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My mom is at her monthly spinning group. This probably fools Randy, as he is only human.

Tomorrow is National Opt-Out Day

A thoughtful commentary

A reasoned debate

A cautionary tale

Full-body scanners: proper stance guide

Hoover Berner

I realized during my morning patrol at four (alpha dogs sleeping soundly;Junior dozing under the bed) that I have the same initials as Harald Bluetooth. I must remember to design a logo.

Berner's eye view of negligent alpha dog

Sheila is ignoring me wirelessly with candy apple red Bluetooth headphones. Dogs don't grok red but we definitely know about being ignored.



Bluetooth technology is named after King Harald I of Denmark, an ancient(before smartphones and facebook) ruler remembered as a great uniter. When he heard this the other, more troublesome alpha dog chimed in: 'Like King George I of the USA, right?'.

Some people think Harald Bluetooth (HB for short) was called that because he ate a lot of blueberries, or maybe he was just cold all the time. The Nordic runes for H and B, when superimposed, give the modern-day logo:



Those Scandinavians are a clever bunch. They are really good knitters too.

Regardless, I am still being ignored.

Gunfight Epiphany et. al.

Not BERNERS, but pretty good anyway

Play

Higher fidelity is available from iTunes starting today.

Some other TV music suggestions from the alpha dogs

• Weeds: Music from the Original Series
• Bored to Death: The Soundtrack

And in case you remember them and aren't too old to operate a keyboard, Beatles albums are now exclusively available for download on iTunes! The two Apples have finally resolved their differences, and not a moment too soon.

Sheila likes the Beatles and downloaded Abbey Road. iTunes annoys Randy and unless he's cornered he just downloads plain old MP3 files. Today he likes the Bored to Death album, especially Dawn Landes, Arling and Cameron, Young Marble Giants, Sean Hayes and Dan Auerbach(half of The Black Keys). Also, M. Ward sings Rave On by Buddy Holly. Even if you remember the Beatles, you might not remember him unless you've lived in Lubbock.

La música aún más: Caribe Atomico(Aterciopelados), Vasos Vacíos(Los Fabulosos Cadillacs),Baïonarena(Manu Chao).

How to explain Daylight Saving Time to a dog

I thought the alpha dogs were kidding about the coffee cups

Someone called Sheila at the yarn store and asked her how to make her new smartphone read the store's QR code. She went on to say it's the up and coming thing.

Sheila said she had no clue how to make a smartphone read a QR code. Maybe take a picture of it with the camera and hope the right app or firmware is installed to decode it? If not, then it is off to the app store with ye, matey. Yarrr.

QR codes,which actually have been around for about 15 years, may have some recent competition from Microsoft Tag, which comes in pretty colors. Google likes the QR codes (an open standard) and we know what Microsoft likes.

The alpha dogs have enough trouble with their feature phones and say they will just be drinking coffee from their QR mugs and reading in the usual way while the barcode wars are fought. Sheila thinks there is such a thing as having too much information.

Randy, who sometimes has no sense and really doesn't think that, did some experiments. An online decoder was able to decipher this, which impressed him (Sheila's response:la la la la la). The coffee cup failed the test miserably, though. Moral: don't bend your QR codes too much.

News on the cancer front

According to Dr. Kelly (my oncologist), my hemangiosarcoma is subcutaneous and did not metastasize from somewhere else. These types of tumors don't usually go elsewhere, although they are locally aggressive and still quite dangerous(blood loss, e.g.) if not looked after. But, it's not an automatic death sentence like the type of hemangiosarcoma that merrily invades an internal organ.

So, once my incision heals Sheila will administer more local chemotherapy with a different drug this time and then keep an eye on me in case she has to cut out some more stuff later.

Before going to see Dr. Kelly, we stopped by SDCAH where Sheila absconded with some of my blood and then put in a few more sutures to replace some she accused me of tearing out, while Jana and Suzanne held me down. It's so nice to see friends. Joy was the only one that behaved in a civilized manner.

Randy said it was pretty good bad news, and decided he doesn't have to be quite so nice to me for a while.

Election Day

The alpha dogs, as voters, know the correct definition of the word 'dilemma'. A choice between chicken and turkey bacon, e.g., would not be a dilemma. Well, not for me, anyway.