The Thermostat Wars

It's winter. We can all agree that we're officially into December, there has been snow on the ground and candy canes are readily available on the shelves at the supermarket. WINTER. It being winter, one has to acknowledge that the previous summer levels for the central heat/air are no longer applicable. Especially when there are LARGE windows in the house letting the winter air and SNOW in. It is officially time to turn on the heater.

My dear husband (who is, at this very moment, decreasing his core body temperature even further by eating ICE CREAM)  doesn't see it that way. He thinks that 60 degrees is a perfectly reasonable temperature to keep the thermostat on all the time. Even when it being set that low keeps the heater from kicking on. My toes are blue, people.

So here's the scenario: I come in from work at the coldest possible time, just before dawn. I am freezing. My breasts are ON FIRE from the cold and I'm shivering and tired. I see the thermostat set on something like "Antarctica" and so I turn it to a reasonable temperature (70) before crawling into bed, in layers of clothing and socks. Justin gets up, sees the reasonable temperature on the thermostat and immediately breaks into a sweat. He's melting...MELTING!! He turns the heater back down to freezing. By this time I'm super drugged and sleeping under a gigantic pile of blankets, pillows and pajamas so I don't notice. When I get up, it's FREEZING again, and we have to have a fight about his ridiculous expectations for the temperature in the house. I maintain that if I'm wearing layers and layers of clothing, am wrapped up in a blanket and still have blue fingers that the heat should be on. One shouldn't have to wear gloves in their own home.  He says it should never, under any circumstances be on and I'm a weenie. So yeah, that's been the weekend.

2 comments:

Brinkley said...

pshaw! I'm wearing a sleeveless tee shirt and shorts... It's not cold in here at all.

Random Esquire said...

Oh man, this is a hard one. One wall of my loft faces South so, even without the heat on, sometimes my place will be 80 degrees in the dead of winter. So I rarely have to turn on the heat but I do like it around 68-70 during the day. At night, in the winter, I crack the patio door a little. I like cold air and cold sheets when I sleep so sometimes, I will wake up in the morning and my place will be 50 degrees. It doesn't faze me at all. I turn on the heat and get in the shower and by the time I'm out, I don't even notice it. Body temperature spikes right when you wake up, I believe - so that is probably why your husband thinks it is ridiculously warm while you think it is freezing.

Solution? Get an electric blanket and ask him to turn it on for you about 15 minutes before you get home so you can crawl into it.

And lest you think Little Filthy is freezing, he burrows under the blankets in the winter (um, if I'm sleeping alone) or if he's relegated to his own bed, he snuggles into a big blanket.

-R.