You gotta give humans credit for being resourceful and inventive, especially when they are rationalizing their own sinful weakness. (5 extra credit points for finding the quote in Ben Franklin's autobiography about his deviation from his youthful vegetarianism.)
I actually have an electric heater warming the inside of my trailer. The Kill-a-Watt device says that it is using only 860 Watts. I wonder if it will be running continuously at 7 tomorrow morning.
How have the mighty fallen! Last year my unheated trailer set a personal record for hitting 28 F inside. But tonight I keep looking at the heater and telling myself that it isn't really cheating because I am mooch-docking on a friend's driveway.
Normally I mock (good-naturedly) the eremitic virtues of the hook-up-free camper, and then turn around and scold any camper who is using heat. Strange.
Not so long ago, I played with the freezing point, as if it were an unattainable achievement. I used to flirt ever so closely with 32 F, getting closer and closer...
What would happen when I hit the freezing point? Would plumbing or canned goods burst? Would it be impossible to sleep? It was analogous to the premise of a fairly well known movie made back in the 1980s. (And 3 extra credit points to the reader who can identify the movie.)
And just like the movie, a certain ennui sets in when you have broken the barrier and can now only improve on it slightly.
I actually have an electric heater warming the inside of my trailer. The Kill-a-Watt device says that it is using only 860 Watts. I wonder if it will be running continuously at 7 tomorrow morning.
How have the mighty fallen! Last year my unheated trailer set a personal record for hitting 28 F inside. But tonight I keep looking at the heater and telling myself that it isn't really cheating because I am mooch-docking on a friend's driveway.
Normally I mock (good-naturedly) the eremitic virtues of the hook-up-free camper, and then turn around and scold any camper who is using heat. Strange.
Not so long ago, I played with the freezing point, as if it were an unattainable achievement. I used to flirt ever so closely with 32 F, getting closer and closer...
What would happen when I hit the freezing point? Would plumbing or canned goods burst? Would it be impossible to sleep? It was analogous to the premise of a fairly well known movie made back in the 1980s. (And 3 extra credit points to the reader who can identify the movie.)
And just like the movie, a certain ennui sets in when you have broken the barrier and can now only improve on it slightly.
Comments
But you win again!
During the last solar minimum, the southwest of the US was plagued with drought.
Chris
It is a bit of a Stoic thing though.....hardening up one's body, doing without, etc. as a way to tame the body's passions and strengthen the spirit.
Have either of you read "Thoughts of a Philosophical Fighter Pilot" by Jim Stockdale....same guy that was Ross Peret's VP pick. He was a POW in Vietnam and used Stoic principles, especially Epictetus', to get through it.
I don't understand why my commenters have turned out to be such sybarites! (grin)
A reasonable response, Boonie. But when I think of "an outdoorsy challenge", I think of tent camping. In that mode, anything (uncomfortable) goes.
Chris