European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - July 11, 1986, Darmstadt, Hesse Page 18 the stars and stripes Friday july 11,1988 columns & comments today s crossword crying outside laughing inside by Russell Bakeras this is written the outside temperature is 99 degrees in new York City. That s in the Shade. 1stepped out there to read the thermometer. The humidity was perhaps 135 percent. I was glad to comeback into the air conditioning. The carpenters who Are erecting a new Porc scowled when i inquired if it was hot enough for them. They have no sense of humor i suspect. Still after you be spent five hours driving nails in heat deep enough to bake a Camel i suppose most people would find it hard to smile at a pleasant jest. And in their defense let it be pointed out that if the temperature is 99 in the Shade it is probably 110 in the full Sunshine which is what they Are working in.1 could t help noticing that they were hardly working at maximum efficiency. There was a goo Deal of climbing Down from the porch roof and stand ing in the Shade of the nearby Dogwood where there was a lot of unnecessarily ostentatious snaking of perspiration from , it seemed unnecessary to me. You Don t pay carpenters Good wages to have perspiration shaken allover your Dogwood tree. At least that s the Way i see it. Nor do you pay them to spend All Day tramping into the House asking for pitchers of water All the time leaving the door ajar so that they can get some of the air conditioning outside i might expect them to realize that drinking so much water in this heat is sheer Folly since it Proba Bly intensifies the flow of perspiration which compels them to keep abandoning the Job in order to snakes eat All Over the Dogwood. I was tempted to Point this out to the Crew Boss Las time i heard him in the Kitchen for water. In fact i Rose from my Library armchair put aside my copy of tax shelter digest and went into the Kitchen intend ing to suggest he rethink his philosophy of bodily fluids. He looked so purple however and so incapable of grasping a summons to Cool headed common tense that i suspected be might pour the Pitcher of water Over my new Slacks if were to favor him with what he would doubtless later Tell the police had been Bunch of his palpable animosity is understandable of course. Labouring at my new porch he and his sweat drenched colleagues can think Only of their hardship. Why they wonder should they have to toil in 110degrees of steam while i sit in my Library armchair Cool As a tax free million in beautifully conditioned dehumidifier air i cannot blame them for being unable to thin things through very clearly in today s heat. Their anger is the anger Felt by people All Over the world when they discover too late that they have failed to provide themselves with air conditioned havens forties of unbearable heat outside in unbearable heat outside in any extremely harsh environment for that matter the mind does not function very clearly. For Clear think ing the world has to rely on inside people whose comfortable amenities enable them to think objectively and dispassionately without the emotional distractions that Handicap people who Are roasting or freezing or suffering any of the other agonies endemic to life on the first observed this during the Vietnam War. Then Clear thinking inside people who had safely sequestered their draft age sons in draft proof col Leges had to struggle constantly to keep their patience with improvident parents who opposed the War be cause their sons were vulnerable to the emotionalism of parents who had not been provident enough to draft proof their sons who had failed to provide air conditioning As it were this emotionalism made it impossible for them to grasp the intellectual lightness of the War. And of course made their do lishness intellectually think of this now As my carpenters gasp for mercy and a scrupulously take my pay for wasting time perspiring All Over my Dogwood. As outsiders it is their social duly to Bear up without the same Way As an insider it is my social duty to keep Cool so that i can think clearly and by dear thought made possible by air conditioned Comfort to advise these carpenters on what is Good for , tomorrow or the next Day or whenever the heat wave Breaks and the carpenters Are willing to listen peaceably to Clear headed precepts from the inside shall urge them to enrol their children i finishing schools for Young bogeys where they will acquire the respect essential for keeping the inside delightful and the insiders comfortably in charge. High tech Means user hostile by Ellen Goodman am mechanically illiterate. I cannot blame my Mother for this one. I inherited the deep disability from both sides of my family. To the Best of my knowledge my father never made a household repair with the single exception of changing a fuse. This was a task he managed to cloaking such mystery that my sister and i would gaze in admiration when he descended the cellar slain i darkness and returned in a Halo of resurrected Light As for the one machine he used the car my father had Only the fuzz Iest Nof Ion what made it go Forward or backward let alone what made it break Down. So i read with some bemusement the latest Survey from the National science foundation. They proved to their dismay that Large numbers of americans Donot know a double Helix from a Cross stitch. By Pur own admissions Only one in three americans claims to know what a molecule is one in six claims a Clear understanding of Dan one in three of radiation. The Survey quiz master Jon Miller noted that the people who knew the least about science were the most superstitious. Moreover the people who ranked lowest in science literacy Felt they had Little control Over their own Fate and that they had to depend on experts. I was not surprised by All this. There is so much More information about the scientific world than there was a generation ago that we have Al increased our opportunities for ignorance. Consider the number of machines that have entered my family since my father s triumphal processions to the fuse Box. I have an oven which in concept can itself turn on Cook the food then turn itself off while i am at the office. It s been four years no Wand i have yet to figure it out. In the Den there is a Var which can record 12separate to shows on 12 separate channels Over time. After a private tutorial session with a Man of saintly patience i had this under control. When we got hooked up for Cable to however one system broke Down and another never successfully emerged. In truth no molecule however misunderstood would make me or Many fellow illiterates feel this powerless. Molecules mind their own business. Thereal culprit is a user hostile appliance. Take this word processor. 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