While our furnace was down I kept the house warm with the wood stove. It's a Vermont, with a catalytic converter. We've only used it a couple of times before now. I used to heat with wood exclusively (another time, another house) and it got to be a real pain. Life seemed to revolve around keeping the fire going.
So far I'm enjoying this stove. I've got a little Seebeck generator fan on it that circulates the air some but mostly gives me something to talk about when someone comes over. A couple of weeks ago I tried the stove when the temp was 15 degrees at night. As with our old house, when it gets that cold it's hard to keep the whole house warm. It gets too hot near the stove and too cold in the extremities of the house.
I kind of like the rituals of keeping the fire going. I also like knowing I can set the thermostat on my new furnace and let the fire go out if I don't feel like messing with it.