I wear UGG boots in winter because it's fucking cold.
I also wrap myself in a blanket on the couch, and have a lovely area rug so I don't have to walk on a cold floor. All these things are necessary to survive the winter; my house isn't well insulated.
The problem with all this, is that I build up a static charge. So when I go to pat my beautiful sweetheart of a dog, I zap him. It's audible and I'm sure, quite unpleasant. Often on the head. He obviously doesn't like that, I think he's taking it personally, and I feel awful. It completely cancels out the affection I'm trying to show him.
So the question for the Lemmy community is:
How do I discharge the static before I pat my dog? I have started shocking my partner (which he doesn't like, but accepts over the alternative), before patting my dog. But as he's out tonight, I have no human vessel to offer as tribute?
What can I touch in my house before patting my dog so that he doesn't receive a shock?
Edit: standard Australian house and furniture
Another edit: I'm all the sheets to the wind so the engineering advice is not sinking in. But I'm loving the immediate response that I'd never have gotten on Deaddit.
Again: I can't stop giggling at how helpful everyone is being and how short m, drunk and silly I am, in a house with apparently no metal
And again: I should probably take me and my baby to bed now, but a big thank you to everyone who replied. You've all been lovely. Lemmy is really a different space to ask these questions! I'll be trying out many of your suggestions over the weekend; big thanks from me and my boy x
Final: thanks to everyone who responded. I did try the kitchen tap again last night and this time it worked! Mustn't have built up enough charge when I tried the night I posted. I will still primarily zap my partner's leg as it's usually closer and doing it makes me laugh. It's important he understands where he fits in the household hierarchy as well. I also learnt that American houses are very different (screws and radiators everywhere!) so that was interesting too.
My son has a chronic respiratory illness, and as much as I'd love to raise the humidity in my flat, doing so using a humidifier would probably send him to the hospital pretty fast.
actually, (unless you have been told not to) humidity can help.
Humidity yes, bacteria and other germs, especially germs that can live in water are a massive no-go. Germs like Pseudomonas aeruginosa would give him a permanent lung infection and many strains of it are resistant to pretty much all antibiotics.
For people with his condition, a Pseudomonas infection is usually the point where stuff like sports or even walking up stairs permanently ends.
So raising humidity isn't bad, but the means to do so are a killer, literally.
Btw, thanks for the downvote. I'm sure you know much more about the illness of my child, an illness that I haven't even named here, than I do, who has to make sure that kid survives. Seriously, that kind of behaviour triggers me so much. That happens so often, that people who haven't even heard of that illness before know everything better. It seriously makes me angry.
That kid spent ~5% of his life in hospital, getting IV antibiotics due to his condition. He takes ~30 doses of medicine a day, just to keep him alive. But people who wouldn't even know how to spell the condition think they know better.
Pro tip: If you aren't affected by the specific illness in question / aren't taking care of someone who is, keep your armchair medical knowledge to yourself.