I have made some expensive choices over the last year and some of them -- e.g., the tap on the kitchen sink that cost Cdn$750 and splatters water all over the place -- give me twinges of guilt now. The insanely expensive custom-made double curtains in the huge master bedroom are quite another matter: without them, the room would be sharply uncomfortable in both winter and summer.

For a bedroom, it's enormous: as wide and deep as the generous two-car garage it was built on top of, with a peaked ceiling that accommodates windows that top out 12 feet from the floor. Those windows face due south. Despite central air-conditioning, an 17-inch fan and single-layer curtains that covered the lower panes, the upper panes admitted such sunlight of such intensity that the room sweltered all through August and September, right up to Thanksgiving. In winter, the temperature gradient across the room was notable; within three feet of the windows, it was downright parky, and even six feet away you had to keep moving to feel comfortable.

The curtains cost a bomb: more than Cdn$5,000, including hardware and installation. The effect on comfort was immediately obvious; getting out of bed on the day after installation (late January), I did not immediately break out into gooseflesh, and putting my feet on the bare floor did not result in blue toes, as it had the day before. Similarly, the voile underlayer prevents the spring sunshine from generating heat at greenhouse levels.

That said, I have to admit that custom-made curtains (and the outsized windows that make them necessary) are an insane luxury. Like many things in this house, those windows make me think that someone saw a photo in a magazine and decided I Want That, without considering the implications.