Adventures in Thermometry

The other thing that marked yesterday as unusual was that I didn't want to get out of bed in the morning.

Ok, not that it's unusual that I don't want to get out of bed. But it's unusual that I don't want to get out of bed because it's really, really cold in the bedroom. I'd stick a hand out and go "Wow! That's cold!" Looking at the sun shining in through the bedroom door, I concluded that we were being bested by greenhouse effect in our dining room. That's where we have nice east-facing windows and the thermostat for the furnace, so it was probably nicely toasty warm there and keeping the furnace from kicking on and heating the rest of the house.

I finally hopped out of bed and took a shower. The shower was nice and hot. Everything else, not so much. I pulled on my clothes and stepped out into the hall to check the indoor / outdoor thermometer there. Fifteen degrees outside. No surprise there -- daisy_knotwise had asked me last night if I'd closed the garage door, because the bedroom had already seemed cold the night before. It had and I had, so that wasn't the source of the problem.

Fifty five degrees inside. Gack! Time to go check the thermostat. If I had to set it to eighty degrees to fight the greenhouse effect, I was going to.

It was fifty nine degrees in the dining room. And the thermostat was clearly switched on for heat.

Crap. Dead furnace.

I went down to the basement to stare at it, preparatory to calling our furnace guy, because staring at it always improves matters. I put a hand on the exhaust pipe. Cold. Obviously hadn't run in a long time. Damn.

And I looked down at the side of the furnace, where a simple light switch allows you to turn it on and off.

Switch off.

A simple light switch that is exactly at Katie's eye level.

And Gretchen had been doing laundry the previous evening -- Katie's bedding, which meant it was almost certain that Katie had followed her downstairs in pursuit of her favorite blanket, Badi.

Oh.

I turned the switch back on. A moment later, the furnace came on.

And eventually, there was heat.

*sigh*

Adventures in Thermometry

The other thing that marked yesterday as unusual was that I didn't want to get out of bed in the morning.

Ok, not that it's unusual that I don't want to get out of bed. But it's unusual that I don't want to get out of bed because it's really, really cold in the bedroom. I'd stick a hand out and go "Wow! That's cold!" Looking at the sun shining in through the bedroom door, I concluded that we were being bested by greenhouse effect in our dining room. That's where we have nice east-facing windows and the thermostat for the furnace, so it was probably nicely toasty warm there and keeping the furnace from kicking on and heating the rest of the house.

I finally hopped out of bed and took a shower. The shower was nice and hot. Everything else, not so much. I pulled on my clothes and stepped out into the hall to check the indoor / outdoor thermometer there. Fifteen degrees outside. No surprise there -- daisy_knotwise had asked me last night if I'd closed the garage door, because the bedroom had already seemed cold the night before. It had and I had, so that wasn't the source of the problem.

Fifty five degrees inside. Gack! Time to go check the thermostat. If I had to set it to eighty degrees to fight the greenhouse effect, I was going to.

It was fifty nine degrees in the dining room. And the thermostat was clearly switched on for heat.

Crap. Dead furnace.

I went down to the basement to stare at it, preparatory to calling our furnace guy, because staring at it always improves matters. I put a hand on the exhaust pipe. Cold. Obviously hadn't run in a long time. Damn.

And I looked down at the side of the furnace, where a simple light switch allows you to turn it on and off.

Switch off.

A simple light switch that is exactly at Katie's eye level.

And Gretchen had been doing laundry the previous evening -- Katie's bedding, which meant it was almost certain that Katie had followed her downstairs in pursuit of her favorite blanket, Badi.

Oh.

I turned the switch back on. A moment later, the furnace came on.

And eventually, there was heat.

*sigh*

When a Plan Comes Together

There's still a good bit of chaos around as a result of the arrival of the girls' new bunk beds. Tonight, I came home from work and started tackling it.

Step one was to bring the old bed downstairs and store it in the space that I recently cleared in the library. While this is a mild setback on the creation of order there, moving the bed out of the office -- which I use a lot more frequently! -- was a big win.

After a bit of negotiation, we've decided to put Katie's crib into the guest bedroom. When we have guests, she can sleep in the pack and play in our room. The crib blocks a small section of the closet door, but it's the same section of the closet door that was blocked by the changing table and dresser, so no real change there.

I slid the new dresser in the girls' room into the corner, making room to move the changing table / dresser in there at least temporarily while we move clothes from one to the other. That made room for the crib to go where it now belongs, so daisy_knotwise is doing the one-person assembly work and has sent me away to read e-mail so I stop pacing. :)

In a minute, I'll go help finish the crib assembly and Julie can sleep there tonight.

And there will be much rejoicing.

When a Plan Comes Together

There's still a good bit of chaos around as a result of the arrival of the girls' new bunk beds. Tonight, I came home from work and started tackling it.

Step one was to bring the old bed downstairs and store it in the space that I recently cleared in the library. While this is a mild setback on the creation of order there, moving the bed out of the office -- which I use a lot more frequently! -- was a big win.

After a bit of negotiation, we've decided to put Katie's crib into the guest bedroom. When we have guests, she can sleep in the pack and play in our room. The crib blocks a small section of the closet door, but it's the same section of the closet door that was blocked by the changing table and dresser, so no real change there.

I slid the new dresser in the girls' room into the corner, making room to move the changing table / dresser in there at least temporarily while we move clothes from one to the other. That made room for the crib to go where it now belongs, so daisy_knotwise is doing the one-person assembly work and has sent me away to read e-mail so I stop pacing. :)

In a minute, I'll go help finish the crib assembly and Julie can sleep there tonight.

And there will be much rejoicing.