Kayaks And CPAPs

We love the memories that daughter Tiffany and granddaughter Destiny left us with after their visit, but we sure wouldn’t have minded at all if they had taken the cold and windy weather back home with them to Northern Arizona, where it belongs. I don’t think it got out of the mid-50s all day yesterday, with the wind blowing about 15 mph, and rain was spitting all day long. It was definitely not a day to be outside, and we are supposed to have the same for at least a week or so.

But in anticipation of when the weather does clear up, we spent part of yesterday reconfiguring our kayak trailer to hold two boats instead of one. Our neighbor Jesse converted it for us last year, and having two boats on it makes it super easy to take them down to the water and launch them for a day of paddling. In a pinch, we can put our third Old Town Predator kayak on top of the other two on the trailer and haul them that way. However, when the pontoon boat is in the garage during the super hot summer months, there’s no room for the trailer configured that way, so we return it back to the single boat set up and store the extra kayaks underneath the pontoon boat.

When I said that we are going to sell our two Sea Eagle inflatables in a previous blog post, a couple of people contacted me asking the price. With everything that comes with them they cost about $3,000 new, and I’d like to get $1,500. One person, someone who I’ve never met or heard from before, contacted me asking if I would take payments of $50 per month. No, I’m sorry, I’m not a banker or a loan company.

Several readers have asked how I am adapting to using my ResMed AirSense 11 CPAP machine at night, and I have to say it’s gone much easier than I expected it to. In reading different online forums, it seems that a lot of people have tremendous difficulty getting used to them, but except for a little bit of anxiety the first night or two, it really hasn’t been an issue for me.

And even then, my sleep score was in the high 90s every night. Here is a bar graph of my sleep score for the first 12 nights. Only twice did it drop out of the mid to high 90s, with a score of 88 the morning we had to get up earlier than normal to pick up the girls at the airport when they arrived from Arizona, and 79 the day they left, when we were up all night and slept for a few hours when we got home. I’ve also noticed that I’m not falling asleep in the evening sitting in my recliner watching television, though that might be because the girls kept us so darned busy that there was no time to fall asleep. 😊 But overall, I do feel a lot more rested.

Speaking of my recliner, there was a time when La-Z-Boy products were considered some of the best available. Not anymore, in my opinion. Less than three years ago I ordered a custom La-Z-Boy powered recliner, and the mechanism has been clunky when it moves from day one. A while back, the remote control stopped working and was replaced under warranty, and now the powered headrest has stopped working. It is in an extended position, which makes it almost impossible to sit in the chair comfortably.

We bought an extended warranty with the chair, so it is covered, but I have no idea how long it’s will take to actually get it repaired. When I called the warranty service last week, they said they would send me the replacement motor, and once it arrives, I need to call and make an appointment for a service tech to come out and make the repair. While I’m glad that they are honoring the warranty, for the price I paid for the chair I wouldn’t expect so many problems. And if we hadn’t bought the extended warranty, we’d be out of luck. I don’t think I would ever buy another La-Z-Boy product, based on my experiences with this one.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us, courtesy of our friend Jim Harper.

Today is your last chance to enter our Free Drawing for an audiobook of The Driving Lesson by my friend Ben Rehder. While Ben writes some excellent mysteries, including the wildly popular Blanco County series, this tale of a boy and his grandfather on an unplanned road trip across the country is a coming of age story that will tug at your heartstrings. To enter, click on this Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name (first and last) in the comments section at the bottom of that page (not this one). Only one entry per person per drawing please, and you must enter with your real name. To prevent spam or multiple entries, the names of cartoon or movie characters are not allowed. The winner will be drawn this evening. Note: Due to the high shipping cost of printed books and Amazon restrictions on e-books to foreign countries, only entries with US addresses and e-mail addresses are allowed.

Thought For The Day – I can’t even imagine the self-control required to work at a bubble wrap factory.