We eat at breakfast Panera once a month or so. Danita has a loyalty card. Sometimes they have a bonus we can use. Every once in a while, they offer one free bagel a day for a month. I spend a month driving to Panera and bringing home a bagel. Panera offered Danita one free bagel a month. They also offered a free coffee subscription for 3 months. That’s a really big deal because coffee costs more than the bagel. I was able to get my own loyalty card and also sign up for the free coffee subscription. Now Danita and I are visiting Panera for breakfast every day. We get 2 bagels and 2 coffees for $1.37. That’s a deal that can’t be beat.

I use a GPS when I bike. I had a nice unit from Garmin, designed specifically for biking. It lasted two years and then it died. That was a bummer, but I decided to buy another one. The new one lasted less than 2 years and died. It would be silly to buy still another $200 GPS. I put my smart phone in a plastic pouch and started looking for GPS apps. It’s relatively easy to find an app that works well, if you don’t mind spending $50 / year. I do mind. I spent hours surfing for a better solution. I found it in Komoot. It’s a strange word. I don’t have any idea how to pronounce it. But I got a map that covers anywhere I am likely to ride for free. If I decide to ride somewhere else, I can buy another map for a few bucks, or I can buy maps for the entire world for $30. There’s no monthly fee. Maps and routes are stored on the phone, everything works without using cellular data. Best of all, the app works brilliantly. Voice prompts are well timed and easy to understand. I can import GPX files (those are routes) I already have. If I want to create a new route, their routing program works better than the one I’m using now. The only disadvantage is that it seems to be hard on the phone’s battery. I’m not sure whether my phone will last for my longer rides (over 4 hours). I’m sure I’ll come up with a decent answer. I’m not sure whether I’ll ever learn how to say Komoot.

Years ago, I put in a device called an AP (short for Access Point) to provide WiFi around our community pool. You never know when you’ll finish your book and need to download another one to your Kindle reader. The pool simply must have WiFi. The WiFi was marginal but it kind of worked and most people were happy. The AP stopped working after a little over a year. I came up with another AP that worked kind of OK, until it also stopped working, this time after several years. Right about that time COVID hit, and interest in poolside WiFi dropped like a stone in deep water. Recently, the board decided to upgrade our existing security cameras and add a new one. A new camera means a new cable. I talked them in to running two cables — one for the new camera and one for a wired Ethernet connection to an outdoor AP. With an wired connection, any old outdoor AP works really well. I got it set up this morning. It’s just in time. The pool has been open, but residents have to bring their own chair. Most people our age don’t want to do that, so the pool hasn’t been very popular. The board expects to allow residents to use shared furniture at the pool starting in a few days. That will make the pool very popular. And the new WiFi is ready — right in the nick of time.

That’s it for this week. I hope this finds everybody doing well.