Granddaughter Number Two tells me she plays a recording of gently falling rain to help her fall asleep at night. I blame her mother who has long been a believer in white noise as an aid to getting babies to fall asleep. To a certain extent I would agree that the sound of rain on the roof, provided it is not too torrential can be soporific. It is certainly not conducive, however, to getting put of bed in the morning. I waited until it had stopped battering the skylight windows this morning before deciding to go for a run, rather later than originally planned. And then it still rained on me during the first part of my run.
Even when it stopped raining it was looking extremely grey over towards Yorkshire, even though it was getting brighter over our village in the last stages of my return homewards.
It doesn’t have to be raining for me to be reluctant to get out of bed in the morning. The snooze button on the alarm is a very dangerous thing. Broadcaster, writer and Guardian columnist Adrian Chiles had this to say the other day about wasting time on a regular basis in the morning:
“I thought I would get up early to write this, like I think I’ll get up early to do something every morning. I set the alarm, full of sincere intentions, but when it goes off I just lie there for about half an hour. It has been this way every morning for 40 years. I’m not resting, I’m not rising, I’m not doing anything worthwhile, unless you consider doomscrolling while listening to the radio worthwhile.
What an appalling waste of time. Forty years multiplied by 365 days multiplied by 30 minutes comes to 438,000 minutes, which is 7,300 hours, or 304 days. Scandalous. Nigh-on a year of my life thrown away neither sleeping nor doing anything useful.”
Of course, he’s lucky to have been able to do that for so long. I certainly didn’t snooze my alarm when I knew I had to be up and in my car and on the road in order to avoid the worst of the rush hour traffic. A five minute delay in setting off could mean at least an extra half hour of sitting in traffic. Yes, the time could be put to some use: I listened to rather a lot of audio books and learnt a good deal of Italian listening to Michel Thomas CDs as I trundled along. It’s only since I retired that I have the luxury of rolling over and ignoring the alarm. I do, however, sometimes resent the loss of my morning, even though I may have put a load of washing in the machine before setting off and then stopped to do some shopping on my way back. And I can still get up early when I absolutely have to!
Now, according to this article, the best way to keep city streets cool during heatwaves is to have green spaces. Well, we knew that already but it goes a little further and says that while parks and trees and even children’s playgrounds, provided I suppose that they have some grass and other greenery as well as concrete, are good, the best thing is botanical gardens. Which is why it’s even more of a shame that Manchester’s Piccadilly Gardens is now a horrid concrete jungle and not then flowerbed filled space it used to be long ago.
Nothing to do with heatwaves but in Valencia, Spain, they have had a horrendous fire in a residential tower block. Not so huge as the Grenfell Tower disaster, but still four people are confirmed dead and maybe 15 are reported missing. I wonder if that building had the same problem with cladding as Grenfell. Another bunch of people who have lost so much. I doubt if a visit from politicians makes up for it.
Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!
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