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> I feel like homes and offices do not breath. My anecdotal napkin math would say like 10% of buildings are designed with proper ventilation, blending of outdoor/indoor air, etc... and the rest are just boxes that are slowly killing us.

First off, you do not want buildings to "breathe" through air leakage. It is desirable for a 'seal tight and vent right':

* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CIcrXut_EFA

There are standards for the amount buildings should exchange the air, e.g., ANSI/ASHRAE Standard 62.1:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_changes_per_hour

Also, air temperature is only one component of feeling comfortable in a room. How warm/cool the walls are, and having good double- (or triple-) pane windows also contributes:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mean_radiant_temperature

While you no doubt have insulation in your external wall cavities, the wooden stud has a very low value (R-1/inch) and so introduces thermal bridging:

* https://www.greenbuildingadvisor.com/article/what-is-thermal...

Modern building codes in colder climate zones mandate a layer of exterior insulation to deal with this bridging.

> I try to keep my CO2 ppm below 800 foor good measure. For a while I was feeling like dogshit in here and I assume it is due to being literally directly above a gas furnace in an older single family home - in hindsight I wish I had a monitor that detected more gases.

You may wish to look into an HRV (or ERV) and get some filtered fresh air:

* https://www.venmar.ca/22-detail-advice-hrv-and-erv-why-choos...

I recall reading a blog post in which a heat lamp was used to warm the hands while working at a desk.

I like to work outdoors even when it is fairly cold, and cold hands are the main limitation. It is difficult to type with gloves.

Try open hand warmers designed to warm the blood on the top of your hand as it flows into your fingers. In my experience, these work great at keeping my hands warm while not reducing dexterity.

https://images.app.goo.gl/DZofccEmDPGdSKvGA

Fingerless gloves should help. I also have some thermasilk glove liners that I love, keep hands warm and also breathable. They are quite thin, but I had to cut the fingertips off the middle fingers for typing and touch screens.