I got up one morning last week and saw Apple has raised prices on most of their devices – one of which is the very same MacBook Air I just bought a few days prior. That particular machine just went up by $200 due to “memory price increases” so it looks like that gamble paid off and it was a good move that I made and just in time. Basically I got $200 off BEFORE the price hike so I have essentially saved $400.

All of the price hikes are crazy high. This is gonna hurt Apple quite a bit, but other companies have done the same thing so there will be enough pain to go around. In the middle of all of it my Watch Ultra 1 and Mac Mini M1 are now no longer of any value for trade-in so I will drive them until they die. I will still use the watch like normal, and the Mac Mini I have an idea for using it as a photo backup machine and for watching movies at home.

I am really liking this MacBook Air but it is taking a little getting used to from the iPad Pro. I keep tapping the Mac screen with my finger to do things but apparently that will not work since it is not a touchscreen device. It is very fast and has a nice screen to look at…when not touching the screen.

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Still trying to get my truck looked at. It is a ridiculous process now to get a car fixed these days and it is very frustrating. Last time I did this I had to go get estimates and turn them in to my insurance. That is no longer the process after going to two places and getting shut down – basically told they would not give me an estimate. Finally the 3rd place I went was helpful so hopefully I can get this taken care of soon. I talked with the adjuster yesterday and when Meghan returns we will get a plan together; I did not have rental car coverage so that sucks a little bit more. Oh well – such is life. At least I got more info and am now able to plan things out.

I can still drive it at least, but only during daylight hours since the passenger-side fender & headlight are beat to hell as you can see. I cannot open the hood and the passenger door is rubbing the fender. I am not 100% sure, but it looks like the cab does not line-up with the bed now. Only way to know for certain is get it in the shop and they will look at it.

I will say the when I hit the deer at highway speed the truck felt rock solid and I felt completely safe. It is a pretty tough little truck…I guess we will see just HOW tough after the body shop has a look!

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A few days ago I stopped at the Montana State Parks office to ask about an annual pass. When you are purchasing a pass, one thing to always check is the expiration date; always ask if it is calendar year or 12 months from the purchase date. The calendar-year type is a waste unless you get it January 1st because they are never pro-rated so you might as well just buy a day pass. But, a little trick I learned about the 12-month type (and would tell people buying USFS/Federal passes) is to buy them on the first day of the month. They expire the last day of the month of purchase the following year, so if you buy it on the first then you basically get another month for free! Since the Montana State Park non-resident annual passes are 12 months from purchase. Another tip is the federal land Annual America the Beautiful Pass is a better bargain than buying an annual pass for one particular National Park or Wildlife Refuge; it is only a few dollars more for nationwide access. And don’t forget free days throughout the year if you want to not spend anything.

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It has been rainy for five days but started to get nicer today and should clear up more in the next day or two so I can get out to some of those State Parks after I get my new pass and get some hiking in. Depending on how long Meghan is back this time I hope to get out for some camping but how long she’ll be here remains to be seen. I can at least get in some day hikes if nothing else.

I got some other good follow-up news in a message from the cardiologist as far as hiking. Along with the acclimation for altitude, she raised my max heart rate level so that will help considerably. I am really noticing an improvement in my cardio levels every time I walk/hike so this gives me more room to push myself a little more and improve all of my levels. I have been doing more walking and can tell the difference. However, after a recent change I will have to wear a heart monitor for a week to double-check on something odd happening. I have an appointment tomorrow to pick that up.

I happened to notice a low heart rate on my watch so at my appointment I showed the cardiologist what information the app recorded. She seemed interested in what she was seeing so she did some quick checks and said she could actually feel it in my pulse. She wants me to wear a heart monitor for a week or two to see what is going on. I never had this happen before so I am a little concerned, but I will wait and see what the results from the monitor say before getting too worried. I do not know yet how all of this will affect my new heart rates and such.

As I have said previously, my Apple watches have been such useful tools for keeping track of my cardiac health as well as my overall health. They were even more valuable in the recovery from my stent and bypass surgery. Of all the health tracking wearables, Apple’s watches have medical-grade approval in some things it tracks, but you also cannot rely on it as being foolproof. It is why I showed my cardiologist what the readings were and she took it from there, possibly finding an issue in those readings. I paid for a top-rated app called Heart Analyzer that creates PDFs to share with healthcare providers so I sent her a PDF after we discussed it. It is not a subscription-based app but a one-time purchase and I recommend it if you want to keep close track of your cardiac health on your Apple Watch. I also bought another highly-rated app to monitor my health while hiking called Workoutdoors that tracks in greater detail some of the things Apple does not; this app is also a one-time purchase.

As a side note: I always check on an app’s website and pay for them through there instead of in-app or the App Store. I have had issues with Apple’s refund policies, especially after a person from Apple called me to help me with an issue and he told me that they cannot override a denied refund in the App Store. Let me say that again outloud: nobody in Apple can override a denied refund in the App Store.

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The last few weeks I had “the feeling” that something was going to happen. I was not sure what it would be; I felt something was just not right in my part of the universe.

Then I got attacked by a dog the day before a deer chose “suicide by Shawn” and wrecked my truck, and of course now the weird heart thing, I was thinking about these events a little more and inside I was tuned into something. Pretty strange.

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I wear hearing aids, and if any of you do as well you know about the stupid adult-proof packaging they now come in. They are impossible to open – it is so bad that companies are selling hearing aid battery holders to carry them in because the package gets wrecked when you need a battery.

I was ordering mine off of Amazon because they were still being g packaged in the old-school flip-top container. I ordered some and they showed up in the new packaging despite the fact they had a picture of the old-school package. I could not get in touch with Amazon Customer Service no matter what I tried so I sent the battery company – based in Hawaii – a nastygram about deceptive pictures on the website PLUS I would have to pay return shipping…to Hawaii.

Long story short – the company responded, gave me a prepaid return label and a refund. I told Amazon I am done with them and cancelled my entire account. Amazon can eff off. I have always hated that company but at times it was a necessary evil so I used them as little as possible. Plus there is Bezos and all of his greedy rich asshole comments and wanting more water for AI instead of humans. No more will I put money into that company.

That is all I have for now. Busy day tomorrow.

Have a good one and see you next time!

Shawn