A Full Year's Worth of Posts!

When I logged on blogger, it informed me that Cautionary Tale has 364 posts in its archive; so with this post, I now have produced a full year's worth of blogging goodness! Of course, it's taken me since 2002 to accomplish this, because I am a lazy bastard who only posts once a week at best... Honestly, I don't know how daily bloggers do it.

Anyway, I'm currently suffused with accomplishment because I managed to extract my window-mounted air conditioning unit from my window singlehandedly today, with only minor injury and property damage. Ordinarily this is a two-person job, involving one person standing outside on a ladder holding onto the thing, while the other person raises the window sash; then both heave it up over the sill and into the house. It's highly unpleasant, as the unit is generally filthy and has random sharp bits that cut into your hands when you're not expecting it. My friends have come to dread this process, to the point that if I invite Fathead over for dinner at any point during November, she says, "You want me to help you move your air conditioner, don't you? God DAMN it." So this year I kind of forgot about it... until today, when it got down to 7°F outside and frigid air was seeping in around the edges of the unit. I decided it was time to stop being such a wuss, and see if I could bring it in by myself--I had the impression that the bulk of the weight was resting on the windowsill, so it MIGHT not fall out the window the moment I raised the sash. (And if it did fall out the window, this would be an excellent excuse for buying a new window unit come next summer--this one really is a piece of crap, it came with the house, it weighs 4000 lbs, and its little fins are all mashed up. It's brought to you by Amana, which always makes me think of my childhood spent watching The Price Is Right--I don't even know what an "Amana Radar Range" actually is, but I think it came in Avocado, Mustard, and Burnt Orange.)

So as it turns out, I was wrong about the weight. I unscrewed the screws, raised the sash--and despite my claim of a cavalier attitude toward dropping my AC unit 8' to its death, I lunged forward yelling "NOOOOOO" and grabbed onto its edges just as it was heading out and downwards. And there I sat, contemplating my next move, as a cold wind rushed past me into the house and attracted the attention of the cats, who came over to investigate. This motivated me to solve the problem sooner rather than later, and after several false starts I managed to lift one corner of the thing up and onto the interior sill. Brief struggles with the couch (which was emphatically In My Way, but had nowhere to go) and then I got the thing inside, turned around, and set down in the corner of the living room. The sill is scraped up, and I punched a small but painful hole in my left middle finger on god-knows-what-sharp-bit, but I didn't throw my back out and I did get the storm window closed. This will all be worth it when I get my next gas bill.... I hope.