One Size Fits All

This might be my final update on freezing my buns: I rode my bike yesterday wearing a teeshirt and jeans and it was such a good feeling.

Intially when the challenge began I was very excited. The excitement wore off a bit when I got sick, when it became really, really cold. Throughout the challenge I still made sure that the heat was turned on only (to 60) when it was unbearable (fingers too cold, ears hurting). Throughout the season I wore layers, my sheepskin skippers, a hat, carried my hot water bottle everywhere and ate hot foods. I also spent alot of time away from our place because it was so miserable. This time away was mainly spent at work and in the library. The winter would have been even more miserable had I spent my time at home all the time.

The challenge was an interesting one. I felt like that I could survive without heat, especially if I had access to a wood burning stove or a drum in which to burn things. There were only a handful of days that were really miserable with the wind and the low temperatures. But it certainly was not fun. It was a general pain in the butt.

So I am still freezing my buns. But a look at my latest gas bill will indicate that I haven’t been freezing my buns too much. For the month of January we used 66 ccf and in December we used 53 ccf. This translates into 54.33 and 67.65 therms respectively. Since I am also rioting, these numbers are very close to what the average American consumes at 83 therms. The riot goal is 1 therm (base being per month). Why are our numbers so high? I have some ideas.

1. We live in a house with two floors. This is alot of space to be heating up even if we turn on the heat once or twice a week for a few hours. This is not by design. We needed to move quick last year when the pipes in our old apartment froze for more than 1 week. We took over a lease that someone else was breaking. And we just stayed here as the place is fairly inexpensive. But we will be moving in a few months to a small space with a short term lease.

2. We live in a drafty house. While we’ve plugged every leak, there may a few we missed. And we have single paned windows.  

3. We have friends over and we like them to be comfortable when at our place. So during these occasions we turn on the heat for more than a few hours.

4. We have long showers in hot water and do dishes in hot water. Hot water is heated with gas.  

I don’t know if we can reduce this consumption any further. I’ll try to be a bit more conscious. But I am a bit sick of this winter.

Its very cold here in Philadelphia. In fact, it has been so cold, I’ve done something I have never done before: day dream about living in Southern California. So I spent time over the weekend looking for jobs in Southern California.

I also turned on the heat because my entire body was cold. I even went out for a bike ride last night and came back feeling as cold as I did before I went out for the ride. I feel my resolve weakening and I have no motivation to do anything but curl up in bed. But since I am not wealthy nor stand to inherit wealth, I have to stick it out in this weather.

So I am freezing my buns (its actually my toes, my buns are always warm), in more or less freezing wonder and perhaps one or two of you are wondering if I actually am freezing.

Well yes. But for about 3 days in the early part of the evening a few weeks back - I didn’t. I had a fever and a cold and sore throat, and didn’t feel like heating my hot water bottle and was in a grumpy mood in general. So I turned on the heat to about 65 degrees for a few hours to warm the house. This was for a few hours after work. I turned the heat off before going to bed, and the heated rooms were almost stuffy. I also used the dryer for the first time since the summer to dry some heavy items like our towels. Since we purchased the line dryer over the summer, we haven’t used the dryer in months.

So how did it feel turning on the heat and using the dryer? Well it was nice, but it also bumped my gas bill by $30!! So there is no way on earth I am ever turning on the heat again. If a few hours of heating a house can increase my heating bill by $30, I can imagine the heart attack I will get if I turn on the heat permanently.

Every week it gets a little bit colder. Every weekend we find new holes in our rented house that need patching up and/or sealing. This serves two purposes: it keeps the draftiness down to a minimum and prevents access points for small creatures such as a mouse.

The interesting thing is I feel that at some point in the future, out house will be held together by caulk.

Anyway. There are no storm windows for the bathroom and office - something I didn’t notice or realize last winter when the central heating system was on all the time. This year I didn’t feel like doing too much work to seal the window nor did I want to spend money or call the lazy landlord to come and get me some storm windows. So I used the flattened cardboard boxes we picked up at uhaul two years ago for about $0.25/box (they were holiday themed and we got a discount because it wasn’t the holiday season) and taped it to the windows. It is pretty effective. No draft any more as evidenced by a candle flame not flickering.

The temperature hit 32&deg F today. There was a mixture of snow, ice and rain for most of the day. This means slippery sidewalks and a colder household.

One downside to not turning on the heat, is that its taking longer for our beer to ferment. In an attempt to further reduce the amount of packaging that enters our house in the form of beer, we are making out own beer and using the bottles we drunk from before to eventually bottle the fermented beer. But since the house is cold, the yeast isn’t working as fast as they normally would.

Spending all day in bed is an option that looks very inviting these days.

One way to keep warm during the Freeze yer buns challenge is to do deep cleaning.

We still haven’t turned on the heat, but it was nice to come across the following article while working on a paper, “Japan Sweats It Out As It Wages War On Air Conditioning”. An excerpt:

Late last month, the presidents of Japan’s three biggest banks gathered to make an important announcement: They were abandoning formal attire for the rest of the summer — and insisting that their 1,630 branches nationwide keep office temperatures at a steamy 82 degrees Fahrenheit in order to conserve energy. In a formal ceremony in Tokyo, young women in cotton kimonos splashed water from wooden buckets on the baking ground — a traditional way to cool it down without using extra power.

“I want the banking world to get together to promote Cool Biz,” said Mitsui Sumitomo Banking Corp. chief Masayoshi Oku, lined up with two other bank presidents and the environment minister — all with open- necked shirts and no jackets.

Cool Biz is the latest stage in Japan’s aggressive campaign to lead the world in reducing energy use. Japan already uses less energy per dollar of output than other major economies. But the government is eager to do more. If all offices raised their temperatures to 82 from 79.2 degrees between June and end of September, when the hot season ends, it says Japan could reduce carbon-dioxide emissions by up to 2.9 million tons over the summer — roughly the amount caused by six million households in a month.

But there is growing social pressure in Japan not to complain. In fact, too much air conditioning is now seen as shameful — the equivalent of unnecessary trips in gas-guzzling automobiles.

I recently joined Crunchy Chicken’s “Freeze Yer Buns” challenge. Why did I join? Because I think its a fun little challenge, how would I deal with the cold if there was an electric shortage or something along those lines? I also think we could save some money. The best part of all is the cooking. Turning on the stove and/or oven and making all those soups and warming apple cider to warm my insides is a very enjoyable activity.

Additionally since we already plan on purchasing a proper mattress I’ve begun looking into getting a canopy bed (used either via ebay or craigslist) so that I can hang some heavy drapes and conserve heat when sleeping. I also use a hot water bottle (where I re-heat the water everynight before going to bed). The goal is to not turn on the heat throughout this winter. We’ll see how long that lasts. So far the temperature has hit the 40s but not freezing.