Weather, who knows!

Last Thursday, towns around us broke records for high temperatures in the 80's. Last night, towns around us broke records for low temperatures in the 20's. Our short exposure to the warm temps only lasted that one day. The cold temps continue to torment us. Friday was a horrendous day of cold & high winds. The water level in the Marina was the lowest we can remember. Waterford's (Garry & Jacque) depth indicator read 0 feet under their boat. We didn't read ours because we decided to stay home until Saturday & not contend with the miserable weather. Saturday morning the water was still low but only @ 0 chart datum instead of minus 20. Windy, cold but the sun was out. The water @ Toledo Beach Marina has been turned on & the bathhouses opened. We decided to work inside the boat today instead of washing & waxing the exterior. Doug filled the water tank, thought he removed the air from the lines, turned on the hot water tank & then later Jan did dishes & ran out of hot water, which never happens. Hmmmm... What does that mean? Still have air in the lines, water was still sputtering. So ran the water some more till the sputtering stopped. Turned hot water tank back on. Water heated up again, nice & hot-good. A bit later though the engine room bilge pump came on, that's not a good sign. The hot water tank's pressure valve opened & drained the nice hot water into the bilge-shoot! We have to trouble shoot this. On to other challenges: this winter @ the Miami Boat show, Doug purchased many fun electronics & has spent March & April installing them. He installed AIS, which stands for Automated information system. It allows us to identify ships in our vicinity, their course & speed & those ships will in turn be able to identify us in the same manner. He also installed a cool multifunctional display (MFD), which is used as a chart plotter, displays AIS & satellite weather, which he also installed this spring. Doug designed & built a really neat mounting bracket for his MFD, I have included a picture. Why I have applied the term challenge to these new electronics is because now Doug has to get them all to recognize & talk to each other-Good luck. During the cold winter months while Day Dreams was shrink wrapped & sitting beachside with a beautiful view of Lake Erie, Doug also built in a microwave in my galley & installed an inverter. The inverter will allow us to run the microwave, the bullet & charge our phones & iPads without running the generator. Doug is so handy!