It’s cold up here in Wisconsin and it isn’t truly cold here; it’s just cold, not hypothermia bad (still happens, like if you pass out in the snow). I am sitting outside in 26F ambient temperature, writing this field note.

My Cordless drill batteries give a couple seconds of torque then voltage drops. I suspect manual, wired-electric, and pneumatic drills rock in the cold.

Both my e-readers ghost illegibly in the cold. Can mitigate somewhat by holding in your hands, affixing a small heat source like a chemical hand warmer to the devices’ backs.

And just now, when I opened this laptop, I discovered the KDE had hibernated at 5% battery. The computer wouldn’t POST until I plugged it into my portable battery. Upon resume completion, I noted KDE’s battery widget reads “not charging” but it wasn’t decreasing either, so I just rolled with it. And another five minutes later it now reads “4:25 until fully charged”. Usually charging takes about 40 minutes or so. To put icing on top of the cake, the IPS panel ghosts slightly. The block cursor feels very 80s.

My Pixel 5 (rest its soul) and my Pixel 8 both handle the cold fairly well.

As for me, hands are alright thanks to thin synthetic liner gloves and a full sized keyboard — laptop keyboard is too small for my gloved hands. I’m wearing my usual jacket, neck warmer, hat, bib overalls, wool socks, boots; though my toes are feeling a little cold so It’s about time to wrap this up. Gotta know your body limits, but nothing beats cold, fresh air.

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