The problem is that I wasn't. Cool. We have been having a very hot summer here in the mountains. I finally decided to Do Something about it and bought a portable air conditioner, for the kitchen, which is where the heat likes to collect. Mind you, I'll only need to use the dang thing a couple of months of the year, at most. And not every day. Which is why the portable machine instead of a more or less permanent window unit. I like to save my windows for 1) light, 2) the view and 3) fresh air. Oh yes, and the occasional photograph.
Of course, it has thoroughly cluttered up the room, not to mention the giant worm breathing out my window. (But I am cool!) And not to mention my dithering while I tried to figure out the instructions. Oh, for a world in which one can buy a product and simply turn it on -- wasn't it like that once upon a time way back in the G.O.D. (Good Old Days)?
To top it all off, would you believe it's completely operated by a remote? Honest Injun -- no buttons, no dials, no switches. I am truly living in the 21st Century. I should have already become used to the magic wand approach with my bedroom radio (below), which, though it has a few buttons for a child-size finger, is primarily operated by a remote. Of course, I am not touching that dial, because there isn't one. What kind of radio is that? But it is pretty cool to be able to turn down the #2 Brandenburg just before I drop off to sleep, without getting out of bed.
Lots of Links: Speaking of media, nobody appears to have picked up the tale of the young public radio journo up in the Alaskan hinterlands who blogged her true feelings about the town where she works, but didn't have the common sense to hide her/the town's identities. How about an interesting blog that features great microscopic pictures of plant parts and critters; a particularly neat sequence follows the development of butterfly eggs. And another that collects dumb and dumber themes and tests from modern classrooms; a classic is the tale of how George Clooney saved the USA. Last, but by no means least, videos of the Cybraphon, an emotionally responsive automatic "orchestra" created by a bunch of Scotch artists. You know that they have to be Scotch because when the Cybraphon makes music, it includes a drone, just like bagpipes.
The problem is that I wasn't. Cool. We have been having a very hot summer here in the mountains. I finally decided to Do Something about it and bought a portable air conditioner, for the kitchen, which is where the heat likes to collect. Mind you, I'll only need to use the dang thing a couple of months of the year, at most. And not every day. Which is why the portable machine instead of a more or less permanent window unit. I like to save my windows for 1) light, 2) the view and 3) fresh air. Oh yes, and the occasional photograph.
Of course, it has thoroughly cluttered up the room, not to mention the giant worm breathing out my window. (But I am cool!) And not to mention my dithering while I tried to figure out the instructions. Oh, for a world in which one can buy a product and simply turn it on -- wasn't it like that once upon a time way back in the G.O.D. (Good Old Days)?
To top it all off, would you believe it's completely operated by a remote? Honest Injun -- no buttons, no dials, no switches. I am truly living in the 21st Century. I should have already become used to the magic wand approach with my bedroom radio (below), which, though it has a few buttons for a child-size finger, is primarily operated by a remote. Of course, I am not touching that dial, because there isn't one. What kind of radio is that? But it is pretty cool to be able to turn down the #2 Brandenburg just before I drop off to sleep, without getting out of bed.
Lots of Links: Speaking of media, nobody appears to have picked up the tale of the young public radio journo up in the Alaskan hinterlands who blogged her true feelings about the town where she works, but didn't have the common sense to hide her/the town's identities. How about an interesting blog that features great microscopic pictures of plant parts and critters; a particularly neat sequence follows the development of butterfly eggs. And another that collects dumb and dumber themes and tests from modern classrooms; a classic is the tale of how George Clooney saved the USA. Last, but by no means least, videos of the Cybraphon, an emotionally responsive automatic "orchestra" created by a bunch of Scotch artists. You know that they have to be Scotch because when the Cybraphon makes music, it includes a drone, just like bagpipes.
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