Just imagine there’s a picture here of an Englishman melting into a puddle. I am not running any renders today!
I’ve even seen reports of this turning up on late night shows in the US, so I think most are aware that it’s HOT in Europe. Worse, it’s HOT in Manchester! That’s like saying the Antarctic ice cap just melted. We don’t do hot in Manchester. We do damp and overcast with potential for torrential rain.
The temperature on my garden thermometer seems to have peaked at 37.5 C. That’s 99.5 F for those who refuse to use SI units. I’ve been hotter. I went out at two pm. in summer in Scottsdale, AZ. I regretted it, but I could go back to an air conditioned hotel room (and wonder whether the people sunbathing beside the pool could actually be heard sizzling). We do not do air con in the UK. My office is at thirty degrees. I give up.
I’m having a little problem with writer’s block at the moment, and progress is slow. I’ve started at least four books and stopped again with problems about knowing where to go with them. I started another yesterday which I’m hopeful about, but today, I can’t think! I’ve written a sentence. I’ve also drawn a map because drawing pretty pictures doesn’t take as much brainpower. I may try taking my laptop down and working in the kitchen, because it’s cooler, but it’s also possible that I just give up until tomorrow.
We need to fix climate change, like yesterday.
On a side note. Well, sort of a side note. In the Fox books, most of southern Europe has been evacuated because they don’t have water to keep the population going and it’s too hot for humans to function properly. I thought I was being a bit pessimistic, to be honest. Watching the coverage of the weather and wild fires in France and Spain, I feel like one of my dire predictions is more likely than I thought. I hate it when I’m right.
Witches and Ray-Guns 
Tips from someone who lives in a hot place:
Try moistening a towel and hanging it around your neck.
Take of your shoes and socks. It sounds silly, but it helps.
Use a spray bottle to occasionally mist your skin with water.
Well ahead of you on the socks and shoes. I have skin problems, so I don’t wear socks pretty much all year around. And that’s another reason to hate these temperatures.
You have my sympathies. Even when you’re used to them, temperatures like that are abysmal to deal with.
I was just thinking about the Fox series and how scarily prescient much of it appears it will be. Perhaps the next one can feature a murder at a beach resort in Antarctica.
Have to feel with you after the hot and humid summer we had this year. I do envy your central heating for winter though while we shiver through an extra cold and wet winter. Do you have a fan, that helps as well. And yes if you have a two story house staying downstairs does help as the heat always rises. Even better if you have a basement you can retreat to.
I have a fan. It helps a bit.
I spent a couple of hours sitting in the kitchen this afternoon, doing something to make me feel like I did some work. My sitting position sucked however, and I eventually had to give up.
No basement here, just a portal to Hell.
Never fear you can complain about it being to cold tomorrow. it is supposed to peek at 26 (78 F).
Bliss!
Right now in Vegas at 6pm it is 106f. The hottest i’ve seen it was one of the record days of 117f. Mind you that is the air temp. All bets re off if you are standing in the sun. Back in 2005 I had to go out on the ramp at the airport on one of the record days. I know what a pizza feels like baking in the oven.
Laughlin NV down the Colorado river has had several highs of 126 F. Where I grew up Albany NY just south of Saratoga Springs had summers of Florida like weather with high heat and humidity. Where I worked in a machine shop the temp and humidity was 100f and 100% from late June to mid September.
If you can get a room a/c for the bedroom it makes a big difference. Portable swamp coolers work too. Swamp coolers fall down in very humid conditions.
Worst thing people do in heat they are not used to is to try and work normally. There will be fools that walk the strip in the heat or hike in Red Rock Canyon.
I wouldn’t live in Phoenix. Searing heat, biblical thunderstorms and sand storms right out of a Sci-Fi movie. I had to go there in November and it was 100 degrees and no a/c in the hangers.
I used to go to Phoenix for work. Around Christmas, it’s quite comfortable. They always recruit new staff there in December and January. And, tbh, I spent an evening sitting on a porch, drinking and watching hummingbirds come to a feeder. It’s not all bad, but no, I wouldn’t live there either.
At this rate, if I were to move somewhere abroad, I think it would be Greenland!
Curious, why don’t they do air conditioning in the UK?
They do, but it’s very rare in homes. We simply don’t get the weather for it to be particularly economic. Usually. Offices, shops, hotels, etc do have air con, though not everywhere. I recall a hotel I stayed in one night when the weather was sweltering. All the windows were open. And the couple in the room above were engaged in some pretty impressive, very loud sex. Didn’t get a lot of sleep that night.
My office has too much electronics in it, so I have seriously considered getting a unit put in. But it would run for 5-10 days a year. It’s a luxury I probably don’t really need. Unless we’re going to get more heatwaves like we’ve had this year. Then…
But it’s a dry heat! Yeah right. When you’re eyebrows start to smolder In the sun, that is HOT!
I hope you weather has improved.
I’m probably the only one who would define it as better, but yes.