These hot April nights.

Sunday, it hit the high 80's; yesterday, it made it to 92 or 93. Hotter than I'd like for it to be in April, but a welcome relief from 40 and rainy, which is what much of the previous week turned out to be.

One of the things about my house is that it's good at retaining heat. Good in winter; not so great when it's in the 90's. Both Sunday and Monday nights when I went to bed, the thermostat outside my bedroom was registering 80 degrees. Sure, it was in the low 70's or below outside, and I had a few windows open, but that wasn't doing the trick.

So I pulled the cord on the light in the ceiling fan, and tried to get to sleep. Nothing doing: Eighty degrees, and all I can do is lie there and perspire. Okay, turn the light on, and I'll read for a while. Perhaps that will make me sleepy enough. A couple of chapters of Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time ought to do the trick, don't you think? (Yes, I've had it for years; no, I haven't previously read it; no, I'm not learning a whole lot from it, other than some interesting trivia about quarks.) Well, it made me somewhat sleepier, so we'll try again - turn out the light in the ceiling fan, jump back into bed, and lie there with sweat collecting at the nape of my neck.

It seems to me that I've suffered through this excessive retained heat in previous springs, and I recall that after a couple of days, I do something that alleviates the problem. But what? It's not the small electric fan that I have downstairs in the office. And the middle of April is much too early to turn the air conditioner on (and that doesn't seem to be the right answer, either).

After about another hour of lying awake, opening more windows, checking and rechecking the thermostat, it finally occurred to me - accompanied by a Self-Applied Forehead Slap! - to pull the other cord in the ceiling fan, thereby turning the fan on. Much better for going to sleep, thank you very much.