Re: What is the obsession
Using the local control the house would be cold when I got home and take several hours to properly warm through
Ok, perhaps not a clockwork timer but the electronic ones (£20 upwards) all have "holiday" settings and "setback" temperatures. I bet even your lifestyle is more predictable than you imply - when you are going to be away for a few days you probably know which day you will be back. As you are collecting your things together you hit the "holiday" button for 2, 3, 4 (or whatever) days and the thing goes to "setback" and ignores the usual schedule for the period specified.
Otherwise, just keep your jumper on for an hour. Saves even more gas.
If working from home, toddle up to the unit and push the temperature up for a bit (the unit I linked can over-ride either until the next programmed time, for a specified length of time or indefinitely). We have our timer set as if we were out at work all day but there's often one of us at home due to working part-time. I can remember maybe two or three occasions since 2016 started when I've felt the need to add heat during the day. Once the sun's up the house very rarely gets below 16 or 17C and I don't tend to be sat, freezing, at the computer; if I'm home I'm usually running about doing "things". I also own jumpers.
Setback temperatures are great, but you probably know that. Much better than pure "off", you can set them as you see fit and they won't let the house get below the set temperature during the "off" period. This helps avoid freezing pipes if your house is prone to that sort of thing. When I lived on my own I had it set to 12C and the heating only ever came on on the very coldest nights - and this in a very badly built 1980s ex-council house. Nowadays the setback is set to 16C and makes a difference on some freezing nights in our not-quite-as-badly-built-and-soon-to-be-demolished 1960s house.
Look, I'm no luddite and I do like the occasional gadget, but I really, really don't see how most of this stuff is going to make our lives better in the short term nor even, really, in the long term given the likelihood of obsolescence by being abandoned. A cheap programmable 'stat could easily last 20 years or more and costs a set of AAs to run every couple of years. I would bet good money that in 20 years the Nest or Hive that is bought today will have long since had to have been "upgraded".
M.