Here we go. First storm of the year woke me up. Again, the fact that this only happens when I'm asleep can't be a coincidence. Okay, so I may be awake during a few storms in July and August, but that's only because it storms pretty much every day during those months. I'm exhausted. Just totally utterly exhausted. I just can't handle sleep disturbances like I could 20 or 30 years ago. It literally hurt my heart when the thunder jolted me awake, sending my HR out of the 70s and well over 100. That certainly can't be good for it. I just don't understand why I deserve to have my sleep so cursed like this. That wasn't the only thing to wake me up either. The Spectrum guy didn't wake me up, but as I was nodding off, air escaped my mouth, then a drop of water trickled out of the hose and tickled my nose. The hose part was easy enough to eliminate because I'm tired of this hose doing that and there's no point in me using a heated hose anyway. It never made a difference in my breathing, and I don't need a heated hose in Florida. Anyway, I'm keeping a log of how many times I'm asleep versus awake whenever there is loud thunder. I wouldn't be the least bit surprised to find myself woken up nearly every time it stormed during the part of the year when storms aren't a regular thing. 

Anyway, it's good to be back with Spectrum because Frontier really sucked. Hopefully, Spectrum hasn't gone downhill during this last year. We haven't used the internet enough yet to really make a judgment. 

Three charcoal treatments in, and I can definitely see that my teeth are whiter. But just as I was warned, the charcoal is definitely abrasive. I can feel it on my gums and tongue, so I'm going to skip a few days. 

My weight has gone from 165.7 to 162.0, but I still don't see myself getting significantly under the 160s. If this diet will keep me from gaining additional weight, though, I'm going to keep doing it. I'm not really craving variety, at least not yet, and it's definitely a little cheaper. I thought my cholesterol would be through the roof this way, but when I checked, I found it to be recommended that you don't go over 300 mg of cholesterol a day. Well, I'm just under that. 

During the time Mother Nature and my CPAP let me sleep, I actually had a cool dream for once. It was definitely funny and interesting even though it took place in the Phoenix house. We were just getting out of the pool, which was badly chipped for some reason. We entered the back room and all of a sudden, I noticed Tom had gotten a guinea pig. I ran up excitedly to the full-grown guinea pig that sat in a glass aquarium. "I thought I smelled rodents," I told him. Then I noticed he also got a baby rat. Then, he reached into a long wooden box and started to say, "You see, the thing about mice…" and then I squealed with additional excitement despite how poopy and smelly mice are and ran to check out the half a dozen or so mice he also got. I was fascinated by one of them that was a cross between pink and orange, lol, and delighted by the new pets even though I managed never to hear or see a thing until that moment. 

I hate to give up a waterbed, but this soft-sided bullshit is terrible. Who in the world ever thought that foam would be strong enough to keep 1000+ pounds of water from causing it to bow out? Because of it, it's causing the bed to sag and it's wreaking havoc on my lower back. We talked about different ideas like maybe switching out the tubes for an air mattress or maybe assembling 4 wooden boards to slip inside the soft cover between the foam and tubes and even switch the tubes out for a bladder, but I don't think we'll be able to afford that as fast as I and our stuff break. We still have the refrigerator and toilet to deal with. I've got the money right now for the fridge; we just have to schedule someone to pick the old one up, preferably when I'm not sleeping to add to the sleep disturbances I already have. I swear today's one of those days where I almost feel like surgery wasn't worth it because there are so many other things waking me up. Anyway, there's this company that will haul it away for free, which either recycles or repairs the appliances. 

Because I'm so tired, I may not bother writing any story scenes tonight. Another thing I like about the idea of doing scenes rather than full novels is that I don't have to worry about word count consistency in each chapter.