Some like it hot.

My husband and I are at war with one another.

The issue we are warring over? Temperature. Specifically, the ideal temperature for comfort in our house.

The thermostat wars started right about the time it got really cold around here, and they likely won't abate until spring. Then there will be a brief resurrection of the battle during the hottest heat of summer.

See, I like the temperature in the house to be just this side of 70. My husband prefers it to be way on the other side of 70. Since he has lost 80+ pounds over two years ago, he's always cold. (Insert joke about the insulating qualities of blubber here.) While I appreciate the fact that he's 75% of the man he used to be, and therefore has likely extended his life expectancy and increased his chances for living a life free of debilitating health issues, the fact of the matter remains that he is smoking me out of the house.

Once upon a time, I was always the cold one. But there was a point at which our body temperatures made the swap, and it happened just about the time I got pregnant and gained 42 pounds (mmmm, cheeseburgers!). The nice thing about being hugely pregnant in the dead of winter is that at least you don't have to deal with the miserable-ness of the heat that moms of summer babies have to endure. Still, I was warmer than usual during those days, and could often be found standing barefooted out on the stoop, fanning my t-shirt, trying to cool off. And once I had Spawn, my personal heat wave continued, mostly likely because I had an 8-pound baby and was left with nearly 35 pounds of extra blubber of my own.

I was recently looking at the photos from those early days of Spawn's life, and they could be accurately titled The Most Excellent Adventures of the Chubby Family. All three of us were porkers. Spawn was the only one it looked good on.

So. I lost the weight. Then later my husband lost the weight. And still, I am the hot one and he is not the hot one he used to be.

Back and forth the thermostat goes, from 68 to 75 and back again. And what we do is change the thermostat and then deny that either of us has touched it, like we have poltergeists tinkering with the mechanics in this house. Oooh, we are so innocent and sneaky.

I maintain, however, that if he would get up off his butt and move around a little bit he wouldn't be cold. Seriously. I'm the one working in a hot kitchen to fix dinner every night. I'm the one cleaning up after the meal. I'm the one getting Spawn into and out of the tub, supervising homework, making lunches for the next day, getting the kid off to bed. I'm the one making fifteen trips a night up and down the basement steps to do laundry. I'm working up a sweat. He's sitting on his butt in front of the TV. With an afghan thrown over his legs. And the man wants to wear shorts in the winter, so of course his legs get cold. The only movement he makes is to raise the clicker once in a while and change the channel. No wonder he's cold -- he's practically catatonic.

And so I change the thermostat because to me the house is so hot I can't breathe. I have ceased to have any sympathy for him and his perception of cold. I'm up moving around, I'm hot, and he's not.

I win.




-- Mox