After some rather decidedly un-summerlike weather lately (which I suppose makes sense, since it’s technically not summer yet), we had our first crappy-hot day in what seems like a long time. Hot and nauseatingly humid – reminiscent of pretty much every day of the summer I was forced to spend in DC.

I was working from home yesterday, and I don’t turn the a/c on because I’m cheap and it seems silly to run it for basically one room. But it was pretty miserable, and I spent some time trying to figure out how to get an air conditioner in my office. The windows aren’t conducive to window a/c installation (not without major modification) and putting something through the wall as I did in our bedroom would really screw up my wall art.

It’s too humid around here to use a portable swamp cooler, and a portable a/c would still have to be vented someplace (even if I wanted to spend money on one). I could put a split system in, but that requires putting yet another condensing unit outside someplace (we already have two that haven’t run since the first summer we moved out here when I was testing them) and running electric to it. Though I suppose I could tie into the electric of one of the ones we don’t use.

But, anyway, all that would cost money and I’m cheap and summers are so short here that it doesn’t seem worthwhile. Not when I’m throwing all kinds of money into the big pit we call a “pool.” For the most part, I can just go jump in that every now and again.

Along those lines, I took a break yesterday to pull the solar cover off and turn the pump on (it’s on a timer, but I have it set for 2-8 AM and 2-8 PM, and I wanted to get it going so I could turn the robot on and let the skimmer do its thing so I could go jump in when it got unbearable in the house.

So I checked the skimmer basket, and there were the usual bugs and leaves (no frogs, toads, or rodents, thankfully) in there so I leaned over to pull it out to clean it. Of course, I had my phone in my shirt pocket and, well, “plunk” – into the skimmer it went.

I pulled it out as quickly as possible, dried it off, and – much to my surprise – it still seemed to work. Except, on further inspection, there was no sound – which is a bummer ‘cuz I like to keep the ringer and the dinger on when I work from home so I can hear if I get a work-related call or e-mail. And then I went to take a movie of the dog (because who can get enough of those, right?) and the camera looked really hazy – because, of course, there was moisture in there.

This, too, was a bummer, because I got a check in the mail and I really didn’t want to have to go the back to deposit it. But the pictures it was taking looked like some kind of artsy-fartsy vaseline filter or something and you couldn’t really make anything out.

After putting the sucker out it the sun for a while as I contemplated plausible excuses to give the folks at work for why my phone was no longer working, the sound came back and water evaporated from the camera and everything seems OK (though it currently seems to be “searching” for the ATT network. WiFi works, so hopefully it’s ATT and not the phone).

Well, crap. Maybe reboot will fix it. It’s time to start getting ready for work anyway, I guess.