Hot water bottles

[Miss Chicken]

It is winter down here and the nights are getting cold so I went out and bought a new hot water bottle to keep me warm at night as I don't like electric blankets and I don't heat my bedroom.

I have been using hot water bottles all my life and I was wondering if this was just me being old-fashioned or whether other people still used them. The woman at the store told me they don't sell many of them nowadays.

So, what do you use on cold nights?

 

[Mr. B]

I've never lived in a place that doesn't have central heating, but small electric space heaters and warm blankets always come in handy. The more fortunate among us probably just use their significant other.

 

[Miss Chicken]

I have never lived in a place that had central heating.

 

[Tora Ziyal]

Never used a hot water bottle. I tend to keep my house cooler in the winter than most people in the US and sleep under a down comforter.

Would you like me to send you a bit of our summer heat? I've got plenty to spare.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

I have baseboard heaters in my apartment, only they are water-based rather than electric. I try not to use them, though. I'll normally just use blankets.

 

[Miss Chicken]

Never used a hot water bottle. I tend to keep my house cooler in the winter than most people in the US and sleep under a down comforter.

Would you like me to send you a bit of our summer heat?

No, I don't mind the cold all that much except first thing in the morning. It rarely gets below freezing in Hobart though it is often around 2 or 3C when I get up.

I don't like having to cope with cold sheets when getting into bed so a hot water bottle helps.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Only blankets and a shirt. When I was a kid, I tried sleeping under an electric blanket, but it never got warm enough to be worth it.

TZ, you still have power, don't you?

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

So, what do you use on cold nights?

Well..

 

[iguana_tonante]

Even tho my slice of Italy can get pretty cold in winter (it's customary to be below 0°C and snowfalls are not unusual), my apartment is so warm it's silly, so I don't have a need for additional heating even during winter nights. A duvet is more than enough in normal conditions.

The only times I've ever used water bottles is when I have been sick with a cold.

 

[RoJoHen]

It's been so hot lately I don't even remember what cold feels like.

Really, though, I get hot really easily. On a cold night, all I need is a regular old blanket, and I'm good.

 

[Kestra]

I've never used a hot water bottle ever. I don't like being warm but if it's too cold, we'd turn up the heat, or throw on another blanket. I recently replaced our bedding so that instead of a comforter, we have a quilt and an extra coverlet on the bed. Between that and the sheets, we can layer them all for whatever suits the current temperature.

 

[PlainSimpleJoel]

It doesn't get too cold here - but I've got a few blankets that I use. I use to have an electric blanket, but I rid of it, after it started to fall apart last winter.

 

[Holdfast]

Central heating means no need for anything extra, but some years ago when the heating broke down in the middle of a really cold winter and couldn't be fixed on the same day, I bought one of those portable radiators (I think oil-filled). Never had to use it since, but it's still stored somewhere in the house. Worked very well, but I remember that even just a few days use added a surprising amount to the next electricity bill. Definitely something to use only when the central heating conks out.

 

[iguana_tonante]

Just for curiosity's sake, when people says "central heating", do they mean a central heating unit for the entire building (including buildings with more than one apartment), or also a heating unit for the single apartment (opposed to movable stoves, portable radiators, and the likes)? I mean, can a heating unit for a single apartment be still called "central heating"?

 

[Kestra]

I take it to refer to either.

 

[TheSeeker]

My wife likes to use a hot water bottle at night when she gets aches and pains that won't go away. I think I might have used one once or twice when I was a kid but that's it.

 

[iguana_tonante]

I take it to refer to either.

Thanks. Here we call it "centralized heating" when it's a single system for the whole building, and "autonomous heating" when there is a heating system for each apartment. Without any of them, it's simply "without heating". Thus my confusion.

 

[Trekker4747]

Usually when I hear people refer to "central heating" or its counterpart "central air" it refers to a house or single apartment unit that has a "central" unit that provides the desired air and pumps it to the other parts of the dwelling through forced air and air vents. This is opposed to each room having an air conditioner unit in the window or a space-heater in the room.

I've no idea what a "hot water bottle" is as usually when I hear that term it refers to a hot-water tank/water heater. I'm not sure what it is in reference to home climate control.

I don't know what the climate or economic conditions are like in Tasmania but it strikes me odd that a modern home wouldn't have central heating in all parts of the house.

 

[Finn]

^its that (usually red) rubber thing you put hot water in then take it to bed with you. Its function is like an electric blanket.

Here's a link for hot water bottles from Walgreens...

 

[Haggis and tatties]

A extra blanket or two......that's it.......had central heating installed about 4 years ago for the first time ever in a house, now have a radiatior in ever room, but it's only been used a handfull of times since then........no doubt being brought up without it has made it very easy not to have it and continue to get by without using it on a daily basis.