My Own Thermostat Challenge

I read about it all the time in various homesteader and eco-minded publications--"the great thermostat challenge." The gist of it is usually the same: how low can you go?? Can you handle turning your home's temp down from 72 to 68 or whatever? Can you put on more socks instead of heat?
Well I have my own challenge this year, and it's quite the opposite. Can I handle turning the thermostat up???
I propose this challenge for my own family not because we like to waste energy or money, but simply because we want to live through the winter. The family of Icy Jane would win the silly thermostat challenge almost every stinkin year. Simply because we reside in a sunless arctic climate, where the temperature is known to hover somewhere around -18 F for weeks at a time. We get zero solar / sun heat for the four coldest months, and have an old claptrap home, that is just plain futile to try and insulate.
The resulting situation is as follows: we heat with wood at night and turn off the "stove" (the only mechanical heat source in the house is one propane monitor stove in the living room). Of course by 7:00am, even with an awesome wood stove--the temp in the living room is back down to 48 by morning (or much lower--the thermostat indoors stops at 48). Not to mention the unheated bedrooms, which usually have ice in all the closets. It is quite amazing to include shaking ice off clothing as part of ones' morning ritual. Then we all jump up and down and complain for five minutes while huddling in front of the monitor stove. (including the dogs that run in frisky manic circles)
Getting too close to this little power house stove results in weird burns on my back, but it's a small price to pay, in order to actually feel heat.. After putting on two pairs of socks (one wool), long underwear and sweaters, we hop around the house some more times and continue complaining.
I do set the stove to 62 degrees--but that seems to be the temperature only in the living room. The dining room usually hovers around 52. We actually have friends in Anchorage who have told us point blank, that they refuse to come to our arctic hell hole for dinner. (they did try, bless their hearts, to pack slippers and sweaters a few times)
So our new lifestyle of choice is seeing if we can handle setting the monitor stove to 66 instead of 62! The thought of it seems so luxurious and foreign I don't know if I can handle it at all. It will certainly cost us more money, and even at 66, the bedrooms will still be icy....but if I have the gall, I may just try it this winter.

Survival of the Fittest

So the Tea Party finally let their true colors show during the Republican debate. Cheering loss of life, due to lack of health insurance, was the sort of thing I knew they were up to all along.
They already unabashedly support Ayn Rands writings, who has no problem whatsoever proclaiming that the incompetent and weak should just go away and die already.
Yet what still puzzles me is this --why is the Tea Party mixing it up with the Right wing? How can you be pro-life and anti Medicaid and Medicare?? Who do you think pays for unwanted, uninsured children? Especially those with complex and expensive medical conditions? It makes no sense at all. Religious anti-abortionists, insisting disabled persons should just suck it up and pay their own way. I heard Ron Paul expressing the idea that charity and doctors in general could somehow cover the medical costs of the uninsured-- but I'm sorry to say, anyone who thinks that hasn't got a clue.
Not that I don't think people wouldn't offer to help the sick and disabled--it's just that they don't seem to understand that this population is increasing (and fast). With advances in medicine and technology--people are living with substantially more complex medical issues and costs they can't afford. There is a compassionate segment of society that understands this, and is willing to pay their share through taxes. But obviously the Tea Party has come up with their own budget minded solution: just let them die.

Crazy Busy Post Office

The depressing news of the United States Post Office becoming obsolete (not to mention bankrupt) is everywhere today. I can certainly understand that some people have no need for it anymore--I too have suffered annoyance at opening my rural P.O. box, only to find boring bills and ridiculous political fliers inside. What's the use??
But alas, there are a few Alaskan post offices worth a visit if you don't believe they are still being utilized.
Example one: the Wasilla Post Office. Holy chickens! You can't even find a parking spot at this place, the line is slower than a snail, and everybody chats it up. Once you get through the grueling line of about 30 people, be prepared for the friendly but overly-thorough postal clerks.
Another Post Office: Palmer, AK. Palmer is the Mat-Su borough seat, so for some reason all the rural mail from Matanuska Glacier to Eklutna seems to go through here. (an area roughly the size of West Virginia)
Nevertheless, it is a common joke to meet up at the post office, especially at Christmas time --as everyone, and I mean EVERYONE will be in that line. It's the nuttiest thing ever, the line goes out the door, down the hall and the last unlucky person is smashed up against the emergency exit. I once cried at this post office, when a postal clerk told me to go to the back of the line, after I had filled out the wrong customs form.
Of course the reason for these crazy lines is due to packages. Everyone in Alaska is always sending some sort of box or receiving weird shaped items from mail order catalogs. At times, I do hear people mucking up the line by asking for money orders, or processing their passport papers to get into neighboring Canada.
If you really want to help out the Postal Service and their budget woes, buy something online that's made in Alaska, and have it shipped via USPS. Most Alaskans will begrudgingly endure hours of lines and post office chit chat, just to get you your package on time....