It’s cooler today. I even contemplated putting on a long-sleeved running top to go out running this morning but decided that that would be unnecessary. My weather app told me the temperature was 14° at 8.30, up to 17° now at more or less midday, with a high of 20° forecast. Quite acceptable!
The newspapers continue to give us advice on how to cope with hot weather. After all, the last few days have been the hottest June days on record in the UK, or so my son tells me! Mind you, it’s not clear whether that is the whole of the UK or just the South East. Anyway, whole articles are dedicated to how to stay hydrated: basically drink water at intervals, tea is okay, one pint of beer is fine but not two! And the latest thing is to carry sun umbrella. Lewis Hamilton was spotted holding a Ferrari red umbrella that matched his race suit.
I’m not sure that a red umbrella is really effective as it must surely absorb the heat but apparently it’s the shade that counts. A reflective outer later is best. Otherwise a pale colour and a close-weave fabric is next best. For £295 you can get a Ladies Handmade Sun Umbrella with Malacca Cane Crook from James Smith & Sons, an umbrella shop in central London that dates to 1830.
More modestly, you can get a folding version (more portable but less posh) from Uniqlo for £19.90.
Here’s a link to an article about air-conditioning. I liked this bit about outside shading:
“Many British homes overheat simply because they lack good insulation and outside shading. This week my neighbour, struggling in the heat, hung a sheet outside his window to test whether some external shading might stop his bedroom from overheating. He recorded a 17.8C difference between the internal temperature of his unshaded windows and shaded ones – the equivalent of multiple 400W radiators on full blast. Sure, he could install AC, but without first cooling down his windows he’d be throwing money down the drain. And what happens when his air conditioning unit malfunctions, as many are prone to during prolonged heatwaves?”
(Incidentally, or coincidentally, we were talking to our son, who lives in the hotter SE bit of the UK, about this and that and he said he is thinking of fitting shutters to the south-facing windows of his house, precisely to provide shade and insulation on hot sunny afternoons.)
But I especially liked this suggestion that air-conditioning homes should be nationalised:
“As temperatures rise, cooling systems will become just as fundamental to a functioning society as other essential infrastructure. Leftists should seize the opportunity to demand public ownership of the cooling sector, bringing democratic accountability while preventing corporate profiteering at the expense of increasingly desperate consumers.”
That’s the frivolous stuff done. Now for something more serious. 235 Palestinian children and teenagers have been killed by Israeli forces on the West Bank since the 7th of October 2023. Another five have been killed by settlers themselves. This, of course, is in addition to the vast number of Palestinian children killed in Gaza. 38 Israeli children died in the Hamas attack on October 7th. If Palestinian children are being killed in retribution, it has got somewhat out of hand. Here’s a link to an article about the killing of Palestinian children, from teenagers to toddlers. Some of the accounts of quite harrowing!
Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!
No comments:
Post a Comment