They say running the fan continuously, here, gives the best year-round heating/cooling efficiency. I dunno, but it sure costs more.

Yeah you're right, it is a 20+ year old furnace, and does not have sensible things like the way your pilot works, mine is continuously lit. Generally though, in the heating season, the furnace isn't off for huge amounts of time when I'm at home, it's when the furnace is "off" that the pilot sucks a surprising amount of gas. I'm waiting for the furnace to die, but these dumb old simple beasts take a lot of killing.


One good thing about having nuke plants nearby is it's extremely unlikely to be bothered by an earthquake :), that's why they built them here. And the lake (for cooling) too. They say the exposed "dangerous" parts of the nuclear plants can withstand a direct hit by a 747. I don't recall reading about a test of that... There are 24/7 armed guards and SWAT teams. You'd almost have to be an insider/employee to do damage from inside. Nobody is allowed alone and unmonitored into a critical area. Which is not to say things still couldn't happen purposely...or accidentally. I have the suspicion we'll all be seeing more nuke plants in the near future.