BRRRR Conditioner

[SamIam]

Not sure where to post this, but it seems a sort of techie question. Sort of.

The problem is the room air conditioner in my living room. It was such a tight fit that I decided to just keep it installed permanently. Here are my questions:

1) Will it hurt it to leave it sticking out of my window all winter? I notice a few people who kept theirs up and covered them with black plastic stuff. Should I run down for plastic and cover my conditioner's shame before its too late?

2) There is one spot that is not a tight fit and that is about 2 inches from the bottom of the AC to the top of the sash. What should I do about this? Should I seal with that caulk type stuff? Or should I just keep wrapping with turquoise duct tape. Yes, turquoise is my favorite color. Anyone wanna make something out of that?

3) If it matters, I live on the verge of the desert where we get 3 or 4 rainstorms all summer. The heat is hot and dry. We do get some real floozies of snow storms here. In fact we are have one now. Its shaping up nicely and meandering its way east and will probably bring some startling excitement into your humdrum little lives.

I was out comparing snow flakes to see if any were the same, when I suddenly remembered my air condtioner and the approach of summer's end.

Thanks in advance your suggestions..