I leave the ceiling fans in my house on ALL the time. And I crank the A/C down to about 70’. I don’t like being hot.
What does the color of your dangly bits have to do with it?
Is acclimatization such a good thing? After a week or so of a heat index hovering around the 110-degree mark, I found myself shivering today at 72 degrees. I finally got used to the heat, and poof, it’s gone! Totally gone! Is summer over already? It just got here!
Winter’s really going to suck. 
And it can change as you get older, right?
I don’t get it either. I live in a house without central air. I have one window unit and it is in the computer room since I can cope with the heat but the CPUs and hard drives can’t. The thermostat is set at 80. For the rest of the house, I keep the computer room door closed and run my attic fan 24/7. It makes it plenty cool enough to sleep in the evenings and makes it a bearable 88-90 degrees when I’m home during the day, even if the outdoor temp tops 100, which has been pretty much the case for the last 40 days or so, except for today and yesterday, when it was a frigid 92 or 93.
Just wanted to throw in another somewhat tangetial rant. What the fuck is with people who cannot understand the concept of a thermostat? I used to live in a house with a couple roommates, induding a chick who was one of the most clueless people ever unleashed on the the earth. The house had one of those thermostats that used the furnace and AC to regulate to the desired temperature. But the stupid bitch couldn’t understand the concept of “target temperature”. No matter how many times I explained the concept to her she thought it was like a switch, all the way to the left if the room was to cold, and all the way to the right if the room was to cold. I ended up sleeping on the balcony at least once a month because the house was 108 in Winter or 39 in summer.
This seems a bit inconsistent. If she likes it cool in summer, wouldn’t it make sense to have it cool in the winter, too? Then again, my grandmother is just the opposite; if the temp in the summer is 100, and the AC brings it down to 85, she will complain about being cold. Yet, in the winter, with the temp. in single digits, she will complain about being hot if the furnace heats the house warmer than 60 degrees. Bizarre.
I never turn my HVAC off. The way my thermostat works, I can set a separate minimum / maximum temperature, and set the thermo to auto. If the temp gets below the minimum, it turns on the heat, if above the maximum, it turns on the AC. I have the AC set for 80, and the heat set for 60 when I’m home, and a timer to change it to 55/85 when I’m at work. The AC comes on a lot in July/August, seldom any other month. The heater comes on in January/February, but never for long. Six months out of the year, the HVAC system doesn’t come on at all.
Things may change when the future Mrs. Six arrives from the Philippines. She has–literally–never been cold in her life. Being a stone’s throw from the equator, the weather varies from highs in the low 90’s to highs in the high 90’s with an occasional day hitting 100. Air conditioning in stores is far from universal, and at the mall it seemed to be in the high 70’s. Even the mild winters where I live (lows in the 40’s in January) are going to seem extreme to her, and snow is an abstract concept.
On the thermostat thing: Where I teach, it isn’t unusual in September and then again in March/April for it to be cool enough in the morning that the heater runs, but by the afternoon the AC is running. This with the thermostat heat setting at 65, and the AC set to 76.
I think I was an Eskimo in a past life. I’d be in hog heaven if it was winter all year long. If I could pass a law abolishing summer, I’d do it in a heartbeat. I despise heat with a level of passion usually reserved for war criminals and child killers.
Screw acclimation. I lived in southern AZ for 25 years, about 24 of that with only a crappy-ass swamp cooler. I know hot. I’ve lived hot. I had outdoor P.E. in 100+ weather every day. I hated every last nanosecond of it.
Cold, on the other hand… mmmm… I love bundling up. I’d walk around with so many layers my body became a huge, fluffy sphere if I had to to stay warm, and I wouldn’t complain. When I get to heaven, if St. Peter isn’t a snowman with a big carrot nose and button eyes, I’m gonna be way pissed off.
Give me HEAT. Sydney isn’t enough - the summers are great but too short. I want to go further north. I love lying in a hammock under a mosquito net in Saigon or Bangkok. Heat, dust, humidity, balmy nights, and beer. mmmmm.
SUMMER ROCKS! Winter is a cruel joke.
I did grow up in CO…in Lakewood! I was there from the time I was 5 until I was 19 and I can’t stand the heat. I drink 1 - 2 quarts of water a day and want to pass out when it gets above 90 degrees. The cold, I love!
I keep my house chilly all year long. My poor a/c was probably over worked last week. I’m in the DC area and it was miserable! I went from cold house to cold car to cold work.
Scylla, I’ve tried to become acclimated to the heat and it just doesn’t work for me. If you’re too cold at work why don’t you bring in a space heater?
Another slightly tangential rant…
Tucson, AZ. It’s generally pretty hot. Which means that most people are acclimated to 100[sup]o[/sup] weather. No problem; we know how to cope. Swamp coolers, monsoon season, floods, whatever; we’re pretty hardy. No big deal for most people.
However, I went to a movie theatre today. It was 72 freaking degrees in there! That was over a thirty-five degree temperature difference from the outside world! I should have brought a parka, for chrissakes!
It’s like that in national chain stores, national chain restaurants, national chain theatres, everywhere… they set the AC to a temperature that sends most Tucsonans scurrying for the doors shivering. This is the Southwest Desert, folks. It gets down to 55 degrees F, and we talk about cold snaps, and bring our pets and plants inside for fear of frostbite. Setting the thermostat to 72 degrees here is like setting it to 50 degrees elsewhere; think for a minute, and crank that puppy up to 80. Still nice and cool, saves you money, and your patrons won’t be blue and frozen to their seats.
Thank you, and goodnight.
I’ve just realized that while I like being warm better than being cold, winter unpleasantness is much easier to deal with than summer unpleasantness, for the very simple reason that you can put as many clothes on as you like, but there’s only so many you can take off. It’s nice not having to deal with a coat for six months, but still, lying half-dead in your room with the fan on full blast is a pain.
Ft. Collins, me.
Actually, I used to walk bare-foot on the asphalt roads during the height of summer as a kid. The soles of my feet are still like shoe leather. Combine that with heavy outdoors work in MD, CA, FL, PA, and Bahrain, and you’ll see what I mean… It just doesn’t matter anymore. Weather is now merely a question of what inconvenience today brings. On the good days (most of them, as it turns out), the answer is: None.
Slight hijack, but does anyone know what part of the world has the largest swing in temperature over the course of a year? I grew up in the midwest, and it would be a rare summer that didn’t see at least a few days hit >100 degrees farenheit. Likewise you could count on any given winter to have at least a few days <0 farenheit. So an average year there might cover a range of about 110 degrees. And I’ve see extremes of right around 110 and -40, so over a longer period of time (like, say, 5-10 years) you might cover 150-160 degrees.
That’s a lot compared to places like, say, San Diego, but I’m sure it’s not the largest typical swing. Anybody have any ideas?
Poor Scylla. Well, look at it this way. You’ll eventually get acclimated to Mrs. Scylla’s weather specifications. [giggle] But I understand where you’re coming from. When I was in college, some of the dorms I stayed in had no air conditioning so we kept the windows open and ran fans, and it was wonderful!
As far as I’m concerned, it’s freezing if in the summer the A/C thermostat is on 75 degrees at home. I’ve been known to be all bundled up in jackets and blankets when the thermostat reads 80 degrees too. I DETEST BEING COLD! My friends always marvel at how cold my hands are. I’ll never forget one day at work they hadn’t turned on the heat, and it was FREEZING in the building. I don’t know what the temperature was. All I knew was I was so cold I literally could not think straight and my bones were aching. I was so cold I was ready to cry. I wound up calling it a day and going home so I could warm up. [shudder]
However, I LOVE it when it’s hot and humid! 
I love complaining about the heat and humidity, but I thrive in it too. I get my best work done when it’s in the 90’s and humid. Ahhhhhhhhh. I just hate it in the summer when I go to the office because I always have to carry a sweater or jacket or something with me. I know co-workers who have space heaters and blankets in their offices, and some days I’ve shared space heaters with them.
Personally, I hate cold weather.
People think its weird that i must wear my winter coat when its 55 or lower, but I walk and take buses and do not have the luxury of getting into a warm car.
I don’t like 90 either, though.
But I prefer 70-80. That is perfect for me.
Unfortunately I am in Ohio where last year during my sons Chrsitmas vacation, it never went above 26 degrees.
Yuck.
But I believe I have acclimated.
Long ago, I’d go out, and it’d be 20 degrees, and it would be unbearable.
Last year, 20 wasn’t as cold as it used to be!'Odd…
The Australian outback is like that. converts brain to fahrenheit It can be 110+ degrees at midday, and drop down below freezing at night (in summer). So midwestern USA probably has a slightly larger swing, but the Australian situation is possibly more dangerous because a lot of people (especially tourists) aren’t prepared for the cold of the summer nights, and many have died simply because they were in very remote areas and couldn’t get help. When it’s so hot you can fry eggs on the road, it’s hard to convince people they need to pack thick coats.
I’d say the large changes in temperature exist in most places a long way from the ocean. My WAG is that Central Asia would have the biggest extremes.
I just want to give opal a high five, as well as bluemon. Winter is the way to go. I recently moved up to MA and figured: hey, this is pretty far north, summers shouldn’t be too bad.
HA.
Now Maine is looking nice. I fear the day I’ll need to move to Alaska. I simply cannot tolerate the heat. Spent over a year in Mississippi-- right on the gulf-- and never, ever got used to the heat. I just wasn’t built for it.
Scylle, your wife is a strange case. I’ve never met a person who dreaded both ends of the temperature spectrum. But I disagree that a person can “get used to” heat or cold. Never been my experience.
Allright. Apparently from the responses to this thread, you are in a minority, though.
Also, professional athletes will tell you it happens, and usually they account for it in their training.
There’s a word to specifically describe it “acclimate.”
I do it. Eskimos do it. Hunters and outdoorsmen who spend several days out in the chilly ffall and winter, will feel it’s effects when they return indoors.
So, in spite of your personal disagreement and lack of experience with it, it is a valid phenomenom.