It’s too darn hot

Posted by Barbara on July 18, 2022 in Blog, climate change, Living today, Politics, Rants | 2 comments

It’s odd, to say the least. We’re sitting and sweltering, but the geopolitical situation means we may be freezing next winter, if things get even worse than they are in Eastern Europe and the gas is turned off. At the moment I have simply forgotten the concept of cold.

The media is full of scary articles about what happens to the body as the temperature rises relentlessly degree by degree. The water companies are desperate for us all to ration our water usage, which makes perfect sense, except that when the shoe is on the other foot and I want them to stop discharging effluent and sewage into the country’s rivers and sea, they do not show the same level of accountability currently being expected of me. One is then left thinking crossly: ‘I’ll just take 2 minutes longer in the shower, and that’ll show you’. Yes, puerile to the extreme.

I also gather that we can no longer take solace in a glass of wine to help relax in the heat– it will dehydrate us further. Farewell Pimms and other traditional English summer drinks. Yet having visited a number of countries in summer months with average climates hotter than ours, I have not observed much abstinence amongst the locals – and they weren’t passing out in the street.

We know it must be serious because a meeting of COBRA has been convened to discuss the dangers posed by the heatwave and ‘red warning’. And to make us fear even more, our current apology for a Prime Minister did not attend. Apparently, he chose instead to host a farewell event for staff at Chequers. Partygate carries on, but let us not forget that Boris Johnson missed several critical COBRA meetings in early 2020, as the Covid pandemic began to spread here. I hope to goodness that his absence at a COBRA meeting is not in any way linked to the severity of the crisis, otherwise we are in deep trouble. Meanwhile I wonder who he has found to host and pay for the wedding party he had planned for Chequers…but I digress.

I am of course hoping that the shock of the UK heating up to 40 degrees for the first time will refocus the government’s attention on the climate crisis and how to take the key steps to achieve the UK’s legislated target of reaching net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. I might as well watch for flying pigs. Of the current PM wannabes still standing, not one has spelled out how they will work to achieve this. The potential implications of this are almost too horrific to contemplate.

So I’ve lowered the blinds, opened all the windows, turned on the fan and relocated some bedding to the sitting room as it’s the coolest room in the house come night time. But before I go to sleep and to cheer me up, I’ll listen to Ella Fitzgerald singing Cole Porter’s ‘It’s Too Darn Hot’. You can too if you want, here.