Wednesday 13 July 2022

Coping with a heatwave

1. Leave all upstairs windows open when you go to bed.
2. When you wake up bathed in sweat at some ungodly hour in the morning, open the curtains and windows downstairs as well.
3. When you finally get up and go downstairs, open front and back doors.
4. If you work from home with fairly flexible hours, learn from the Spanish. Start as early as you can and clock off around midday.
5. Check every hour or so whether it's now warmer outside than inside.
6. As soon as it is (about 10.30 am), close all doors, windows and curtains again.
7. Remain indoors until it's bearable outside (5 or 6 in the afternoon). Apply sun cream before venturing into the garden, the shops, the pub etc, remaining in the shade where possible.
8. Drink plenty of fluids. Don't forget that your body cannot synthesise its own alcohol and you need regular supplements!
9. Open all windows, curtains and back door in the afternoon/evening, front door optional.
10. Shut downstairs windows and doors when you go to bed, because burglars, stray cats etc.

26 comments:

DAD said...

Do you think that your readers are so stupid that they need this advice?

Mark Wadsworth said...

Dad, that's just my basic list. I hope it will prompt some into providing useful tips which I haven't worked out yet.

Doonhamer said...

If there is any breeze open windward downstairs windows and leeward upstairs windows.
Then the through draught will aid natural convection and let warm air out of the upstairs windows.
Having the incoming air pass through a clothes airer or horse with a couple of wet towels hanging on it will cool the air.
A wet keffiyeh or small towel wrapped around your head is very cooling unless ambient humidity is so high that evaporation is inhibited.
The same trick will keep your beer at a nice temperature. It is not good to quaff ice cold beer. It loosens fillings and affects the vocal chords resulting in a nasal colonial accent.

Mark Wadsworth said...

D, I'll try the first one.

Penseivat said...

You could also pop down to the local Afghan or Somali community centre, hire a trafficked child to continually fan you.

Mark Wadsworth said...

PS, does anybody believe a word of all that self-contradictory nonsense?

A K Haart said...

Go to bed in wet socks. Our son says it works and by morning the socks are fairly dry.

Mark Wadsworth said...

AKH, that sounds ghastly.

Penseivat said...

MW,
Considering what is going on today in this country, I thought irony, tasteless I know, but still irony, would be appropriate.
Apologies to anyone who was upset, or felt threatened by this, however, humour is subjective, and there has been a lot worse.

Mark Wadsworth said...

P, seriously, does anybody find Mo Farah's account of his origins more truthful or honest than crap that Donald Trump or Boris Johnson say? If so, why?

Penseivat said...

Referring to Trump and Johnson suggests you are entering the non-winning war of politics. Living in the UK, I am not all that familiar with Trump and his Presidency. He is a New Yorker businessman and tried to run the country as a (profitable) business. As I understand it, the political elite did not like this and, allegedly, stole the last election.
Johnson is a womanizing liar, pussy whipped by his current wife, meaning he will do what she, or the WEF, tells him if he wants sex with her again, allegedly.
I have no real impression of Farrah's comment, but wonder what, if any, his statement results in and what he gets out of it.
The majority of trafficked children into this country is, allegedly, by Afghans and Somalis, which is why I referred to their 'community centres'.
You do not have to agree with me, or appreciate my sense of humour, but should agree that my comment, made in jest, should be worthy of debate by those who do agree, or disagree, with me.

Mark Wadsworth said...

Ps, I basically agreed with your comment. I also thought it was mildly funny in a dead pan sort of way. So I asked whether you thought anybody believes him. Our exchange seems to have taken a wrong turn...

Penseivat said...

MW,
Sorry. I do seem to have taken a wrong turn and misinterpreted your comments. For this, I do apologise.

Mark Wadsworth said...

P, with the benefit of hindsight, in my first reply I should have said "his nonsense" and not "this nonsense" :-)

ontheotherhand said...

There are plenty of people so stupid as to need this advice, but perhaps not amongst MW's readers. Many people leave everything open all day. For a while, the hot air pushing in moves the cooler air in the house around, fooling the resident that they are cooking the house.

Mark Wadsworth said...

OTOH, ta.

This last bit is ambiguous:

"they are cooking the house."

Should that be "cooking" or "cooling"?

Bayard said...

Alternatively, come to Pembrokeshire, where it's lovely and cool at night (or bloody cold, if you are having an evening BBQ and have forgotten to bring a jersey).

Mark Wadsworth said...

B, I'm not moving from Essex, which has the nicest weather in England just because of a couple of stupid hot days every year or two*. Better than coping with torrential rain or cold most of the year.

* Obviously, this will become the norm if we don't go to Net Zero immediately.

ontheotherhand said...

Yes it should have been "cooling". Pesky autocomplete.

Mark Wadsworth said...

Dh, returning to your ideas.
- Prevailing wind here is west to east, our house faces north to south (with only one window on east side and none on west), so there is a seldom a clear one-way through draught. So ta, but doesn't really work in my house.
- The wet towels trick actually works, a bit at least, ta.

OTOH, thanks for clarifying.

Bayard said...

Pembrokeshire is the sunniest county in Wales.

Lola said...

Sorry. I must have missed something. Heatwave? I just thought it was nice hot summers day, or two.

Mark Wadsworth said...

B, maybe. It is still not as sunny as Essex so that's a diagonal comparison.

L, Monday and Tuesday were off the charts hell-ish nasty in most places. I am still recovering.

Bayard said...

M, there's probably a strong correlation between the amount of tarmac around and the excessive temperature. Since Lola and I live in the depths of the country, we didn't suffer so much, if at all.

Mark Wadsworth said...

B, indeed. Which is why yesterday's record temp's were recorded at RAF Coningsby and Heathrow airport. Umpteen acres of flat, treeless dark-ish tarmac.

Bayard said...

Well the Alarmists do say that air travel causes global warming.