall-to-wall carpet.

You learn a lot of little things when you track yourself at the gym. I was somewhat surprised to discover that twenty minutes on the hand bicycle burn up far more energy than twenty minutes on the treadmill. I use the hand bicycle because it was part of my exercise routine when I went to physical therapy for my shoulder. I only did five minutes on the bike back then, but I figured that if five was good, twenty would be even better. Hardly anybody every uses this machine except feeble old heart patients. This is apparently not a cool machine for younger people to use. I like it though. Using your arms to peddle strenuously for twenty minutes or more is a pretty good upper body workout.

There's a section in the meat department at Central Market that features a huge assortment of marinated meats. There are all sorts of interesting regional flavors and you don't have to go to the time and trouble of marinating the meat yourself. I've grown fond of these pre-marinated cuts of meat, partially because I'm lazy and partially because I don't think I could ever do a better job of preparing the meat myself. Tonight, we had a marinated pork roast for dinner and it was delicious. I'm starting to feel guilty about eating pork though. There are lots of animal advocates on my Facebook feed who constantly post cute pictures of little piglets or upsetting messages about the cruel ways commercial pork producers treat their pigs. I love bacon but this is starting to upset me. I wonder if you can find free range pork, somewhat like free range chickens and beef?  I'll never be a vegan, but maybe I'd feel better about eating a pig that at least had an opportunity to live a life outside of a small cage.

I don't feel guilty about drinking my breakfast smoothies.  There are two raw eggs for protein, but mostly the ingredients consist of fresh fruit, with some rolled oats and ice cream thrown in for flavor. Janet bought the Vitamix to make fancy soups, but mostly it just gets used to make my breakfast now. I don't know what I'd do without the Vitamix and my Keurig brewer. They have both become my breakfast best friends.

Tomorrow, I'll need to see where I can get a new registration sticker for my car. I think you can still get these things at Kroger and Tom Thumb stores. I hope so anyway. Going to the grocery store for the sticker definitely beats standing in a long line at the courthouse. Dot has her annual exam this week and her birthday is next week. She goes to the vet so often that an annual exam almost seems redundant, but I guess it is still something you need to do. Inspections and exams are how I measure time these days. The car gets safety inspected and another year has passed. A trip to the urologist and another year has passed. A real estate tax notice arrives in the mail and another year has passed. Way too many years have passed this way. I wish there was a way to slow down time.

Pogo is today's Dalmatian of the Day
Watch of the Day