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This month of liveaboard life was fairly uneventful as we both recover from the virus. Clark has an update about his Hybrid Lithium-Lead Charge Controller (HLLC) invention, and we came in well under our $1000/month budget.
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Hi, I'm Emily. And I'm Clark. I'm sailing vessel Temptress
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We've been living on our boat here in the Dominican Republic for the last eight months. And here's what the last month has looked like for us. Hi, I'm Emily. And I'm Clark
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We opted out of a typical American life to live more independently
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frugally, and off the grid. We currently travel the world aboard our antique sailboat named Temptress. Each month
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we sit down to tell you where we are, what we're doing, share the best and worst moments
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answer questions, and tell you exactly how much it costs us to live this life
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This is our adventure log for March 2021. Clark is still sick
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Thankfully, this has been a unique month for us. Unique in that it hasn't been the greatest month
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Emily had that hospital visit, picked up something. I caught it from her. It hit me a little harder
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So this is the first you've seen me on video since the last adventure log where I was coughing
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And I'm still coughing, but in the middle, I was really coughing. That other video of me is pre-recorded, you know, from before the sick
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I've got this lung thing and sometimes when I get sick, it really affects my bronchial tubes
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I had to lie in bed and try not to cough and try to breathe for a month
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So I didn't do a lot that was adventurous and outward. But I still do some cool stuff. He did what was important, which was taking care of himself and
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being a mad scientist and inventing new things. I want to show that right away
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Jump out of it because I'm so excited. I did that Hulk thing, that lithium hybrid, hybrid lithium charge controller
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And I sent it out to a board house. This is something I've never done before
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But the last contract I took being a real engineer, they made things like this. They were actually
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much more complex and they were like graphics devices that ran around in drones for the military
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But I learned a lot from those guys and I realized I knew enough. And this just came yesterday, late yesterday
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I haven't had a chance to do anything but open the box. But this is a little microprocessor and everything else needed to control the
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charge sources. It'll come in a little box. It's made to fit in a box special
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So I'm going to solder up two more parts onto it and then test it this afternoon. I'm very excited. So this is what makes our
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lithium and lead batteries combine in a way that we can charge them both optimally. Yeah, it doesn't look like there's much but
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that's a microprocessor. I'm a software engineer. So it's really all done in software. So there's actually a lot on this little board
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Okay, got that out of the way. It's like Christmas. I've been just anxious. I got delayed and delayed and delayed
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Sending it out was delayed because of Chinese New Year. Like they weren't gonna do anything for two weeks or something
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So I just had to sit on it and wait. And obsessed and I get it all right. And then when it arrived, it arrived here at Easter
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Same thing. We didn't get to deliver it for the longest time. Mm-hmm. So Clark's happy. I'm happy
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He's still a little sick, but he's happy. And I've been getting out a little bit more. We've been going and getting
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takeout pizza sometimes. I've been playing music with friends aboard friends boats and also at our restaurant here called Chelsea's
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We have a jam session every Saturday. So we're like slowly... In games, yes, making and playing games
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online with the game design community. So Yeah, so we're easing back into normal life
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Hopefully we will get our tans back and not be so pale. We've just basically been inside for two months, which is not very fun, but it helps us save money
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Sort of it does. We're not out spending money, but we are shopping online a lot
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Our budget every month is $1,000. We decided to keep that going this year and this month we spent
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$745. That included $220 in groceries, $36 at restaurants, $44 for alcohol for a total of $300 for food and drink, which is funny enough is like our budget like $300 a month
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And then we've got household expenses of $27, $51 for phone and some phone cables and things, $15 for water
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$60 for our mooring, $100 for maintenance, which was we bought some new lines, some new Dyneema
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some polypropylene and some other things. Health, $115 including $60 some dollars for our health insurance and some
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Lots of cough drops. Lots of cough drops, like giant bags of cough drops for Clark
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$33 in entertainment and computer and Wi-Fi, $35. So that is our expenses for this month. So we're well within the budget. Our
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monthly average for the year is right here. Because I didn't do it. And our total for the year is here because I didn't do it yet
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But I'll put them there in the editing process. So what other news do we have? I think it's gonna be a short log because there wasn't a lot going on
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Can you think of anything? What's your favorite thing for the month? Best part of the month is you feeling better. Yeah, it was just like yesterday the day before where I felt
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I could get up and move around and not cough. I took a shot at it last week and
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I kind of muscled through it and chatted with friends for like a couple hours and came back and went right back into it
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Yeah, so I'm still gonna be a little careful. Yeah, the hard thing for him has been
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when he's feeling better, he needs to still treat himself like he's sick for another few days and then go back into trying to be a normal. Yeah
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I've had this all my life. I just never had it associated with such a bad
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cold flu, whatever you want to call it that we have. We haven't been tested so we really don't know
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We still have to treat it like we don't have it. We still have to mask up, of course, you know, anyway
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you just for social reasons you need to so you don't look like a pariah. But we, you know, we still have to be careful because we don't really want to bother trying to figure out how to do a
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test from here. Mm-hmm. There should be, there's some tests available if we'll have to look into it. I think we'll get a shot before we get a test
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Yeah, the shots are coming out. So that should come soon. I guess the worst part are the growth here in the harbor is really gross
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Yeah, our dinghy won't float anymore. I'm in no shape to go down and clean the bottom
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So we're gonna actually have to haul our dinghy out of the water this month and crunch off all of the
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seafood buffet that's underneath there and try to get that running again. I've been failing to lift the motor up sometimes so our propeller gets full of stuff, too
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One of the downsides of being here in Luperon, there's a lot of upsides, but the water is
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just not very good. But we're feeling a little better, I think. Better than last month. So that's our monthly log and
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I guess we'll talk to you guys soon. If you guys have questions or ideas for videos this month, leave them in the comments
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We always like to talk to people and get new ideas. Well, we have another bad news for us, but good news for you. I have a leak in the refrigeration system
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I have to deal with. I just been topping it off because I've been sick. So really soon I'm gonna have to tear the whole fridge out
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fix the leak, I think I found it, put it all back in. I'll video it and this will be a video on how marine refrigeration works
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This is something that even if it doesn't wildly interest you, it should interest you a bit if you're thinking at all about failing because these things fail a lot
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It's really hard to find someone that knows how they work. I know I'm busy with people saying, Clark
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could you please fix our fridge? Knowing a little bit will maybe let you say, hey, I could do that because you know, anything's doable
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Troubleshooting. But it also will let you say when the guy comes by and says, oh, you need all the whole new system
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That's $3,000. You can say no, it just changed the filter. It's like going into an auto mechanic thing. I don't know what's wrong. You don't want to be like that
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So watch the video. If you're gonna have a boat, you should know how fridges work. Mm-hmm. I'll try to make it interesting
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And I'll add some funny animation. Yeah. Yeah. So cool. All right
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Okay, thanks. We'll talk to you next month. Bye. Life upon the sea
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For the worse and for the better. To live a life full of adventure
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Emily and Clark's Adventure
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