They say that once you live in Arizona awhile, your blood gets thinner.
I mentioned that bit of local "wisdom" - and the fact that I'm not sure it's true - to an engineering student from India. She paused for a moment, and then replied, "I suppose, thermodynamically speaking, that would be correct." Um....okay.
Whatever happens thermodynamically, the fact is that pretty much anyone who's been through an Arizona summer no longer can tolerate the cold as much. You can move here from the frozen reaches of upper Michigan in May, and, by fall, you'll be reaching for your jacket if temperatures dip below 65 degrees.
Which explains (to those of you in cooler climes) why people in Phoenix have and use central heating. Our next door neighbor asked us how often we turned our heater on last year, and it was often enough I wasn't sure.
That got the Hubs and I thinking that maybe we could get by with using it less often. Last year the Hubs bought me a space heater. This year we started using it a whole lot more. In fact, we didn't even turn the main heater on until Thursday when a friend was coming over with her little girl.
We use the space heater in the room we're in. Or we put on an extra layer. In the morning I come downstairs all wrapped up in a blanket, and it's pretty cozy. During the day, we open the blinds and let the sunshine in.
We're saving energy, saving money, cuddling more, and everyone wins!
Obviously, this minimally-turning-on-the-heater thing may not be the best solution for everyone. But it was an adjustment we could make. Maybe there's something else that, if you just thought about it, you could adjust too.
P.S. I was going to do another post about recycling, but I decided to mix it up a bit. More recycling beyond the bin will be the subject of a future PSBN post.
*****
Photos by me. The one of the Hubs was taken last week right before he left for work.
Monday, December 8, 2008
Arizona heat
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We do that too! We haven't turned on the heater yet this year! Our living room and bedroom face south, so we get sunshine, glorious sunshine, all day long!
ReplyDeleteI have flannel pajamas from my Chicago and NYC days that I wear at night and that combined with our down comforter keeps me pretty toasty at night too.
We do eventually turn it on, but only when it's really really really cold!!
So I can totally relate to what you're talking about! People laugh because I get so cold in the winter here since I'm from NY. Your idea about the space heater is great and I'm going to mention it to Andrew. Especially since our thermostat is downstairs, our house gets blazing hot upstairs and wastes energy trying to warm the downstairs:/ Thanks for the idea!
ReplyDeleteSheila: That's great you guys were already doing that! And hooray for flannel p.j.s!
ReplyDeleteLiz: Upstairs and downstairs are never the same temperature! The space heater we got shuts off automatically if it gets knocked over. Might be a good thing to look for - especially with a doggie in the house! ;)
Rich and I were just talking about getting a space heater. The baby room is the coldest in the house and since we can't pile him with blankets, it makes it hard to let the house get too cold at night... We were thinking that we could at least warm up his room before he goes to sleep at night.
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