When I worked part time I would open the south facing windows when I left for work when it was sunny. The living room would be hot by time I got home a few hours later and I would close the shades before the shadow was cast over that part of the home. I also use the oven more for cooking vs microwave as it further helped to heat and I cut the heater back.
On the other hand I had an apartment with FREE gas heat. Well, hearing it run all the time got old fast. I would replace my Cf lamps with regular 75w bulbs and that helped to offset my heater needs so it would cycle off and on. I had a few I left on all the time and in the bathroom. I normally left them on but had used CF bulbs to save power.
One of my grand ideas to offset my heater and cooler needs is to turn a cube fridge into a water chiller. Water to air deal with 2 water pools, one on the hot and one on the cold side and switch them depending on what I wanted heat or cool in the room. The other coil would cycle water from the toilet tank. This way as I flushed the toilet the warm or cold water from the refigerator coils would help to remove waste from the toilet and new water would fill the tank and the process would repeat. Question would be how long a tank of fresh water would last before it reached its thermal absorption limit and I needed to flush again.
