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Spring has sprunged

I’ve gotten so used to AC living over here, that I’m concerned about how I’ll survive when we eventually move back to England in a few years time…
 
lizkat said:
My 1860s place came with so much air conditioning we demolished the plaster and lath in favor of sheetrock (and INSULATION).
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I have this mad love affair with sash windows......until I realised that I also loathe (and I mean, loathe, loathe, loathe, detest, abominate, absolutely hate) the cold, - I have a weird and wonderful tolerance for heat and warmth - whereupon I (with regret) have had to let those of my friends (who own/love/live in) ancient Georgian (and earlier) houses with sash windows that I can only be expected to visit (pre-Covid) in that period between the Vernal Equinox and Hallowe'en.

Otherwise, well: They may suffer, but I most certainly will.

I still recall the stupefaction of my friends in an (old) central Bristol (lovely old town house, late Georgian - I love it) when I requested duvets and extra blankets late one August (having just returned from my nearly two year deployment in Kabul).

Bless them. They just rummaged (with some slight disbelief "you're cold??" - I was (expletive deleted) frozen) and found the relevant (and requested) items, and necessities for me.
 
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That's right, you've hung out in place where it can get pretty toasty in the daytimes, either all year round or in the warm seasons. I have no idea how you tolerated places like Somalia, although the body does get used to certain temperature ranges.

Here in the mountains I don't heat my house up to 70-72ºF over winter as some people do, because it's not reliably that warm in the peak of summer right here, so it has never made sense to me to train my body to expect that level of heat IN WINTER.

I don't miss the work and mess of firewood management, but I did start buying a little more gas for the furnace when I quit burning wood. Those chilly mornings in the kitchen used to consume furnace gas only as long as it took to fire up the stove in the morning. First season without the stove routine, well... 😵 yep, I got some serious sticker shock, running over my gas contract in mid-March and paying the higher spring price per gallon to take me out to the end-April top-off.
 
lizkat said:
That's right, you've hung out in place where it can get pretty toasty in the daytimes, either all year round or in the warm seasons. I have no idea how you tolerated places like Somalia, although the body does get used to certain temperature ranges.

Here in the mountains I don't heat my house up to 70-72ºF over winter as some people do, because it's not reliably that warm in the peak of summer right here, so it has never made sense to me to train my body to expect that level of heat IN WINTER.

I don't miss the work and mess of firewood management, but I did start buying a little more gas for the furnace when I quit burning wood. Those chilly mornings in the kitchen used to consume furnace gas only as long as it took to fire up the stove in the morning. First season without the stove routine, well... 😵 yep, I got some serious sticker shock, running over my gas contract in mid-March and paying the higher spring price per gallon to take me out to the end-April top-off.
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Amen to that.

And, oh yes, it (the body, well, my body) does.

Surprisingly easily (in my case; but then, I have an extraordinary tolerance for heat and warmth).

I remember when I was in Georgia (Caucasus Georgia) with the EU, for a couple of years in the period immediately after the (2008) Russian-Georgian conflict.

One July day, Bastille Day, - 14th July - in fact, and suitably attired (I was wearing an exquisite bespoke pants-suit in charcoal grey, in superfine wool, crafted by a Saville Row trained master tailor - therein also lies a tale), I attended a function at the French Embassy (in Tbilisi) by invitation.

My boss at the time (a four star French General, beautifully turned out - pressed navy tunic, light blue trousers) had invited me to attend the function, and I spent some of my time there in the company of a French gendarmerie lieut-colonel who mulled over whether drenching the (exquisite) white uniforms of some of the visiting (and surprisingly muscular) US officers with an "accidental" red wine spillage would be a challenge worth pursuing. Nursing our glasses of (French) wine, I attempted to persuade him that life offered greater challenges.

At 20.30 (8.30pm), that evening, the temperature still read 38C (100F).

Later, a Lithuanian (diplomatic) colleague and I repaired to the (Art Nouveau) Marriott Hotel on Rustaveli (main street in Tbilisi), where he requested my (English language editorial) skills, in editing, amending, proofing some (I was about to write "nonsense that he had written"), a document that he had written.

We did the needful, chatted, shared some wine.

I will never forget leaving that hotel that night; I remember thinking - realising, with a relaxed relief - that it was wonderfully cool. Gorgeous. Bliss. It was 00.45, - I remember the time - (that read 00.45) and then, the temperature - as flashed out by the sequential signs on Freedom Square - in Tbilisi - that registered 25C (77F).

My first thought was how blessedly cool it was.

My second was how - wearing a jacket (yes, superfine wool) was okay, absolutely fine in 25C. I didn't feel remotely hot.

My third thought was of the - oh (expletive deleted) variety.

What world am I living in, where I think that 25C (77F) at nearly one o'clock in the morning is somehow "cool"?

For, I was due to head home on leave in two days time (for the second time in nine months); and, I knew, that - in a world where summer temperatures of 14C (57F) - which is what greeted me on my return, were neither unusual nor unexpected (yes, I froze, while my mother - who - at that time - had not quite reached the foothills of dementia - wondered, with, mild, amused, surprise at my request for an electric blanket and duvets) that I would simply freeze when I arrived home.

As I did.

But, Mother, bless her, (who also hated the cold and loved warmth and heat) simply accepted that my internal thermometer registered things on an entirely different register, and that I had become acclimatised to warmth and heat.

Re Somalia: Mogadishu is on the Indian Ocean, and so, perhaps surprisingly, while the humidity and salinity (motor car engines...) both extract a (considerable) toll, the climate is unexpectedly pleasant.
 
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Scepticalscribe said:
Amen to that.

And, oh yes, it (the body, well, my body) does.

Surprisingly easily (in my case; but then, I have an extraordinary tolerance for heat and warmth).

I remember when I was in Georgia (Caucasus Georgia) with the EU, for a couple of years in the period immediately after the (2008) Russian-Georgian conflict.

One July day, Bastille Day, - 14th July - in fact, and suitably attired (I was wearing an exquisite bespoke pants-suit in charcoal grey, in superfine wool, crafted by a Saville Row trained master tailor - therein also lies a tale), I attended a function at the French Embassy (in Tbilisi) by invitation.

My boss at the time (a four star French General, beautifully turned out - pressed navy tunic, light blue trousers) had invited me to attend the function, and I spent some of my time there in the company of a French gendarmerie lieut-colonel who mulled over whether drenching the (exquisite) white uniforms of some of the visiting (and surprisingly muscular) US officers with an "accidental" red wine spillage would be a challenge worth pursuing. Nursing our glasses of (French) wine, I attempted to persuade him that life offered greater challenges.

At 20.30 (8.30pm), that evening, the temperature still read 38C (100F).

Later, a Lithuanian (diplomatic) colleague and I repaired to the (Art Nouveau) Marriott Hotel on Rustaveli (main street in Tbilisi), where he requested my (English language editorial) skills, in editing, amending, proofing some (I was about to write "nonsense that he had written"), a document that he had written.

We did the needful, chatted, shared some wine.

I will never forget leaving that hotel that night; I remember thinking - realising, with a relaxed relief - that it was wonderfully cool. Gorgeous. Bliss. It was 00.45, - I remember the time - (that read 00.45) and then, the temperature - as flashed out by the sequential signs on Freedom Square - in Tbilisi - that registered 25C (77F).

My first thought was how blessedly cool it was.

My second was how - wearing a jacket (yes, superfine wool) was okay, absolutely fine in 25C. I didn't feel remotely hot.

My third thought was of the - oh (expletive deleted) variety.

What world am I living in, where I think that 25C (77F) at nearly one o'clock in the morning is somehow "cool"?

For, I was due to head home on leave in two days time (for the second time in nine months); and, I knew, that - in a world where summer temperatures of 14C (57F) - which is what greeted me on my return, were neither unusual nor unexpected (yes, I froze, while my mother - who - at that time - had not quite reached the foothills of dementia - wondered, with, mild, amused, surprise at my request for an electric blanket and duvets) that I would simply freeze when I arrived home.

As I did.

But, Mother, bless her, (who also hated the cold and loved warmth and heat) simply accepted that my internal thermometer registered things on an entirely different register, and that I had become acclimatised to warmth and heat.

Re Somalia: Mogadishu is on the Indian Ocean, and so, perhaps surprisingly, while the humidity and salinity (motor car engines...) both extract a (considerable) toll, the climate is unexpectedly pleasant.
Click to expand...

Nothing quite as elaborate or romantic as your time, but I was lucky enough to work down in Cape Town for a while during the height of Summer (November thru February) and I still remember walking on the Victoria and Alfred Waterfront, still wearing a leather jacket and full length jeans, despite a near as dammit 100º F (38ºC) temperature.

Happier days….
 
Scepticalscribe said:
I have this mad love affair with sash windows......until I realised that I also loathe (and I mean, loathe, loathe, loathe, detest, abominate, absolutely hate) the cold, - I have a weird and wonderful tolerance for heat and warmth - whereupon I (with regret) have had to let those of my friends (who own/love/live in) ancient Georgian (and earlier) houses with sash windows that I can only be expected to visit (pre-Covid) in that period between the Vernal Equinox and Hallowe'en.
Click to expand...
I know exactly what you mean…

I live in Georgian central… AKA Bath.

The sash windows are lovely, and when opened they really feel huge. The way you can adjust them for air circulation and so on is excellent in summer. Winters however bring problems with the insulation — or at least, the lack of.

In the mornings when we open the shutters the condensation runs rivers down the panes.

Nothing to do but grin and bear it. Still, it all comes from living in a building dating to 1788. 🤷🏻‍♂️
 
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