Friday, June 24, 2005

Fatigue and the Frozen Tundra that is my House...

Quote of the Day: "My second favorite household chore is ironing. My first being, hitting my head on the top bunk bed until I faint."--Erma Bombeck

OH MY HECK I am so tired! My hubby is killing me. Literally. He is insisting that I work out with him every night (and the workouts are getting later and later--we worked out at 10:30 last night) and then of course after we collapse into bed, he is up at 3am fiddling with the air conditioner because he is "too hot" and "can't sleep."
Maybe it was because he was born in Alaska (his parents were transferred there) and he wants to "get back to his roots" or something, because lately, it's been 95 degrees, and apparently he feels the need to compensate by keeping sub-arctic temperatures inside the house. (I politely suggested that we might as well hang our children up in the basement on meat hooks while they watch TV--since the basement temperatures resembled a meat locker. You know it's bad when you can see your breath inside your own home.) He didn't appreciate that comment much, but tough toodles. I will admit it was bordering on the Snide...I am very adept at snide comments.

You see, Hubby and I have the misfortune of having the warmest room in the house (I swear all the heat rises to OUR room) and so to cool our room down, the rest of the house has to be VERY cold at night. But it never seems cold enough, lately.

Here's the routine as of late (usually taking place at 3am in the morning):

Hubby: (tossing and turning) I’m hot! I can’t sleep! Did you turn the air up?

Me: (groaning) No, I did not turn the air up. Why would I?

Hubby: You must have, because I’m roasting.

Me: You're right. I secretly crept downstairs and put the air on 80. Open a window.

Hubby: (unintelligible muttering) No! It’s still 90 degrees outside!

Me: **yawn* then turn the air down!

Hubby: I will!

Then he throws off the sheets, and stumbles downstairs, and moments later I hear the air kick on.
Then it’s back upstairs for Round Two: The Ceiling Fan War:

The Dreaded Ceiling Fan. This has been a source of discord in our marriage since, well, The Beginning. The reason? I can't sleep with a fan on my face. I always wake up with fever blisters on my lips and a sore throat, it seems. But DESPITE this fact, Hubby insists on having the fan on at full speed (and every house we lived in it always was directly above the bed) and I'm sorry, I just can't fall asleep with my hair and sheets blowing about like I'm in a wind tunnel.

So, I usually win the Ceiling Fan Debate, and we have it on the setting just below "High". But lately, after he turns the air down, I’ve been losing the Fan War.

Just this morning, I woke up with icicles on my nose--and the kids were all curled up instinctively like pill bugs in their beds, to ward off the cold. Poor things, I had to heap covers on them to get them to loosen up. Maybe it's because the air was SET TO 73 DEGREES!!! (Arrgh!)
Of course Snide Comment Me resisted the urge to ask the kids (very loudly) if they wanted a mug of HOT CHOCOLATE, and we opted for hot oatmeal instead.

MEN. My poor mother in law suffers the same fate. She freezes in winter because her "always hot" hubby won't turn on the heat, and she freezes in summer because he likes to keep the air on a frosty 72 degrees. BRRRRRR.

So, I keep the air on 76 during the day, and turn it waayyyy down right before hubby comes home from work.

But that still doesn't solve the "I'm-so-tired-I'm-going-to-slip-into-a-coma" problem. How can I function when all I want to do is lay on the sofa while my kids "make bubbles" in the basement? Caffiene doesn't work. It makes me jittery. I need to find something, and quick.

Hmmm, that living room sofa is looking very comfy right about now…**snore**

4 comments:

Michelle Miles said...

We have a similar fight over the ceiling fan. He hates I; I have to have it on LOW.

And we keep our house as 78. Otherwise, we couldn't afford the durn electric bill.

Anonymous said...

Hi, I stumbled upon your blog from...where? I'm not sure *g. I was out blog hopping writer's blogs.

Anyway...the ceiling fan thing. ARGH. Same here. I wake up all stuffed up if that darn thing is on all night. And I also get the middle of the night comments..."did you mess with the a/c. It's HOT"

Colin said...

I know JUST how he feels! :-)

Ann said...

Brrrrr - I can relate too. My sister and brother -in- law keep their house like Alaska. I wear layers when I go over there in the summer. My nieces are growing up in a tundra.