Well, Thomas, when in Rome, as they say.

As soon as the temps up here (SF area) dropped where I started closing the windows and doors at night to keep the cold air out (during the summer I used the usually cold night air to cool down the house), I started wearing sweats at night (and during the day, for that matter). I STRONGLY  recommend getting used to wearing something to bed. Like Dorothy, you're not in Kansas (well, Brazil) any more and either you have to change or find a warmer clime. Although global warming is on the menu, it probably won't ever be as warm as Brazil here.

Plus, wearing PJ's or long johns or sweats to bed means your bed sheets etc will stay cleaner longer.

I do sympathize: in the last decades of her life, my mom lived in a nice rent controlled apartment in the SF Richmond district. It had steam heat, and the heat was paid for by the landlord. But, when the system had a problem, instead of fixing it, the landlord decommissioned it and installed inadequate space heaters in all the apartments. Her heater was located in the entrance hallway of her apartment, which was closest to the front door and the bath, but nowhere near the living room or the bedroom. The steam heat radiator used to be in the living room close by her bedroom. She'd spend a lot of her time standing at the end of that hallway by that gas heater, and complained about the cost of the gas to heat the place. There was nothing to be done, it supposedly was the only spot such a heater could go. Supposedly. And for sure the landlord ran the numbers and realized he'd save money by installing cheap gas heaters in the apartments instead of continuing to keep the steam system alive and paying for that heat without recompense.

When I was younger we lived in a number of flats in SF where the sole heat was one of those floor gas heaters. The exception was when we moved to the "Stonestown Apartments" the last year of my high school days. That place had hot water heating. Often I'd keep my window open because we were on the second floor and I found it too hot - even though we were out by the ocean and in the fog belt. There was a little chain you could pull on the heater that supposedly controlled the hot water flow. It didn't seem to have any effect, LOL.

When I lived in Berkeley as a student, one house actually had a gas space heater in each bedroom. Apparently the tenants before me had raised holy hell with the landlord and used legal methods to force them to install those heaters. A later house I lived in, alone, had a single wall heater on the first floor by the stairs. It really was inadequate to heat the first floor, but the bedrooms up stairs stayed comfortable. Cause, you know, heat rises. I also stuck a fan on the stairs to help blow heat around the first floor, which sort of worked.

This house now, I own, and it has forced air central heating. The first winter it ran almost continuously on winter nights, and the gas bills showed it. Single story, with no insulation above the ceiling in the low attic. As soon as I could, I insulated the attic "floor", and also sealed off all the air leaks I could find (there were a LOT).  Also insulated under the first floor in the crawl space, which help a lot also. After that my gas bill (and usage) was 1/2 of what it was the previous winter, and the furnace didn't run all night, even on the coldest nights. I even insulated the heating ducts and the return air duct under the house.

These days I keep the thermostat at 66F, and it's fine for me - albeit with sweats on most of the time. The windows are single pane, aluminum framed, but I did renew the "mouse fur" strips at the joins so they don't leak air as much as before. I'll have to look for the 3M winterizing stuff. I've seen (and used) it before. What I don't like is that it involves using cheezy double sided tape to affix the plastic to the window frames. I'd rather build some wooden frames and figure out some way to attach those to the windows, instead. Probably on the interior.

I gather arctic exploration is not on your menu ;-)...

That can backfire on you.  My FWB is furry all over and as much as we like to spoon and cuddle, he says I run too hot for him and usually can't last more than a few minutes.  During the summer he has his bedroom AC set to 64.

I'm looking forward to cold nights, which is totally out of character for me, but I have my priorities.

Oil filled electric radiators work really well.  I have one in my office room so I don't have to heat the whole house with the forced air system, and considering the circumstances, the last room I want to heat is the master bedroom.

Considering all of the electric powered augmentation that has been mentioned, either already in use or as potential additions to the current (NPI) mix, I would suggest making sure the wiring in your old building can support it.

The entire electrical system in my 1922 house was upgraded to modern standards before I bought it, and I still wouldn't plug in all of the heating appliances that you're using.

Thomas, the added-on den at our previous house was both sunken and had a high vaulted ceiling, and it was heated by a gas wall unit.   Unlike most wall heaters, it was mounted about 18" above the floor.  Without anything to circulate the air, while standing in the opening above the two steps down into the room, well away from the wall heater, your shoulders would be above the inversion layer and you'd get a blast of heat from there up.

I used a fan something like you described having at a 45 degree angle in front of your wall heater -- just a little plastic 10" Vornado -- and stuck it in a corner of the room aiming straight up, set to the lowest speed.  I had it on an appliance timer that could be set for it to run for 15 minutes at 15 minute intervals.  That was enough to equalize the temperature throughout the entire den space. 

Instead of placing the fan where you have it, try what I did and see if it helps.  It's very cost-effective.

And, from what it sounds like, you live in an interesting part of town.  Can you provide some references like major streets or freeways?

Uninsulated walls seem to the norm in California, even in the SF Bay Area, at least in older construction. Oddly, this house was originally built in 1941, and has plaster/lathe interior walls, and a stucco exterior. There's a master bed/bath addition at the back, probably put in during the 60's or 70's. It has the more modern drywall construction, and there seems to be some fiberglass insulation behind it, but it is the coldest part of the house, usually a degree cooler, despite forced air heating.  I suspect the old plaster/lathe walls insulate better than modern drywall. It's not a big problem, since like most people (except those from Brazil) I prefer a slightly cooler bedroom. But it does make getting up in the mornings during the winter a little more challenging.

The one thing I really can't stand is waking up in the middle of the night feeling too warm, and having to throw off covers. I have tried electric blankets or mattress pads, but find them too much bother. Although running the pad for an hour before retiring can make the bed more comfortable.

One thing I'd recommend if Thomas doesn't already have it, is to have programmable thermostat. They are not expensive and simple to install. And can save $$$ on energy, assuming you can stand not having the heater running full blast 7x24.

Well Thomas, it sounds like your neighborhood has some of the best and the worst of L.A.  I will admit that I've not had much reason to venture very far south of the city center, other than to events at the Shrine Auditorium.

My sister lives in Glassell Park (near the bottom end of the 2 Freeway, south of the 134) back behind Dodger Stadium.  It's very much a "transitional" neighborhood.   I like how she is located between downtown L.A. and Pasadena, which are desirable arts and entertainment destinations, and how many original homes have survived in that area.   A couple of homes up the road behind her house there is one of those '20s staircases down to the block below hers, as seen on TV/movies.  I've spent time sitting at the top of those steps and enjoying the view of Griffith Observatory on the next ridge over to the west.  I may be a Bay Area native, but I love L.A.  Maybe not more, but I love it there.  And yes, I've worked and commuted there, so mine is not some la la perspective. 

It would be great if you got the front house and could steer the LL toward affordable fixtures and finishes that at least don't look cheap.  The ReStore is your friend.

Eddie,

You're lucky that your house is shaded by trees and stays cool enough in the summer. Most of the summer here at this house, I have to shut all the windows in the morning and pull the shades on the south and west sides. That's because the long side of the house faces west, and faces a paved (concrete) courtyard that reflects a lot of heat. I planted a line of shade trees along the property line about 15 years ago, and they've grown to 20 feet or so, but they are not close enough to shade the house in the heat of the day. At night I open the windows and sometimes run fans as well, to pull in cool night air to cool everything down. This way the interior of the home stays in the 70's , sometimes into the 80's on really hot days, such as when it's 100 outside. Adding insulation to the attic seems to have helped a lot to prevent heat from the roof radiating down to the living quarters below. I have a small portable A/C unit in the family room that I can run when it gets unbearable; this last summer I think I ran it for just a few of the hottest nights.

Eddie,

What gets me is that from my experience here, the old plaster and lathe walls seem to have better insulating value than the newer drywall walls, even when there is fiberglass between the drywall and outer wall.

There is one difference: the crawl space under the addition has more ventilation than the older part of the house. So that may be a factor... but I made sure to heavily insulate the attic and under the floor in the addition to compensate for the increased ventilation. The older part of the house has markedly less crawl space ventilation. It seems to work OK, as there never seems to be any dampness down there. One reason is that the front part of the house - the part facing the street - has a tall foundation, triangular in shape, that acts like a buttress against the soil in front. In other words, no cripple wall on that side, so no vents. And the vents on the east side of the older part of the home are reduced in number, as they are blocked by a variety of constructions, such as a fireplace, a half bath, stairs, water heater, and the patio kitchen counter. It all works out to about 225 sq ft of '41 house per sq ft of foundation vent, vs. 61 sq ft of addition per sq ft of foundation vent. The addition crawl space is open (save for an open cripple wall) to the main house crawl, so there must be some compensating air circulation between the two. But the probable deficient part is that the entire north-east corner of the house has no foundation venting. There's about 30 feet of the east side, and about 26 feet of the north side, without any foundation venting. It is perhaps not as bad as it sounds since the shed roofing over the half bath and patio kitchen tends to keep that side of the house perfectly dry. But still, if I were to address this I'd add a couple of foundation vents to the northeast corner of the structure. I helped compensate for the lack of venting by laying down polyethylene tarp on the exposed dirt in the entire crawl space, which should reduce moisture intrusion from the earth (where I gather a lot of foundation/moisture originates). I also installed full perimeter strip venting in the roof soffits, where little to none existed before. That, along with the attic floor insulation, likely helps keep the living quarters cooler in the summer heat.

Hey, it all beats a soggy sleeping bag in the park. ;-)

That's probably a good idea, with the attic opening. I could probably work up a frame to house a cheap window box fan to do the same. But the soffit vents also serve the same purpose, to keep the attic cool, more or less. They are combined with roof vents higher on the roofing, although from my reading it appears an attic can be adequately vented with just soffit venting.

I have accumulated a fair amount of firewood from managing trees on the property. It's fairly well aged now. The problem in this area are the frequent "no burn" days designed to keep the air quality from degrading from wood smoke during cold windless weather. Just the nights when a cozy wood fire would seem best. Ah, the price we pay to live in a supposed paradise.

Not sure what that thermostat is, but if it's not programmable, my suggestion is to get a programmable model. I program my Lux 1500 to start at 5 or 6 pm to heat the house to 67F, then at 11:30 pm it goes down to 64. Depending on my schedule, it starts up again in the morning to 67, then ratchets down to 64 for the day. The thing has separate routines for weekdays and Sat and Sun, as well. The main difference I make for the weekend is a later morning startup time. It takes the millivolt signal from the heater pilot, as well as a couple of internal AA batteries that last at least a year. Of course it can be overridden if someone starts raising a ruckus about the temperature, and then it goes back to the schedule at the next time point,  or it can be disabled completely. The Lux 1500, as I recall, was reasonably priced about 10 years ago at $25 or less. I would never go back to a manual thermostat.

I grew up with the central gas heat set on 74.  In the 70's energy crunch my dad built a chimney and put up a wood stove.  We'd get used to that warmth and as winter dwindled down we'd take the stove down and store it in the room outside until next winter.  We'd freeze using the gas heat after the stove was taken down.  They no longer use wood in the house so keep the furnace set on 74.  I like the comfort but it's hard to breathe since my own gas furnace is set on 72 and I've acclimated to that temp.  I'm usually cold-natured.  I wear 4 layers to work because we all know how cold it gets in hospitalsSummertime I keep the central AC at 76-77. 

My living room, kitchen, and each bedroom all have 2 outside walls.  Those rooms are significantly colder than the bathroom which has only one small outside wall.  It's warmer in the bathroom.  My house is insulated in the walls to 1956 standards but there's thicker insulation up in the attic that was added at some point by a previous owner.  Frequently when we have cold nights and warm days and still need the AC in the day time, overnight it will still cycle the AC even though the outside temp may be in the mid 60's and the thermostat will be set at 76.  Warmer inside than outside and causing the air to kick on.  Can't open the windows at that time due to humidity and mugginess.  Tony thought I was playing some kind of trick when the house was showing 74 degrees once and the Tstat was set on 72.  "How can that be"? he asked me.

I would call an engineer to investigate, this type of thing usually as a simple answer if you know what you are looking for.

John L.

If there's something weird
And it don't look good

Who you gonna call?