Althouse: At the Christmas Café...

December 25, 2013

At the Christmas Café...

... did you get everything you wanted?

40 comments:

Michael K said...: I got more than I wanted since I didn't want anything.; 12/25/13, 10:11 AM
Anonymous said...: Did Anyone Buy "Can't Stop the Music" through the Portal?

That was One of my Wishes.; 12/25/13, 10:12 AM
madAsHell said...: My sister insists upon gifting.

Auf Deutsch "gift" bedeutet poison!!

Need I say more.....; 12/25/13, 10:13 AM
Rabel said...: Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to everyone at the Althouse blog.; 12/25/13, 10:18 AM
paminwi said...: All I wished for was a furnace that worked. Alas, it was not to be. Waiting on a furnace technician who works on Christmas Day!; 12/25/13, 10:21 AM
Wince said...: ... did you get everything you wanted?

No, but I just might find, I got what I need.; 12/25/13, 10:23 AM
peacelovewoodstock said...: Happy Christmas and Merry New Year to All Althouseans!

I got diamonds on the soles of my shoes.; 12/25/13, 10:30 AM
rhhardin said...: I've gone for a year without a furnace in Ohio, just to prove it's easy to do.

Turn on a lot of 100w bulbs.

Each one produces 100w of heat.

You need maybe 2000-3000w to make a house toasty.

TVs, fans, computers, anything at all, counts towards the heating wattage. Everything turns to heat after doing whatever it was meant to do without loss.

Another trick is open the basement door. The basement floor keeps the house from falling below its temperature of about 50 degrees for several weeks.; 12/25/13, 10:47 AM
Anonymous said...: Ditto Michael K's comment at top.

Merry Christmas and thanks for the always-hoppin' salon, Professor A.; 12/25/13, 10:47 AM
rhhardin said...: Fill the bathtub with hot water.

Refill it when the water gets to room temperature.; 12/25/13, 10:51 AM
rhhardin said...: Fill the bathtub with the shower if you have that, since it warms the air faster (=cools the water).

Running a bare shower doesn't work so well because hot water runs down the drain, so it's a little expensive.; 12/25/13, 10:53 AM
Sorun said...: Now that the subject's been raised, I miss my wood stove.; 12/25/13, 10:57 AM
rhhardin said...: "The Queen is still going strong after more than sixty years on the throne."

One of several macro'd news items about Christmas that turn up relentlessly.; 12/25/13, 11:03 AM
rhhardin said...: The poverty line is also mentioned a lot.; 12/25/13, 11:06 AM
Hagar said...: madAsHell,

In the Scandinavian languages, "gift" also means marry or married.
Just sayin'.; 12/25/13, 11:15 AM
Hagar said...: and, of course, poison as well.; 12/25/13, 11:15 AM
traditionalguy said...: No. But it wasn't my birthday!; 12/25/13, 11:31 AM
traditionalguy said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 12/25/13, 11:32 AM
pm317 said...: The lady ahead of us paid our toll! How is that for Christmas spirit?; 12/25/13, 11:33 AM
AmPowerBlog said...: Merry Christmas, Althouse. And Meade too!; 12/25/13, 11:33 AM
traditionalguy said...: The 6 year old got a guitar starter set via Althouse Amazon portal.

It turns out she had been asking for one without Grandpaw knowing about it. Success.; 12/25/13, 11:36 AM
rhhardin said...: WABC played a christmas program instead of Imus this morning; this is followed by Rush playing solid manheim steamroller xmas travesties.

This is why you save old shows on the hard drive.

I'm listening to Mark Steyn filling in for Rush from some past year right now.; 12/25/13, 11:43 AM
Heartless Aztec said...: Did my brother from a different mother get what he wanted?; 12/25/13, 12:19 PM
lemondog said...: @rhhardin:
Another trick is open the basement door. The basement floor keeps the house from falling below its temperature of about 50 degrees for several weeks.

Can you explain the physics behind this?; 12/25/13, 12:26 PM
rhhardin said...: Can you explain the physics behind this?

The basement floor has a huge thermal mass, owing to the ground beneath it.

Its comparatively hot air keeps rising and replacing the colder air upstairs if you let it.

It gets cooler as this happens but it lasts for weeks.; 12/25/13, 12:31 PM
Freeman Hunt said...: I've been playing with children's toys all morning. Zometool is probably my favorite.; 12/25/13, 12:33 PM
Lucien said...: I just found the quote I wanted from "Tinker, Tailor ...".
It's Smiley to Peter Guillam:"I'm surprised you didn't get thrown out along with the rest of us, Peter. You had all the right qualifications for dismissal - good at your work, loyal, discreet..."

I thought of this in the finale to "Homeland" when Saul Berenson says to Dar Adal (from memory) "I'm surprised you didn't get shitcanned, too, you had all the right qualifications, experience, discretion, loyalty".

All this without a single reference to Smiley.; 12/25/13, 12:36 PM
Anonymous said...: I got kissed by Santa last night! Merry Christmas to Althousia.; 12/25/13, 12:37 PM
Freeman Hunt said...: The kids asked for wood, metal, and tools. Wasn't sure about the metal until the eye doctor suggested cookie sheets. Brilliant! Lots of oven liners. They have the desired metal panels for their constructions.; 12/25/13, 12:48 PM
Christy said...: Sister always does a birthday cake for Jesus. Youngest kids always blow out the candles after everyone sings. How weird is that?

Merry Christmas to all.; 12/25/13, 12:52 PM
lemondog said...: @rhhardin, thanks.

I was thinking along the line that heat rises and that the basement floor absorbs the heavier cooler air, but had no rational for a perpetual source of heated air.

I will still cling to my electric blanket.; 12/25/13, 12:58 PM
Michael K said...: "Can you explain the physics behind this?

The basement floor has a huge thermal mass, owing to the ground beneath it."

There was a great cold climate house described in Fine Homebuilding a few years ago, It was in Vermont but the contractor was from Alberta. They framed and sheathed the house, then put another outer wall on I beam shaped trusses so there was a one foot space between walls which was then filled with fiberglass insulation. The walls were almost two feet thick and it required deep window and door insets but it would stay warm in that climate with just body heat and appliance waste heat all winter. It required special venting for some appliances but was almost self sustaining to 50 below.; 12/25/13, 1:12 PM
Meade said...: "Did my brother from a different mother get what he wanted?"

Sure did — snow. You, bro?; 12/25/13, 2:14 PM
FullMoon said...: For all you planning on getting back in shape next year, Craigslist will be having barely used exercise equipment in the free and for sale sections starting right about the beginning of March.; 12/25/13, 2:53 PM
Freeman Hunt said...: You know how the Hive game pieces have a pleasing feel in the hand? Making these Zometool structures is like that. Very pleasant tactile sensation. There is a sort of muted snapping together.; 12/25/13, 3:05 PM
southcentralpa said...: Ah, the footprint of the American Chicken ...; 12/25/13, 3:18 PM
ndspinelli said...: Sounds like Inga was hallucinating again last night.; 12/25/13, 3:36 PM
traditionalguy said...: Happy New Year Ms Inga. After I have drunk a bottle of Korbel Rouge Champagne I remember you as a fine that woman who livens up the Althouse comments. Cheers.; 12/25/13, 4:36 PM
Heartless Aztec said...: Sure did - A nor' easter. The surf is POUNDING on the sandbars. Need a west wind to groom it for Boxing Day.; 12/25/13, 4:49 PM
George M. Spencer said...: Ah, the best Christmas story?

"The Gift of the Magi" by O. Henry

"One dollar and eighty-seven cents. That was all. And sixty cents of it was in pennies. Pennies saved one and two at a time by bulldozing the grocer and the vegetable man and the butcher until one's cheeks burned with the silent imputation of parsimony that such close dealing implied. Three times Della counted it. One dollar and eighty- seven cents. And the next day would be Christmas."; 12/25/13, 5:09 PM