Wendi, did you turn up the heat again?
What heat?
The heat in the house.
Our house?
Yes, our house.
I’m going to say “no”?
Then how did it get up to 74? I had it set for 68.
Maybe the thermostat’s broken.
It’s not broken.
Maybe there was a power outage.
There wasn’t a power outage.
Maybe you did it in your sleep. You don’t know.
Seriously? You’re trying that one again?
Okay, maybe Jack did it.
Jack’s mystified by the toaster.
Then I give up. It’s a complete mystery. I totally think you should call the power company and demand to speak to a heat supervisor. Use your Stallone voice. Not your Steve Harvey voice–that one’s really creepy and not as authoritative as you’d think.
Or maybe you could just man up and tell me you did it. You turned up the heat.
What? Why would I turn up the heat? I LOVE being frozen to the bone all day long! I love wearing so many layers that it’d take an archeologist with a pick axe to reach my underwear! I love that I don’t need to use potholders when I take pans out of the oven! I love that showering in our bathroom is like camping and my toothpaste has little, frozen chunks in it! Why, it’s just glorious to spend my days Swiffering in 69 degrees! Glorious, I tell you!
Really.
Really.
So when I left the house this morning, that wasn’t you I heard blasting 80’s hip-hop music and screaming, “Take off your pants, boys, cause mama’s turnin’ this joint into a Jamaican heat wave and we’s about to SWEAT IT ’til WE FORGET IT, yo!”?
Nope, not me.
And that means it probably wasn’t you who was also heard bragging at the PTO meeting that your heating vents are so hot you use them for weenie roasts and the occasional glass blowing?
Of course not.
That’s good. Because you know where the money to keep the house at 75 degrees comes from?
Amnesty International?
No. No, no, no. It comes out of your wine and movie popcorn budget.
(long pause) Throwing down my gauntlet. You win.
Thank you. Where are you going?
To put on another sweater. I think it’s going to be a really cold winter.
You have no idea.

Where’s that sweater you call hot chocolate or hot mama or whatever. Pull it out!
76 degrees over here. That was my one demand when we moved in together: I control the thermostat.
His choice is simple:
toasty warm all through the house until March 31st (when we turn on the A/C), or icy cold between the sheets all they way through July…
Well, you might use the oven oftener: that would keep at least the kitchen warm, and if the electricity bill increases, well, it’s not your fault: it’s called family cooking! 😉
I’m cold natured. I suspect it goes along with the condition of my dark heart. My wonderful, sweet, amazing wife? Her body temp is at least 3 degrees warmer than most humans.
Our thermostat fight is legendary and forever.
These stories are among my favorite!! I can hear you and the Captain!!! 68 is SO damn cold. Must keep it at least at 70!!!!
So when we hear the strains of “Caribbean Queen” wafting out your windows, we can assume you are trying to work up to a sweat-it-til-you-forget-it level?
You are, officially, a Texan. Blood too thin to live anywhere else anymore.
Threaten him with Hot Chocolate. The sweater-coat, not the beverage.
ARGUMENT OVER.
Ours is at 68. When it’s super cold I become one with my fleece jacket and wear my running tights under my yoga pants. There’s just no point to being cold.
The heat in our house is not consistent. If I turn up the heat so I am comfortable downstairs, I’m sweating my ass of upstairs.
Either way, I am constantly wearing fleece something, especially when it was -4 degrees!
My husband adores the number 68. I, on the other hand, prefer something in a nice 80s range.
You are lucky at 68, during the weekdays (work hours) ours is at 64. I freeze the days I work from home.
All hail the sanctity of the wine budget. Amen.
Steve Harvey is my dad.
Time to start the at home cable show “Musings of a Fashionable Latvian File Clerk.”