This will be my final column for Enclosed Porch Monthly. These last 14 years have brought me in touch with a wide, caring and devoted community of folks whose passion for outdoors-excitement-at-a-distance is unmatched in the low-end home enhancement sector. Whether we’re anxious to keep track of disabled pets or we’re simply resentful of those unafraid to walk freely in the Sun’s boundless joy, we all prefer the safety, convenience and face-saving protection of a screened-in, vinyl-windowed porch.

From the coldest corner of Maine, where they stack old newspapers and lottery tickets all around the mail slot in hopes of keeping out snow vipers, to damp, dark, mid-country Ohio, where the good folks just need a place to store their elderly, unmarried uncles that won’t stink up the house while not arousing the suspicions of the local Care board, to sunny, all-expense paid Arizona whose people require a cooling-off third space for their hatreds and resentments – we are a family united in our love of rooms that cannot decide whether they are indoors or out!

I’ve learned a lot writing this column. I’ve learned that a properly shaded enclosed porch is enough to disguise even the hardest-set of scowls. Done right, most passersby will assume you’re simply a stroke victim and not a curdled misanthrope. I’ve also learned that an enclosed porch is a great place to just pass the time!

So friends I bid you farewell. I’m moving on to a web publication devoted to step-parents who’ve converted their old fruit cellars and coal chutes into acceptable housing for albino children. Next month will find these pages intentionally left blank.

Chris Weagel

Chris Weagel writes about the intersection of technology and parenting for Wired Magazine. No he doesn't. He can't stand that shit.

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