the home i'm affordably staying in - due to the generosity not of government religion family business or the dogooder agencies but of a lone freak unexpected benefactor who places no demands on me other than modest rent and sufficient care of the place - had appliances when i moved in - washer dryer dishwasher fridge stove - and one by one they've broken down - first dryer then washer and more recently dishwasher - i can't afford to get them replaced without sacrificing things more important to me - eg good nutritious food - and am certainly not going to ask benefactor to replace them - so i resort to more manual methods - as dirty dishes pile up i fill the dishwasher then the sinks and counters until finally - after five or six days - the mess is overwhelming and i finally set to task and clean everything up - a close to two hour endeavour in durative time
it's not an unfortunate thing i think - to retreat in technological ease and advance in manual work - who should assume continual progress in things without corollary regress - we all should have sufficiently open lives that the time used for manual housework doesn't feel like a chore but a gift - i playfully stack the newly cleaned dishes as high as babel - a jengarama of intricate precariously linked items - unlike ampops in absinthia i have two sinks and easily available hot water so washing dishes feels like a luxury - but i boil the water rather than run it from the tap - as hot water runs from the boiler here and the boiler's run by furnace oil which is fatsmackingly expensive now
i keep the house between 10 and 12 degrees celsius, layering it up, using an electric space heater to heat the room i'm working in as necessary - i don't expect to turn the furnace on at all until december or january - these adaptations are good - it's surprising how we can adjust our bodies minds and expectations
13 degrees inside now feels warm, 15 degrees hot - and i go into homes in babelon that are kept at 18 or 20 or even higher and it's everything i can do not to strip immediately, dab myself with a cold washcloth and fan myself like a geisha in osaka in august
i adapt creatively - i save baking and complex cooking for the colder days so that the oven and stove double as heating up the place - i never pour warm or hot water down the drain but keep it in receptacles until it's cooled - my one luxury is taking a bath every few days though i avoid one when it's warmer - the only times i'm truly comfy are in the bath and under the covers - other times i'm cool but rarely uncomfortable - if i discover myself shivering i add a layer and cook or temporarily turn up a space heater
people hear i keep my home at 12 degrees and freak out - it's not that bad i truthfully say - i don't suffer, it's an opportunity to live creatively, i reduce energy use, i don't get sick - winter inside cool always feels better than winter inside warm - i behave very similarly to how i'd behave if it were 18 - nifty!
when i wake up in the morning i run naked to the bathroom to shit then back to the bedroom to weigh myself on the renpho scale then get dressed - those few minutes in a cold winter dawn are enough to fully wake me up and set me on a good track for the day
i sleep like a princess on a pea but in reverse - instead of there being 20 mattresses under me there are 20 coverings on top - i wouldn't feel the pea but then i'm not a very good princess
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