Stick a Fork, We're Done
Turn off the oven. I'm done.
Since Thursday, in our little, green, temperate corner of Spain we have been suffering a heatwave that have taken temperatures close to 38ºC/100ºF on the coast, and have gone to 43ºc/109ºF in the town of Arbo, province of Ourense, near the border with Portugal. The worst problem of all, was the humidity that invaded us. It was worse on Friday, though it hasn't gone away yet.
When I was growing up in Boston, we got heatwaves with temperatures in the 90's, and humidity so high, I was dripping as soon as I moved. Whenever meteorologist Dick Albert put up the three HHH's on the board (hazy, hot, and humid), I would go into a limbo of existence. It didn't help matters that our apartment was on the third floor under a hot pitch roof. Nights were spent with all the windows in the apartment opened and lying across the bed, trying to catch the whisper of a breeze. Extreme nights were spent on the porch, battling mosquitoes.
Generally, when it gets hot here, it's a dry heat, which, though it burns, can be experienced more easily than wading through the humid air that presses down on your mouth and nose when you try to breathe. On Friday I was reminded of having my face covered with a mask and forced to breathe the hot air that I exhaled. Only, when wearing a mask, I could simply pull it aside and drink in cooler air. Not on Friday.
There is a slight relief in the lower floor of our house. On two sides it's surrounded by a tall grape arbor, on most of the third by the barn, and on the other it's open to the late afternoon sun. The shadowed parts help keep the temperature lower, but I try to help it by closing the windows and the blinds of the front windows when the sun makes the turn west. Even so, the temperature inside has gradually been climbing these days from 24ºC/75ºF on Thursday, to around 28ºC/82ºF today. Yesterday and today I set up a fan in the kitchen with a plate of cold water in front of it. I have the fan blow at the plate, and it seems to help a little bit. Upstairs is another story.
The bedrooms are upstairs, with only a little space between the ceiling and the roof. The heat accumulates over the length of the day and, when we go to bed, it is like stepping into four o'clock in the afternoon. The blinds are down with the slats letting in the air, and we open the round little window above the bed. I turn on a small fan next to the bed, and we stretch out, trying not to touch each other, moving from time to time, trying to find a cooler patch on the bedding. Last night, I was so tired from not being able to sleep, that I slept from around midnight, to four thirty, without moving. I woke up and discovered I was in the same position as when I had fallen asleep.
I have been trying not to use the stove too much. I make something in the morning that can be eaten cold, and make enough to have leftovers for supper, so that the stove doesn't add to the afternoon heat. Not that we're very hungry, though. What does disappear, however, are the watermelons. We buy one today, tomorrow the last rind is left. Ice creams are also filling every cranny of the freezer. Alcohol? God, no. Water and zero alcohol beer await in the fridge.
I have been finding myself with less energy lately, but these days I barely have the energy to get up out of the chair. As the heat builds, I feel I should do something, but everything is so heavy. I expend the least amount of energy from around two in the afternoon until after the sun sets, at nine-thirty. Then, about an hour after the disc has disappeared into the Saharan dust that is making up the air these days, the whisper of breeze strengthens a bit and turns cooler and gentle. That is when I prefer to sit outside and read by streetlight. It's cooler then, and the temperature it should be on a normal summer's day here.
No, I could not live in the south of Spain. Temperatures of over 100ºF are normal in Córdoba, and in Sevilla they comfortably reach 95ºF. With this heatwave they've reached 44ºC/111ºF from Córdoba west to southern Portugal. No, no, and no. I would love to visit someday, but in spring or fall, possibly winter, never, ever in summer.
Another thing I won't do these days is go to the beach. Normally, on a regularly hot summer's day, it's cooler at the beach and the water ranges from cool to ice cube. These days, the sun is a jackhammer on my skull. Even if the water is warm this year, even if I spend most of the time at the beach in it, the sun is still hammering into my head, and the trip there and back is an inferno. Going to the beach is not cooling down, it's being masochistic.
Let me go soak in some cold water in my tub.
Since Thursday, in our little, green, temperate corner of Spain we have been suffering a heatwave that have taken temperatures close to 38ºC/100ºF on the coast, and have gone to 43ºc/109ºF in the town of Arbo, province of Ourense, near the border with Portugal. The worst problem of all, was the humidity that invaded us. It was worse on Friday, though it hasn't gone away yet.
When I was growing up in Boston, we got heatwaves with temperatures in the 90's, and humidity so high, I was dripping as soon as I moved. Whenever meteorologist Dick Albert put up the three HHH's on the board (hazy, hot, and humid), I would go into a limbo of existence. It didn't help matters that our apartment was on the third floor under a hot pitch roof. Nights were spent with all the windows in the apartment opened and lying across the bed, trying to catch the whisper of a breeze. Extreme nights were spent on the porch, battling mosquitoes.
Generally, when it gets hot here, it's a dry heat, which, though it burns, can be experienced more easily than wading through the humid air that presses down on your mouth and nose when you try to breathe. On Friday I was reminded of having my face covered with a mask and forced to breathe the hot air that I exhaled. Only, when wearing a mask, I could simply pull it aside and drink in cooler air. Not on Friday.
There is a slight relief in the lower floor of our house. On two sides it's surrounded by a tall grape arbor, on most of the third by the barn, and on the other it's open to the late afternoon sun. The shadowed parts help keep the temperature lower, but I try to help it by closing the windows and the blinds of the front windows when the sun makes the turn west. Even so, the temperature inside has gradually been climbing these days from 24ºC/75ºF on Thursday, to around 28ºC/82ºF today. Yesterday and today I set up a fan in the kitchen with a plate of cold water in front of it. I have the fan blow at the plate, and it seems to help a little bit. Upstairs is another story.
The bedrooms are upstairs, with only a little space between the ceiling and the roof. The heat accumulates over the length of the day and, when we go to bed, it is like stepping into four o'clock in the afternoon. The blinds are down with the slats letting in the air, and we open the round little window above the bed. I turn on a small fan next to the bed, and we stretch out, trying not to touch each other, moving from time to time, trying to find a cooler patch on the bedding. Last night, I was so tired from not being able to sleep, that I slept from around midnight, to four thirty, without moving. I woke up and discovered I was in the same position as when I had fallen asleep.
I have been trying not to use the stove too much. I make something in the morning that can be eaten cold, and make enough to have leftovers for supper, so that the stove doesn't add to the afternoon heat. Not that we're very hungry, though. What does disappear, however, are the watermelons. We buy one today, tomorrow the last rind is left. Ice creams are also filling every cranny of the freezer. Alcohol? God, no. Water and zero alcohol beer await in the fridge.
I have been finding myself with less energy lately, but these days I barely have the energy to get up out of the chair. As the heat builds, I feel I should do something, but everything is so heavy. I expend the least amount of energy from around two in the afternoon until after the sun sets, at nine-thirty. Then, about an hour after the disc has disappeared into the Saharan dust that is making up the air these days, the whisper of breeze strengthens a bit and turns cooler and gentle. That is when I prefer to sit outside and read by streetlight. It's cooler then, and the temperature it should be on a normal summer's day here.
No, I could not live in the south of Spain. Temperatures of over 100ºF are normal in Córdoba, and in Sevilla they comfortably reach 95ºF. With this heatwave they've reached 44ºC/111ºF from Córdoba west to southern Portugal. No, no, and no. I would love to visit someday, but in spring or fall, possibly winter, never, ever in summer.
Another thing I won't do these days is go to the beach. Normally, on a regularly hot summer's day, it's cooler at the beach and the water ranges from cool to ice cube. These days, the sun is a jackhammer on my skull. Even if the water is warm this year, even if I spend most of the time at the beach in it, the sun is still hammering into my head, and the trip there and back is an inferno. Going to the beach is not cooling down, it's being masochistic.
Let me go soak in some cold water in my tub.
Comments
Post a Comment