It’s over tomorrow, the heat is over for another year

[LaurieFairyCake]

Firstly I appreciate this is not the same for the rest of the country

but we’ve had it horrific here (London). I’ve never felt so shit in my life as I have for the last 10 weeks. I’ve spent between £250-350 a month on electricity (portable air conditioners). I’ve felt anxious, headachy, it’s FUCKED with my peri menopause (brain fog, no words, cognitive decline). I’ve felt tearful and as if it would go on forever. There are moments where I’ve thought I can’t take another moment of this. My sleep is proper fucked.

this has to change. I’ve done everything on a personsl
level I can. Air conditioners only when necessary, above 26 inside (DH has long Covid so literally throws up in heat). His asthma is exacerbated. The dogs have had the shittest summer. I’ve had a couple of rescues that can’t go out about 22 degrees. I reckon they’ve been walked briefly 3 times a week. We deliberately went away on a cheap caravan holiday twice just so they could smile. There were endless days I couldn’t work as too hot in my home office and clients cancelled.

I cannot wait til Saturday.

I hope for solidarity from others. I want to wear a fucking hoodie again. I’ve spent every day sat around in my underwear inside for vast stretches of the day. This is not sexy.

Plant a tree this autumn. It’s pretty much the only positive thing we can all do (that’s not like, stop doing xyz) and if we all did it we can make a huge difference

It’s a horrible feeling isn’t it!

She said from Saturday.

What about Autumn and Spring? They are my favourite seasons.

I was listening to radio presenter JoAnne Good and her guests recently. They were saying summer is so easy, you don't have to think about putting a coat on before you go out. Then they started talking about scarves and gloves.

In Summer, you have to think about sun screen before you go out. Or wear light-coloured clothes to cover your skin. And a hat. And dark glasses. And remember to take water with you. I'm looking forward to September and I can go back to long walks.

I was confused about that as well. She posted about 'tomorrow' yesterday. That's today (Friday).

Exactly.

There's a desalination plant on Lanzarote ... makes me wonder why on earth we can't have them here.

Probably because they’re expensive to build, require a huge amount of energy and create toxic waste as a by-product!

She specifically says NE Europe. Spain, Paris and Basel aren’t in NE Europe.

Well this Caribbean heritage person is suffering greatly. I can't take much more and I'm asthmatic, with other comorbid autoimmune conditions and I have come close to going to A&E a few times. My clinic appointment today was to check I am not suffering neurologically. I am hating every bit of this extreme heat!

As are some other people I know with Caribbean and/or African heritage. The heat in the UK is different and it is often remarked upon as being more like an oven. Someone somewhere explained why there's a difference between the Pacific heat and the UK heat, but I have forgotten the science. It's not the thriving heat of the Caribbean with it's nice sea breezes and frequent mini downpours.

I can't wait for October. The very next time it properly rains I shall run out without a jacket and get sodding wet! Praying for a massive thunderstorm.

The sunshine and hot weather is fine but the lack of rain is becoming a real problem. If it was this hot mixed in with some thunderstorms it would have been fine. I have to admit I’m quite looking forward to the cooler weather we’re meant to be getting next week.

I’m in East Anglia so it has been relentless here.

The lack of rain is worrying me a lot. Since may we’ve had nowt and it isn’t good

@DysonSphereI think it's the humidity here that's the problem; in some other countries it's a dry heat, that cools in the evening so there is some respite from it.

We're unlucky that being an island we get a maritime airflow that picks up moisture, hence the wretched humidity. And our houses are built to keep the heat in. A recipe for disaster in this heat!

In answer to the misinformation specialists and the wilfully ignorant

1976 was once a statistical outlier, however

6 of the longest heatwaves since 1916 occurred 1983 onwards
3 of these are from 2013 onwards

That is a skewed distribution towards the present day

The data sample collected for the window of the last 110 years shows the frequency of long duration heatwaves is increasing as we proceed.

Also, the second image shows the number of heatwaves per year is increasing, I've added a threshold line at 6 heatwaves per year - there are more years with 6 heatwaves or more post 1960, with increasing frequency clumping towards present day. That plot also suggests non-stationarity, but I'm not getting into that.

The number of heatwaves per year is also increasing.as we proceed

The last chart shows the difference of the mean Global Mean Average heatwave frequency measured in the number of days over time that exceeded the 90th percentile temperature value calculated from the hottest days in the observation record for 1960-1991

As per chart 2, that time-series shows an outlier in the mid-1930s. However, the global story is similar to the UK - heatwave frequency has increased as we have moved in the 21st Century

UK heatwaves: How the records tell a changing story - Met Office

Heatwave metrics | Global Climate Extremes Dashboard

Great. I can't wait. I've had enough of this shit now. My life has basically been put on hold for the last 3 months, appointments cancelled left, right and centre because I can't handle going out in extreme heat. I spent most of yesterday (37 degrees where I live) feeling like I couldn't breath properly. Anything over 28 degrees is too much for me.

Mum had a heart op I April and subsequently can’t breathe in the heat, she’s really struggling so any break from the relentless heat would be good for her

Today in SE London was forecast to be 2 or 3° 'cooler' than yesterday, but they've revised that up a couple of degrees and trust me, it feels much hotter and drier than yesterday. By 1am it will still be 24°!! So "tomorrow" is set to be tortuous again even with a forecast high of 26° because we'll have had no chance to cool down, and the 'lived' temperatures this summer have been higher than the daily predictions.

And OP, according to the Met Office on YouTube, this is not over. We're due another heatwave at the beginning of next month.

I can’t wait til autumn!!

I understand what you’re saying. Kent here, so similar temperatures to London. 36 degrees here today and it was 41 degrees In my garden yesterday.
however we’ve had multiple occasions where the forecast has said the temperature will drop and it hasn’t dropped below 26/27 degrees here and has then risen again within a day or two. So I genuinely actually don’t believe it’s going to drop drastically at all!

I love the blossoms of spring and the temp rising. That’s a lovely time too but it just gets me so excited for the heat to come and the best time of year for me is knowing summer is ahead of me. Thinking that this is the end of high summer makes me sad. But horses for courses. And I wear SPF every single day of the year so don’t really see that as something to remember.

I've had enough of the heat too. But it has prompted us to look at what more we can do to reduce our impact on the planet. We already refuse to buy anything from Temu, recycle, have 20 year old appliances because we dont replace unless we need to, and we donate to charities like Solar Aid, we've also paid for lots of tree planting over the years.

If you want to feel more hopeful look at the earthshot prizes and initiatives like this one https://earthshotprize.org/winners-finalists/low-carbon-materials/

Remember how quickly vaccines were developed for covid? Scientists could solve this problem too given enough support.

Plug in solar panels like these www.hampshiregenerators.co.uk/generators/plug-in-solar/plug-in-solar-kit-400w-400w-solar-panel/ will be legal soon and hopefully widely adopted.

It's true that some countries have dry heat but lots have humid heat too. I was reading about Lebanon where apparently it's extremely hot and humid in the summer. People who can leave the coastal plain and try to get high up in the mountains.

So I don't agree that people in hot countries don't suffer in the heat. They have to find ways to avoid it which today means air conditioning but in the past meant siestas, carrying fans with you etc.

Well-insulated houses can be better. They can be cooler in the summer and warmer in the winter. But they don't cool down at night in the same way. It's not as if we can sleep on the roof like people in some countries can.

Plus if it were actually true that the rest of the world manages perfectly fine whilst the stupid UK doesn’t understand how to manage heat, you wouldn’t get the tens of thousands of heat related excess deaths that occur globally.

Still going to be hot here tomorrow... and no rain at all expected before next Friday!

Don;t be stupid, you shower, get out and are covered in sweat almost immediately. Makes NO difference.

I quite like that mother earth is winning against the plague of animals that have damaged it so much. Putting yet more of them on the planet won't help either