Gear shopping

I spent a quiet day at home today.  Last night I felt pretty tired so I went to sleep at 9.  The alarm woke me at 7 and I wasn't ready to get up.  To me this indicates a malfunction.

I was already scheduled to wait for the plumber/videographer to come look at the pipes, so I settled in with a mug of coffee.  No change.  After a while a thought gradually drifted into my brain.  Let's see.. multiple tick bites Saturday.  Rash showed up four days later.  Fever a week after that.  1+1+1= I should go talk to my doc about Lyme disease again.  And so I have an appointment for tomorrow.  I hope to be the proud new owner of a prophylactic dose of antibiotics by the afternoon.

In less irksome news, today started Shopping for Camping Gear season.  I put a multitool on my Xmas wishlist.  I'm pondering putting a tarp/bivy combo on my wishlist too, following this blog article:

http://www.briangreen.net/2011/07/tarp-bivy-combo-your-sub-1lb-shelter.html 

Brian's whole website is pretty cool.  I got a couple of ideas from it.  I've subscribed to the RSS feed to see what else he might write.

I'm also hankering for an alcohol stove that can simmer.  So far I don't know of any lightweight ones.  This heavy one can do it, though:

http://www.greatoutdoorsdepot.com/trangia-westwind-stove.html

Somebody has to have made one of these NOT out of brass, right?  Right?

My new emergency radio showed up today.  It's one of these:

American Red Cross Radio

I neglected to notice before purchasing that you can't charge it from the wall.  Your options are solar or crank.  That's fine, though.  90 seconds of cranking buys you 30 minutes of radio time.  Assuming the rechargeable batteries don't bite it.

Oh, and the pipes?  Looked like I was watching somebody's colonoscopy.  Understandable I suppose.  Drain pipes are not that dissimilar to a colon.  Although they aren't self-repairing, unfortunately.