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I did something crazy. Actually, WE did something crazy. My little family trio took a trip back to Japan this past July. Everyone told us we were idiots crazy for vacationing anywhere in Asia during the summer months. The weather anywhere in Asia is both hotter than the 7th circle of hell, & more humid than a sweaty ass crack in a Scandinavian sauna. I’m not even exaggerating, not even a little bit.
We went on a summer holiday to Osaka. July was the only time available between our little bean finishing preschool and the start of kindergarten at her new elementary school. I tried to plan ahead & bought a portable clip-on fan for us to use on the days it was overbearing hot, but that fan didn’t quite cut it, especially for 3 people to take turns. Sure, it worked well, & as advertised, but to truly beat the heat (the humidity was tolerable), we needed a stronger & larger fan.
Towards the end of our 2 week trip, I caved & bought a bigger handheld electric fan, one that I saw every other woman using or buying. Why didn’t I buy this fan at the beginning of our trip you might be wondering. Well, first of all, I wanted to justify buying the little clip-on one & not have Jian complain that it was a wasted purchase.
Next, we weren’t outside very often. Our hotel was connected to the main subway station & all of the nearby shopping malls/department stores (of which there were many). So we very much utilized all of the underground passageways and tunnel connectors between all of the buildings, & when we weren’t riding the nicely air conditioned subway, we were taking taxis. We made sure to walk outside as little as possible to stay out of the heat.
Lastly, we were so lucky to be in Osaka, which is near the bay, so there was plenty of breeze/wind to circulate the air & made the overall weather more tolerable. (Sorry, Tokyo.) The only time we got pummeled by the heat was on the day we traveled to nearby Nara so our little bean could say her prayers to the extra large Buddha at Toda-ji temple & feed the deer. (FYI, we are a Buddhist family, but we don’t strictly adhere to all of the spiritual teachings.)
At the end of our trip, we used the fan a couple of times, & I felt foolish for buying it, thinking that once we got home I’d have no other use for it other than the 2-3 week Indian Summer we get in the Bay Area at the end of September. Boy, was I wrong. So very wrong. I have been using his handheld electric fan almost every day since I’ve gotten back home.
I mostly use this fan at night after showering (we are a nighttime shower family). Other times I will use it throughout the day. I don’t know if it’s because I am going through what I think it might be for a woman roughly my age (perimenopause), or if I am just hot from the shower or doing strenuous manual labor, but I feel like I am experiencing hot flashes & need to use the fan quite often. This fan has been an incredibly useful tool.
My little bean tends to get hot when she sleeps, so often times when she co-sleeps with me, I will set the fan on its stand on my nightstand & turn it on for a few minutes to circulate the air around the room, while cooling down my little bean so she can have a restful night’s sleep. I also use the fan to cool down hot food sometimes.
The handheld fan comes with a stand that can also connect to a USB-C charging cable, or it can be charged without the stand. I am so glad I bought this handheld fan, & I am even more happy that I have found multiple uses for it, so I consider this purchase a success. Here are a few photos of the fan, in the exact color that I purchased:
Until the next post, cheers!
Song of the day:
Of course this is not really a mind-blowing DIY idea. No, I’m not painting & repurposing IKEA kitchen cabinets into a Mid-Century Modern drawer set. Today, I’m going to share my little clever tech idea on how to make…AN EXTENSION CORD FOR THE IPAD!!! No need to bust out the champagne here. This is just a simple idea I stumbled upon one night when I was trying to charge my iPad AND use it while sitting in bed. The charger kept popping out because the cord was too short. The distance between the wall socket & my bed isn’t really that wide, but unless I’m sitting on the edge of my bed facing the wall, the cord is not going to reach the bed. Then, I had a “lightbulb moment” where I thought about merging my Macbook laptop charger with my iPad charger (Thank you, Apple for your interchangeable & USB plugs).
I’m not sure if this will work for ALL Apple products, but this worked in my situation.
- I am using a standard 2010 Macbook charger & an iPad 2 charger with a flathead USB cord.
- For the laptop charger, remove the laptop piece of the plug & keep the long wall plug-in. Then, for the iPad charger, remove the wall plug-in & keep the iPad piece.
- Connect the long wall plug-in to the iPad piece & Ta-Da! You just made an extension cord for your gadget.
This isn’t the next great invention. You won’t see me on the TV show Shark Tank hocking my new idea. This is just a simple DIY project I wanted to share because I never thought of mixing & matching my gadget chargers to make one long extension cord. Maybe this idea might work on other gadget chargers. We’ll see… Until then, cheers.
Today’s song of the day:
“I Wanna Get Better” by Bleachers
Rabbits & Foxes 
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