Quickie: Bonehead at the Bank

She just called me this morning to explain to her how to cash a check at a drive-up ATM. I had to walk her through:

1. Putting her card in.
2. Entering her PIN.
3. Putting the check in the envelope.
4. Putting the envelope in the right slot.
5. Doing a new, second transaction to withdraw money.

The Temperature's Low, But Higher Than Her I.Q.

Another result of my wife's ongoing paranoia about our finances is our fighting over the thermostat. Right before she goes to bed, she will lower the thermostat to the low 60's to save energy overnight. There is only one problem; I typically stay awake about two hours longer than she. To combat this, I often turn the dial back up to the high 60's. As a side note, she is also deathly afraid that our furnace will break in the dead of winter, and we'll all freeze to death.

One night she got up around 10:30 and noticed the furnace was running and looked at the thermostat.

She. Freaked. Out.

"What are you doing?! You can't turn it up that fast! You'll break it!" she screamed.

"Break what?" I replied.

"The furnace! You have to turn it up gradually just until it turns on!"

"Do you know how this works? It's not going to make the furnace come on 'harder'. It just turns the furnace on and leaves it on until it reaches the temperature and then turns off."

"Yeah.", she said slowly.

"But that's not what you said. You thought that the furnace would blow itself up trying to get up to temperature. They aren't designed that way...", I explained.

"Whatever.", she fumed.