26.12.2022 Beating my chest!

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 Monday 26th 41F. Thick mist. Mostly wet today. Up at 6am. Stove lit at 6.45. Indoor temperatures remain stable and comfortable by my own standards. While wearing fleece trousers, a T-shirt and a warm jumper.

 I spent some time in the lounge early this morning. Removing the drawers from the chest and arranging everything out of the way. To allow the heavy chest to be dragged to the opposite corner. It was already 21C. So I was a bit too warm by the time I had pushed everything back again. 

 The hall doors have been opened. To share the heat with the kitchen. A better picture will follow in daylight. When I have had a chance to reorganise the chaotic storage situation. The longcase clock and chest of drawers make suitable companions.

 It has been hovering around 19-20C upstairs day and night. Starting at 15C and ending at 19-20C in the lounge. The kitchen remained at 15C yesterday thanks to my open door policy. Dropping to 14C overnight with the small electric radiator going. All thanks to the relatively mild outdoor temperatures of 4-5C.

 I am consuming quite a lot of logs to keep things this comfortable. With the old stove and burning briquettes I would have been wearing a down jacket and fleece hat. Over my normal winter clothes. Plus the inevitable, full length, thermal underwear.

 Not any longer. The modern stove completely eclipses the old, antique box stove. Such a shame that my wife would not let me have the new one installed. I waited for months after its delivery. While it blocked access to the kitchen in the entrance hall. I still have the scars from repeatedly tripping over the pallet. On which it stood in the dark. Before our kind sweep installed it expertly and professionally. While my wife was in hospital.

 I keep taking new pictures to try and capture a more flattering cottage "atmosphere." The cheap cushions are temporary. Until I find something larger and more appropriate.

 

 Most of the supermarkets are closed today. With at least one exception. Should I decide to drive there. It is only a few short miles away in another shopping village. I could have cycled there but the weather is promising to be inclement for several days. Even windy at times. As fronts and lows move across the North Sea.

 A "party" demands my attendance this evening at 17.00. About 15 miles away by car. So there will be no drinking. I am pondering on my remaining wardrobe. Having given most of my more formal "British" clothing away to charity.

 In the Britain, of 30 years ago, I would normally wear a tweed jacket and trousers. Striped shirt and tweed tie. In modern Denmark, a pair of jeans and a jumper over a T-shirt. May be rather nearer the norm. 

 How could I possibly know? Parties were not something we ever did. Not in all the time we have been here. Nor all the years before that.

 9.00 Time for a walk. Misty, a cool breeze and spots of rain in the air. Traffic modest. It started raining briefly on the return journey from the lanes.

 12.30. I have been investigating the north wall for insulation. 50mm of foam mounted on a timber skeleton fixed to the mostly damaged plasterboard. Poor [open] joints and no DPM. No longer legal, nor desirable construction. Nor thick enough for modern standards of insulation.

 The free standing, brick inner wall has always been cold. So must have no insulation as far as I know. It runs parallel with the ceiling joists so is not structural. Though it does support an exposed cross beam. [Lintel?] Where an internal, dividing wall was removed at the chimney in the past. The external wall has been cracking for years in the centre. Now cross pinned and fixed. 

 A structural floor pad and matching, upright beam indoors might be an idea. Professional advice would be valuable to discuss my options for this wall. It must be dragging a lot of heat out of the lounge. Even the removal man, 26 years ago, told us it was a cold wall!

 13.30 7C/45F!  Rain and increasing SW wind. Lunch over. 

 I have just checked all the wall surfaces in the lounge with the "pistol" remote sensing thermometer. All the walls are at the air temperature of the room. 20C. With only a slight decline approaching the floor. 20C-18C. Will this hold true when the outside temperatures drop?

14.20 The low sun has just burst through the clouds to light up the attic! Meanwhile, the northern sky is black! Now breaking up to cloud and turquoise. The forecaster's radar shows bands of rain crossing the country.

 11.00 Safely home from the family party. It was fun but exhausting. As usual I struggled to hear voices against loud background noise. The batteries went flat in my hearing aids. So I removed them. Without obvious loss or gain. Which was disappointing. 

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