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the cold house

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-seven years and one million words

Kokubunji, 2022.01.18

It's not cold in Tokyo, but the houses sure are. I gave Mari and poncho thing for X'mas that plugs into her PC via USB to keep her warm. She uses that plus a heating pad I bought her the year before plus the air conditioner built into the ceiling of the room. Because you can't work for long in -1º or 5º, and our house is as cold as the outdoors. The windows are single panes of glass and the walls have literally zero insulation. In fact there are gaps between the floor and wall. We paid $10,000 in fees and so on to move in here. Japan's housing stock is lousy.

rand()m quote

A civilization is a heritage of beliefs, customs, and knowledge slowly accumulated in the course of centuries, elements difficult at times to justify by logic, but justifying themselves as paths when they lead somewhere, since they open up for man his inner distance.

—Antoine de Saint-Exupery