I'VE DONE IT... NOVEMBER 2020

We don't have air-conditioning and I am not going to lie, the heatwave conditions of the last weekend saw me waver. We ad...

We don't have air-conditioning and I am not going to lie, the heatwave conditions of the last weekend saw me waver.


We added ceiling fans to our modest home in the 2000s thinking 'yeah, that'll do it', and mostly it did except for the odd sweaty day broken by a southerly buster. But cue 2019 and 2020 and what we know is the science is being borne out, and it's freakin' hot. 

So, what do you do if you live without an air-conditioner and you're looking at working from home through a hot summer, you head to the beach, a lot, and here's where my snapshot of things I've done this month kicks off. I hope you're staying cool and hydrated.

I WENT TO... the beach and ocean baths all month. It's become a new weekend and after-work habit to dive under salty, clean water and wash away the heat, the work of the day and stretch limbs that have spent hours bent over a keyboard. We've lived here almost 20 years and it's only in the past few that this habit's made it's way into our days.

I OP SHOPPED... I've been picking up spare T-shirts, shorts and dresses for the grandkidlets who will come and stay through summer. It's good to have spares when tubs of water, loaded water pistols and evenings watering the garden turn into a nudie run through a spray otherwise meant for zucchinis, tomatoes and cucumbers. 

I READ... Meg Mason's Sorrow and Bliss. It is everything people say about it. It's beautiful, sad, funny, whimsical, fraught and crazy. If anything, it wraps up a little too quickly and neatly. I also read The Mother Fault, for which I'll offer a warning: if you don't wish to know how much worse it could get beyond natural disasters and a global pandemic, keep it off your holiday reading list. It's fictional, but the best dystopian fiction always rolls a little too close to what's plausible, if not possible.

I MADE... sweet iced tea, which will evolve over the summer to become sweet iced chai with the addition of cinnamon, cloves and maybe star anise. I'm also going through cook books to find ways to use what will be a glut of zucchinis. Bread and butter pickles, made to Stephanie Alexander's simple recipe, have been the go-to.

Photo by Mourad Saadi on Unsplash

You Might Also Like

1 comments