Heat

It's cold out, and if we don't want to freeze, it would be best to make our homes warmer. Generally, we do this by blithely turning up the thermostat, which is usually a knob with some numbers on it which rarely if ever reflect the actual temperature indicating one of those numbers with the knob would create. Then, we wait for warmth to penetrate the air, giving no thought to system which performed this miracle, but the system makes all the difference.

I would assume that most people have central heating, where the thermostat turns on a big furnace in the basement or under the stairs, and the heat it creates is piped through vents to every room in the house. I've got a system like that as well, and I know all the little quirks it has. For example, the warmest room in the house is the tiny closet off the kitchen we put food in and call a pantry, because the largest vent runs next to one of its thin walls. So, when I get cold, I know I can simply grab a snack to be enveloped by a satisfying bubble of heat. Other rooms, meanwhile, are absolutely freezing, like that tiny room above the garage we stuck a bookshelf in and called a library. Whoever designed the house decided that this room needed no warm air, so the only vent in the room is a return vent that sucks out all the warm air that had trickled in from the adjacent hallway, and that air is replaced by what filters in through the poorly sealed windows.

The point of a central air system is that you barely notice it while it makes your house warm and comfortable, but it utterly fails in that regard. With temperature differences as dramatic as those, it becomes increasingly difficult to ignore the reasons that they arise. Those reasons, as becomes clear with very little thought, is that the thermostat is only bothered with how warm its thermometer is, and it's only got the one in the one room. If another room is draftier, the thermostat pays no mind and delivers no more heat to that room than to any other room, resulting in the house acquiring a second, much larger refrigerator.

An alternative is presented in heating each room individually with space heaters or radiators, something done in the especially cold rooms of my house. These are often not terribly powerful appliances, but with sufficiently many of them, adequate warmth can be achieved. However, these also have their disadvantages. The first and most annoying of these is that each room must now be tended to individually, as each thermostat must be constantly adjusted to keep a temperature that is still not indicated by the dial. The other disadvantage is that they are more prone to setting things on fire, as they are completely exposed. However, if you ignore that slight smokey odor, then you might find that radiators have their benefits as well. Because they are heating up significantly smaller spaces than furnaces, their heat can be felt more quickly, and if you can't even wait for the heat to move across the room, you can stand over the radiator and become almost arbitrarily hot. Another advantage, at least in my opinion, is that radiators are not designed to operate entirely in the background while remaining unseen. You get the satisfaction of knowing when they're working when you hear them ticking and clunking, noises which can become extremely soothing. They also provide decoration, the modern ones appearing almost like floor molding.

This is the topic I have been leading up to: while the functionality of a heating system is its most important quality, there is still something to be said about its ascetic qualities and its visual appeal, and these qualities are the largest distinguishing factors between different heating systems. Central heating, as I have said, has its beauty in its ability to be completely concealed. No one must know where the furnace is or what it looks like in order to feel its effects. This allows for other decorations and furnishings to be placed where more obvious heating systems would be. It also provides the pleasingly quiet sound of the air rushing through a long metal tunnel followed by a noticeable yet subtle boom as it turns off. Modern radiators, meanwhile, present themselves proudly on the edges of rooms, not demanding attention visually, but not fearing it either. They provide a backdrop for the room, much like woodwork, and windowsills, which further decoration may be based on. Their ticking, similarly, provides background noise, which is helpful for the focus and sanity of the room's occupants.

Topping both of these systems, in my opinion, are old-fashioned radiators which have several parallel tubes nearly a meter high. While they may be functionally antiquated, their charm and appeal has not been lost. These appliances are decorations in themselves, contributing to the character of a room as much as the colour of its walls. They can be modified to match any style, some demanding attention with their rustic designs, while others, with their simple, round tubes, appear almost minimalist. What does not change from one old radiator to the next are the sounds of clunking, banging, and ticking which scare away pesky children and sooth more matured and refined people. This is a noise which lets people know that they are home and helps people, or at least me, fall asleep. They also have an advantage in their heating capabilities. Because they are much larger than modern radiators, the old ones must not reach the same temperatures, so most things placed on them won't burn. This means that, should one of these radiators is installed in a bathroom, towels may be placed on it to get warm. Few things feel better than a warm towel on a cold day.

Overall, while I have favoured old radiators to other heating systems, I have shown no displeasure with newer radiators or furnaces. Both have their advantages and disadvantages, and both are overall good systems. The one system I mentioned which I find infinite problems with, however, is the space heater. With all the bulkiness of the old radiators and none of the style, these monstrosities appear to litter rooms rather than add to them. They require sprawling cords, and most have no thermostats, only high and low settings, meaning a large discontinuity in the levels of heat they produce. Further, only being plugged in to ordinary wall sockets, they don't have access to the power required to heat a room properly, even on their "high" settings. They are feeble, ugly, useless, and constantly being tripped over. Space heaters have no redeeming qualities, especially in the midst of their more powerful, more practical, and more visually pleasing competition.

Radio

Many of us listen to the radio. We listen to it when we don't have our phones or other sources of music, a radio is available, and we want to listen to some "popular" songs. This situation usually happens when we're in the car and just about nowhere else. So, this is the fate of radio: it has been permanently relegated to playing cruddy music in a place where there's so much other noise that it can barely be heard. So much for that.

The above description is generally true: most people only listen to bad music with their radios, but the simple yet elegant sound box can offer more than that. There is, for example, news broadcast over the air waves. If we wanted, we could catch up on the latest headlines. Many sporting events are also played with a radio announcer sitting in a nearby booth, so we could make sure that pitiful team we root for isn't losing again.

At this point, I'm struggling, because there really isn't much more being broadcast anymore other than news, sports, and disgusting collections of noises some call music, yet the radio used to offer significantly more. People used to turn to their radios for all sorts of entertainment, namely that thing we are unconsciously desperate for: radio shows.

A radio show is a unique form of entertainment. By providing the sounds of conversation, a radio show allows freedom in the way we imagine a scene, but it still allows the ease of sitting back for easy listening. It's the perfect thing to wind down to. As you try to bring your brain out of overdrive after a hard day's thinking, focusing on the sounds of a humorous, dramatic, or engaging radio show can help to turn off the unnecessary parts of your brain so you can relax properly.

If you're thinking, "that's what television is for", frankly, you're wrong. Television is too severe of a drop in brain activity after lots of thinking. It requires no thinking at all, providing everything that each scene is comprised of. There's nothing left for the viewer to do. If you try to stop thinking that quickly, you'll be plagued by an excess of thought, and you won't be able to appreciate the show you're watching.

The only problem is that people don't appreciate a gradual drop in thoughts enough to care about radio shows. They simply don't want to put in the effort, even if it does assist relaxation better than television. Radio shows, therefore, have all ended. The only decent ones left are recorded on old, stretching cassette tapes, and radios are permanently ruined by a lack of variety, a lack of interest, and a lack of appreciation.

Squirrels

Squirrels are such adorable little pests. They make themselves utterly cute when they hop around, enjoying their days. They've got wonderfully fuzzy tails that seem to move so effortlessly through the air when they run. They run quite often, and they dig quite often too.

When I talk to most people about squirrels, they simply can't get past their negative tendencies. People seem to think that a squirrel's only natural function is to deface lawns. They see them as ugly rodent pests. My mother is one of those people. Whenever she sees a squirrel, she remarks, "look at it there, digging up our lawn", even if it's resting harmlessly on the pavement. She also focus on their habits of taking much of the food she tries to grow in her garden. "How", she aggressively wonders, "can such a small animal steal an entire tomato?" Very effectively, it seems.

But surely the odd tomato and three square centimeter patch of grass can be sacrificed in order to sustain the population of these fuzzy little creatures. If we could overcome our tendencies to ignore all their good qualities and focus only on the minor irritations, then we would realize how much joy squirrels could bring to our lives. Simply admiring them can put a smile on anyone's face.

Have you ever looked a squirrel dead in the face? If you did, you would have seen beautiful, clear black eyes revealing the squirrel's uplifting attitude, a furry little nose begging for some kind person to come and give it a boop, and a hesitant mouth slightly ajar, wondering whether to find more tomatoes to eat or to keep looking into your pleasing eyes. Such a kind face has rarely been seen on a human, but this face is common on squirrels. Why should we not peer into those beady, squirrel eyes more often?

Have you ever seen a squirrel taking a nap on the top of a fence post? If you have, you saw a creature in utter peace. Sprawled out over that fence post, the squirrel has made a tranquil bed out of what you had previously thought of as only a lump of hard, unforgiving wood, and it looks adorable doing it. Could you really imagine it dreaming about maliciously robbing you of tomatoes?

Squirrels are so much more than thieves and miniature plows. They brighten our lives with their chirping, their fuzzy underbellies, and their cute bushy tails. We shouldn't look at squirrels with disgust and anger over their instinctive habits. We should appreciate that they are just as cute as any other small fuzzy animal and admire them as such.

Tree

As most of you know, I spent every lunch period during my freshman and sophomore years in a tree by the south doors of Uni. As far as I could tell, people thought it was cool and creative of me to sit there. (If people actually thought I was just an idiot, those people can stuff a large stick infested with ants and termites up their snoots and wait uncomfortably for their eyeballs to be eaten through from the inside.) Here are some of the reasons I began eating in a tree and why it took me so long to leave.

At the end of subbie year, a time none of us like to think about, I was beginning to notice that the people who I thought were my close friends weren't that close after all. Since I had been eating lunch with them, and a clear disconnect was forming between myself and them, it didn't take me long at the beginning of freshman year to abandon their crummy lunch group (who needs them?) and seek out a new spot to eat in. At first, I thought I could eat with some other group of people, but I realized that was a dumb idea once I remembered that we were one of the most cliquey, disconnected classes in Uni. I decided to eat wherever I pleased rather than with whomever I pleased.

This train of thought led me outside, because the outdoors has fresh air, colourful scenery, and fewer people to reject me. Out of convenience, I had exited out the south doors, with the intent to wander around the corner to the (sort of) green space between Uni and Uni Gym. However, the moment I rounded the corner, I saw oodles of upperclassmen who I thought would have been more than happy to bury me under the rocks of the picnic area, stomp all over the ground above me, and place one of the wooden tables (remember them?) on top of me as a place marker and scratch "rip" into it. I didn't think the air under those rocks would be too fresh, so I turned around. As I nearly hit my head on that now-famous tree limb, it (nearly) hit me: I would eat in the tree.

The branch was nearly level and surprisingly comfy. There was another branch just within reach that I could use as a table. The air was delightful. It was the perfect spot.

Soon people started to walk by. Even though it was still early in the year, a surprising number of them, with their zombified faces staring straight ahead, didn't even notice that I was there. I chuckled. Those that did notice gave me more civility and open kindness than I had had at lunch for quite a while. It was refreshing, and they gave me a satisfied smile that lasted the whole period.

While there were no people beneath me, my time was my own. I could think aloud freely. I was not constrained by the presence of judging humans. All I had to do was enjoy my surroundings and my food. It reminded me of British gardening shows, where everything was "pleasant". The only thing that could have made it better was flowers. Those came in the spring.

Between summer and spring, of course, was winter. It was cold, and my hands got numb, but I didn't care. Fewer people passed me on the sidewalk, and I had even more freedom to think aloud than before. When it snowed, there was glistening beauty covering a bleak backdrop everywhere. Flowers were unnecessary. How could I leave such a paradise?


(How? The lounge, that's how.)

Alarm

At least once or twice a month, something will be cooking in the oven at my house, and a small piece of it, usually a speck of cheese, will fall onto the oven floor and catch fire. What ensues is a tiring struggle to fan a tiny puff of smoke away from the smoke alarms around the kitchen. There were two of them: one was in the hallway, and one was at the top of the staircase leading down to the basement. It was never fun to put up with the eardrum-shattering beeps while waving a hand-towel of futility at the alarms, but it got worse when my dad decided to put in a third.

The third alarm was technically in a different room, but it was still in the same area: in the sun room, near to the doorway, right next to the kitchen. When my dad suddenly came in saying that he had a new smoke alarm he was going to install, by brother Linus and I told him that it was a bone-headed idea. We would then have three smoke alarms in the one area where they were more of a pain than a safety device, and if there were a fire in the sun room, the nearest alarm was already fewer than ten feet away. As was typically the case, he didn't listen.

He climbed a stepladder and placed the alarm on a ledge near the doorway. He pushed a button to activate it, and a small red light flashed. With his job complete, he climbed back down and said something about how that would keep us all safer, a statement to which Linus and I both rolled our eyes.

As Dad was folding up the ladder, the new smoke alarm suddenly started beeping. Flippantly, I said, "Oh, there's a fire. Run for your lives." Dad let out an aggravated sigh as he put the ladder back up to examine the alarm. He pushed the reset button, but the alarm continued to beep. Linus, who was not enjoying getting his ears blasted out, demanded that the alarm be shut off. I voiced my agreement. Dad pushed the reset button again, and nothing happened. Before Linus could become unpleasantly agitated, I suggested that the battery be removed from the alarm, a solution so simple, I was somewhat aggravated that he hadn't thought of it himself. Dad took the alarm down, but he did not take the battery out. At this point, Linus and I were both getting unpleasantly agitated, as we asserted that the best course of action was to remove the battery. Dad then informed us that there was no way to open the alarm to remove the battery. Statements such as, "What do you mean?" and "Whose stupid idea was it to make a smoke alarm you can't shut off?!" followed.

As Dad looked at the instructions on the package, Linus trotted down the basement stairs. I was somewhat annoyed that he wasn't going to suffer along with the rest of us, but I was prepared to join him if the alarm could not be silenced soon. Apparently, the instructions recommended to Dad that he push the reset button, which he did. Then he pushed it again. And again. Just as I told him to quit faffing around with the reset button, Linus returned with the off button: a hammer. He told Dad to give him the alarm. A short discussion took place, and Dad agreed to relinquish the alarm to Linus. He took it and the hammer outside. Before long, there was a loud bang and the sound of shattering plastic, followed by a heavily distorted "bueeoueoep". There were several more bangs. Linus walked back in and declared the alarm dead.

As my ears recovered, I began to appreciate that we would not be installing a third alarm where it would be least useful and most annoying. Our reluctant attempt had been a waste of time and an unpleasant experience, so I assumed that another would not follow. I was, however, wrong. A couple days later, Dad came home with another alarm, which he installed without incident, though there were plenty of arguments and reminders of what had happened the last time. Luckily, this new alarm came with two buttons: one marked "test", and one marked "silence".

Cookies

A cookie is little more than a mass of flour, sugar, often vanilla, butter, and various other items lying around the kitchen that have been warmed in an oven until golden brown (or in some cases, a considerably darker brown). Despite the simplicity of these small bundles of health problems, some of us humans (and occasionally our pets) find ourselves uncontrollably attracted to them, resulting in those of us with greater restraint being beaten to the cookie jar by our hungrier counterparts and finding, when we finally get there, that there are no cookies left for us.

Every year around Christmas, this is the problem in my family. As a tradition, my mother devotes herself to baking so many "seasonal" cookies that we nearly run out of cookie tins to store them in. She makes several different styles of cookies, from traditional jam and chocolate filled German ones, to decorated sugar cookies, to new creations from online recipes she discovered five months ago but decided not to make until what she considered a more festive occasion. No matter what the cookie, my brother Linus devours them all. From his usual unresponsive position behind his laptop screen and between his extra-loud headphones, he will mysteriously arise and follow his nose to wherever it senses the strongest aroma of freshly baked sweets. Often while they are still piping-hot, he will begin to almost passively consume large quantities of the sugary treats.

An hour or so later, I will be wandering through the kitchen in search of a quick snack, and, on the table, I will find two cooling racks, one with cookies and one already cleared. I casually pick one up, sniff it, take a bite, and smile as I savour the flavour that has begun to satisfy my sugar tooth. Meanwhile, Linus will reenter the room with his laptop and other necessities and sack out at the table to guard his hoard from any more of my thievery. His most common response when he sees that I am eating from his treasured stash is to show exaggerated emotion as he bites into the first cookie of his sitting in an attempt to deter me from eating his joy. Then, as I try to reach for one myself, he will surround the cookies with his arms, attempting to appear jovial while blocking me from the cookie rack. As I attempt to penetrate the blockade, his sinister intentions become apparent as he tells me to "Unhand my cookies!"

The pursuing argument lasts only a minute or two before he reluctantly agrees to relinquish a single cookie to me. As I leave, I give him an evil look to let him know, "this isn't over", but before I can return for round two, all the cookies are gone.

All Posts from here on will be for Nonfiction Writing.