Crankin- my kids flights aren't scheduled to leave until 10pm on sat., so hopefully they'll be OK. Thanks for interpreting the weather forecast for me!

You asked why our house is only ~50 degrees inside. The problem is we live in a historic neighborhhood (for real, its on the national historic registry) in a home that was built 100 years ago. Charming, yes, always practical, no! It does not have central heat and air, and whenever we have tried to get an estimate for it to be installed the contractors never even complete making the estimate (it will not be easy in other words). Each room has an individual air conditioner and a gas radiator. The good news is you only heat or cool the rooms you are using, when you are using them, so energy costs and consumption are low. Most of the time, we have mild winters, and if its 50 outside we can get the inside temp as high as we'd want. But when it drops to the 40s and even 30s, which does happen just not every day, they are just not strong enough to get us much above 50. So, I wear my woolies, alpstar pant, an ibex midweight base, shak and fleece, and sit under a blanket when indoors. Last night it was so cold I just climbed under my down comforter in my bed after dinner and went to sleep (it was one of those *very unusual* days in the 30s).

Work is another matter. Why they insist on running the air conditioning on 30 degree days I simply do not understand, so I need the same layers indoors, minus the fleece. I have ibex short sleeve polos and even tank tops to wear under blouses in summer, cuz it is so freakingly over-air conditioned. And I have an ibex ecru boucle sweater I keep in my office to wear in summer even when it might be 105 deg outside!

So, now you see why I am so confused when I travel. Here there is often not that big a diff between our indoor and outdoor temps, so all I will add when I go outside is a goretex shell to block the wind, and a hat and gloves, even when its really cold out (although yesterday I tested my down sweater and hmmmmm, what a good purchase).

Portugal will be worse, the only source of heat in my in-laws home is a wood stove. Again, it works cuz its usually mild, but still winters run in the 40-50s with no central heating.......... So we will be sleeping in bedrooms with no heat at all.