Local Heat Observations - The Good and the Bad

Ok, we’ll tackle the Bad first and get it over with. It’s bad. But it’s not unusual if you’ve lived here in this area 23 years as I have. Yes, it’s still 113 in my neighborhood at 8 p.m., and Yes, my thermostat is set to 79 but can’t get the house internal temp below 81. And Yes, my back bedroom where my PC is and where I am now, is hotter than the other rooms in my home because it has less external protection. And Yes, all 4 of my ceiling fans are no longer working. And Yes, the newscasters are giving everyone excuses to do bad things because they’re continually talking about how the heat makes it harder for folks to control themselves. C’mon, folks, pull up your socks and get on with your lives. (I knew a gal who taught kindergarten all her adult life; she’s gone now, but that was one of her favorite lines.)

Now, the Good.

The heat does not stay this intense for long. When I was a little girl in Philly, those hazy, hot and humid days were forever in June, July, August, and half of September. As for the inside temp in my old mobile home, 81 trying to get down to 79 is great when you consider that as recently as 10 years ago in this house, it could not get below 95 on a day like this. You do not want to know what those electric bills were each summer. But now my roof is newly coated (about 1-1/2 years ago), the A/C unit is newer (as of about 6 years ago, thanks to a local agency), we have solar screens on the unprotected windows (that agency), and all the floor vents (all 11 of them) were sealed nicely (again, that agency). As for the room the PC is in, it is now only that warm for one or two hours a day on the worst days. On the folks who go ballistic in the heat - that really ticks me off. That’s just looking for an excuse to blow your stack. Rather silly. You just get hotter that way, for Pete’s sake.

The thing is, I am inside; I am reasonably comfortable; the cat is reasonably comfortable. We are not trying to sleep on a red hot pavement at night like the homeless are doing.

So, hot as it is, it is bearable. It is momentary in the scheme of the whole summer and it is what it is.