Miraculously, this morning, we were delivered from a stultifying week of record-breaking heat and humidity.
Right now, it’s about 70 degrees, with overcast skies.
Many of us are feeling human again, able to turn off the air conditioners and open doors and windows, as if it were early fall.
The forecast looks good for the rest of the week, too.
We still need rain. The last two days, there were torrential downpours around the Boston area, but this summer, the storms have missed us, or evaporated before reaching the Cape.
Today, I saved $30 by visiting Town Hall, noteworthy since most such trips mean writing checks which, by the way, I don’t begrudge, because the people at Town Hall are infallibly pleasant and efficient. Today was a particularly good visit, though, since I arranged for a rebate of excise tax on my old car, and found that the cost of permitting was less than we’d been told.
Over the weekend, Peter, Bonnie, the kids and I ordered some new appliances for #11. One unit is to be installed as early as this Friday. We were able to take advantage both of tax-free weekend and a sale which included several rebates and a 2 year supply of Cascade.
These appliances should have been replaced 3 years ago, so it wasn’t exactly an impulse buy, and I’m glad we got it done.
Aside from the shopping trip, a couple of hours of volunteer work yesterday and helping a friend who just had her roof redone clean up her yard, the weekend was pretty much a wash.
That could be because after many days of relentless heat, I (and as it turns out, others in my acquaintance) were transformed from cognizant human beings to chunks of protoplasmic stupidity.
To give you an example: an advertising company in Florida called about selling my timeshare unit. Under normal weather conditions, I wouldn’t have spent 10 seconds with them, but I, sweating and almost unconscious, actually listened to their spiel long enough to almost – almost – give them my credit card number, on the phone, without a contract or references.
I had enough functioning wit about me to tell the salesperson I needed to check them out first and would call him back. Naturally, a dozen or more phonecalls followed, one of which was on my cellphone while I was driving around with my grandkids on Saturday.
I didn’t answer the call, and of course, they wanted to know why.
When I told them the story, the 8 year old said, solemnly, that she didn’t think it was a good idea to give them a credit card number, Grandma. The 5 year old said that in his view, I shouldn’t even talk with them at all.
Just goes to show you, a week (or more) worth of lousy, hot, humid weather makes adults a lot stupider than a normal 5 and 8 year old.
Which could explain a lot about voting patterns in this country.
P.S. With a clearer head, I did speak with the salesperson tonight, got him to fax me some info, checked out his company with the Clearwater, Florida BBB, found they have an abominable record, and taking my grandson’s advice, left a message for the salesman not to call me again.
P.P.S. to the patronizing (w)itch with whom I spoke at Fairfield Resorts, also in that misbegotten place, Florida: the word is pronounced “ask”, not “ax”.