Brisk and bracing

I ran out of kindling last night, which makes starting a fire a little difficult. And I didn’t plan ahead all that well, letting the fire go out before I went to bed last night. It was pretty warm in here and I didn’t really want to waste the wood making it extremely hot so that it would be comfortably warm this morning. Since it’s not *really* cold outside, I figured the house would hold the heat through the night.

I figured kinda wrong.

This morning the living room was a brisk 56°. The rest of the house was a few degrees colder. The sun has been shining brightly outside so the temps have gone up a degree or two inside and may even go up a little more before late afternoon.

I didn’t feel like going out to rustle up some kindling. Which is to say...going out to buy some because I’m really, really out of kindling. I’ll get around to it later, but I don’t have any other reasons to go out right now. I must not be suffering that much because I’m still not moved to go out to find some kindling. I piled on the layers instead.

So let’s count the layers. On top: a thin microfiber long sleeved shirt, a cotton long underwear shirt over that, a sweatshirt, and a chambray shirt on top. With a scarf around my neck. On the bottom: a pair of microfiber long johns and jeans with heavy wool socks.

And a hot water bottle filled with boiling water tucked between the folds of a down throw blanket and my feet tucked inside the folds of the blanket.

I am, actually, quite toasty. My nose isn’t even cold nor are my fingers.

Well, it’s that much more wood saved. My woodpile isn’t as robust as I’d like it considering that at least a month and a half of heating weather remains. So anything saved today is something I’ll have later. I think I’ll have to get used to piling on these layers and doling out the wood in Scroogey increments from here on. Maybe 3 1/2 cords next year. And a whole lot more kindling.