Forcing the issue

We've been in Canada for four and a half years. This is our fifth winter. Long enough, one would think, that we'd have got the hang of it all now.

Not so.

In the midst of what turned out to be the coldest February on record in Toronto, our house was freezing. We would set the thermostat to 22C, then 23C, then even 24C. But the thermometer persistently stuck at 17C or 18C. Tsk, tsk, we said to ourselves. It's that cold outside. The poor furnace can't keep up. We donned layers of clothing, multiple sweaters, and set electric space heaters out. I huddled in the kitchen, one ring of the gas stove burning and the oven on. I cooked a lot.

Finally, our tenant, who is a Canadian, suggested that perhaps there was something actually wrong with the furnace. At first we said no, it must be fine, or we'd have no heat at all (like last year at this time, in fact, when the thing broke down). But then we began to wonder. She is Canadian, after all. So we dug out the name of the guy who solved the problem of the broken furnace last year (NOT the one who told us the only solution was to buy a new furnace) and he sent someone over. The very first thing he checked was the filter. 'This is filthy!' he exclaimed, showing me a fuzzy rectangle the same color as our tabby cat (a coincidence? I think not). 'When's the last time you changed it?'

Changed it? We're supposed to change the filter? How do people know these things? We had never changed it. It turns out that you are meant to examine filters every two months! For heaven's sake. If that's the rule, then put a sticker on the front door with instructions.

Over the weekend our friend Sue came  from Indianapolis to visit  our now delightfully toasty home. Sue grew up in the northeast of the US, and lived in the northeast of England, which is where we met her. We told her our furnace story and particularly addressed the question of how we could have owned three homes and never confronted the issue of furnace filters. 'Simple,' Sue told us. 'In England, it's all radiators. No filters needed. Here, you have forced air.'  Ah! It was true. We'd always had radiators, and the plumber looked after the heating as well as the taps.

In retrospect, it seems so obvious. We smote our foreheads. I still think houses should come with instructions, though, stuck somewhere sensible. Perhaps the fridge. Which, it turns out, is leaking.

The house: a never-ending story.