We live in Indiana which has a real winter. Not the kind of winter they have in Quebec, but, none-the-less an interval of some months when there is ice on the ground, snow flakes fall, and people dress in sweaters and coats. Shoveling and sledding are not unheard of.
Some people keep their homes so warm that you want to don shorts and halter tops, even if you are over 50, bulge in the wrong places and would never dress that way in the middle of the summer.
Other people keep their homes cool during the winter. One of my relatives believes that 55 is the ideal indoor temperature because cold and flu germs are deterred by it.
Right now, and for the past few days, that 55 degrees sounds awfully warm to me. That is because our furnace has died.
While we wait for the replacement part to come ( due to arrive, today), we wear multiple layers of mismatched , but warm, clothes, and drink a lot of hot tea. We have decided that drinking it raises our body temperatures. We have a few space heaters, and they are being employed in areas with no drapes, carpeting or pajama bottoms ( which are often casually strewn about the floor of his room by my middle child.)
Of course, having survived one house fire ( caused by lightning) , I am excessively neurotic about the placement and running of the heaters. I also sleep with a fire extinguisher by my bed. If one of the children's heaters starts a fire, I want to get to them as quickly as possible, not having to run past their room and then back again to get one of the extinguishers from the kitchen or the laundry room.
Despite the warm clothing, down-alternative comforters and tea, my daughter's feet are cold, Very, very cold.
So, last night, I did what I read about , on the internet. I warmed a towel to lay over her feet.
I warmed it in the microwave. One bath sized towel for one minute.
I have heated non-food objects in the microwave, before.
I have a neck/shoulder wrap that is filled with grain and herbs to ease aches. My son has one for allergy relief. They heat well and I thought this, as instructed by the internet, would be the same.
It was, except that there was this faint, odd odor. I smelled it as I was walking to my daughter's room with the warm towel.
The smell got stronger, and then, I realized it was the scent of burning cotton. The center inside of the towel had decided to combust.
Fortunately, it was doing it very slowly, and I doused it in the sink.
I am sure there is a moral to this story, in addition to the never microwave a towel, no matter what the internet says.
It might be that we should pack up and move to Arizona, and live near Lynne. Except that it is not drivable to my kids who are at college in New York, there is no synagogue in walking distance, no job immediately available and no naked people.
Okay, maybe there are naked people, I haven't checked.
Actually, the way the summer temperatures are in Arizona, there are probably a few.
1 comment:
I will add this to my list of things not to do in the New Year. Thanks for sharing. :)
-MH
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