Coping with the heat.

[Woody girl]

Wondering how people are coping with this heat. Especially if you have health conditions that make it dodgy.
Normaly I love the sun and long for the warmer weather, but this past few days I've been struggling a bit with it.
I have heart, blood pressure, and asthmatic conditions, which makes things difficult if its too hot or cold, so I realy need to take care.
So far, I've closed the windows and doors, covered the windows, taken cool showers, and wear a water soaked bandanna around my neck, but that dries out realy quickly. I have a fan with ice cubes in front of it, but its still 24° in my bedroom tonight.
It's been 29° in the shade outside, and we'll over 40 up the top of my south facing sun trap garden.
I'm thinking of getting one of those pet cooling mats for dogs to sleep on. Anyone tried one for their dogs or even themselves?
I'm making rehydration drinks, part of my routine, plenty of iced tea, and eating plenty of salads so my body isn't working too hard to digest food, and resting, with my feet in a bowl of cold water, but I'm still wiped out by midday.
I feel like I want to live in a bathfull of cold water while this heat wave is on.!!
What are your tips for coping with the heat?

 

[Ozmundo]

The scarves with absorbent crystals in extend the duration of the evaporative cooling effect.

I am not sure if there is something similar that will work on the inside of your forearms.

Otherwise I cheat, 8c. Got to check the trout stocks.

 

[Toddy]

I don't close the windows and doors, I get a cross breeze going by opening one front and back. Works at night too, bedroom windows and bathroom window are at opposite sides of the house and it creates a cool draught.

I don't do well in the heat, I'm much more comfortable in the cold, but I do love this warm dry, mud free, few months.
Use a sponge and wipe down your foreams and lower legs....the skin's thin there, evaporation cools the blood. Same with your scalp.

 

[Woody girl]

The scarves with absorbent crystals in extend the duration of the evaporative cooling effect.

I am not sure if there is something similar that will work on the inside of your forearms.

Otherwise I cheat, 8c. Got to check the trout stocks.

View attachment 103193

I bought one of those scarves at the wilderness gathering last year, worked well, tried to use it yesterday, but its gone all slimy when rehydrated this year,....nasty! They are meant to be reusable. Not this one!

 

[Ozmundo]

 

[Woody girl]

I don't close the windows and doors, I get a cross breeze going by opening one front and back. Works at night too, bedroom windows and bathroom window are at opposite sides of the house and it creates a cool draught.

I don't do well in the heat, I'm much more comfortable in the cold, but I do love this warm dry, mud free, few months.
Use a sponge and wipe down your foreams and lower legs....the skin's thin there, evaporation cools the blood. Same with your scalp.

I wet my hair this morning..long hair.. it was dry in about 3 minutes when i went out to water the garden early!
Tried the through draft, but no breeze and it just gets hotter!
I've got a strange micro climate in my road, being a cul de sac, in a narrow deep valley about half a mile or less across. South facing house with 5 windows and glazed front door on the south or east, only two on the north. Semi detached bungalow, west side, so this is the cooler ground floor temperature.
It was like walking into an oven today if I went outside. In the house, 26 felt cool in comparison to outside.
Ive managed to get it down to 23° tonight so far but its not budging any further, it's 19° outside atm. I just can't seem to get the house cooler.
Would opening the loft hatch to let hot air into the loft work do you reckon, ir would it just spill the hot air from the loftinto the house?
Hot air rises, so technically it should help.

 

[Silverclaws2]

My recent acquisition of a dehumidifier is keeping my place oddly cool, not cool as in temperature as that's high but the lower humidity is making living in higher temperatures that much more comfortable and yes to keep the humidity out am keeping the windows shut. The dehum has it's own two speed fan to keep the air on the move. Also a HEPA filter to be cleaning the air as it dehumidifies. Over the last three days it has extracted 10 litres of water from my air and the water, de-ionised water I can use that for maintaining my water filters.

Current stats ; indoor temp 27 celsius, Humidity 49%

Outside it's the Kilt, Silk Kurta, floppy hat and and soaked bandana that's keeping everything happy.

 

[Falstaff]

Opening the loft hatch should help as roofs are meant to be ventilated, so if you open the windows below it should encourage a vertical cross draft. Roof tiles absorb a lot of heat then radiate it downward at night, and cook you in bed a bit like a grill pan. Putting the tent up in the garden might be a viable sleeping option, and/or putting some fabric over leaning poles over the windows to reduce heat gain. If I get a chance the hammock is going up tonight, (and the insect repellent on).
A fan seems to keep me awake at night but helps, as does a dehumidifier, if you don't mind the electricity bill.

 

[Toddy]

If you open the front (back ? ) door, and open the loft hatch, and the door closes, then it might well be worth opening the hatch and just leaving windows a bit ajar on that side.
I reckon Falstaff has the right of it on the tiles.....our loft would bake bread just now.

 

[Woody girl]

Opening the loft hatch should help as roofs are meant to be ventilated, so if you open the windows below it should encourage a vertical cross draft. Roof tiles absorb a lot of heat then radiate it downward at night, and cook you in bed a bit like a grill pan. Putting the tent up in the garden might be a viable sleeping option, and/or putting some fabric over leaning poles over the windows to reduce heat gain. If I get a chance the hammock is going up tonight, (and the insect repellent on).
A fan seems to keep me awake at night but helps, as does a dehumidifier, if you don't mind the electricity bill.

Yep, my loft is well insulated but concrete tiles make it like an oven!
Wish I could get my hammock up, but I only have one tree, and there is a street light that shines into my garden all night with a terrible white led gleam. Lights the whole garden up, this despite all the other streetlights going out at midnight... and I have contacted the council, still waiting 3 yrs later for a reply despite several phone calls about the nuisance factor and the fact I'm supposedly in a dark sky reserve.
A tent is no good as the slope means I'd slide out of the door within minutes. Then there are the rat family (who have stolen my best rat trap...how the heck can it just disappear????)
Can't afford a dehumidifier sadly. I'm still looking at the cooling pet mat idea. Going into town tomorrow with my neighbour to try and get a couple. One for me, and one for his pup, and hope the shops haven't sold out.
Got to go in to get replacement Henry hoover parts, and another rat trap so ill add the cooling mat to the list, and see if i can get another fan.
It's even hotter today. 31 °
I'm melting.........!

 

[Keith_Beef]

It's warm here, too.


33°C in the shade, and I still have the back garden to strim.

But I bought some ice cream this morning.

 

[Nice65]

So the advice here generally, is "open the windows".

Here it's been hotter out than in, but the bricks and flat roof are heating up now so I've opened all the windows and have a fan running. Dog is on shortish walks to the stream where we paddle, and I'm doing everything slower than usual. Have to say it's not bothering me much at all.

 

[hughtrimble]

I've found external blinds are a real temperature saver. Blinds/curtains inside can only do so much as the sunlight is getting through the glass and then heating the interior, but if the sun is really limited in being able to get inside, you can keep temps down. Currently 5c lower than the outside.

 

[Falstaff]

If the rat gets caught just by it's foot they can drag the trap a long way before either the foot or the trap comes off. Now I know why you are supposed to tie the trap to a stake or something. However, this means you might have to kill a tee'd off rat in the morning, or clear up a rats foot.
I have a neighbour with LED floodlights like that, maybe you need a friend with a catapult or a pair of electrical snips!

 

[Herman30]

All youse opening windows when it´s hot outside; that´s a big error. You just let the heat in.

 

[Pattree]

Dunno whether there might be something useful in this.
With apologies if the link has appeared above.

If you can’t get an air flow then I’d agree with @Herman30. Sub-Saharan Africa and much of the Indian sub continent build thick walls and small windows.

In Thailand their traditional wooden homes are built with roofs higher at one end than the other. This is enough to promote air flow which I find the better option here in UK.

I’m fortunate in that I have a traditional fire place, two stories and a high chimney stack. Total = 11 brush rods. I get a good through draft in my sitting room which is well worth the windows being set at “trickle feed”.

It’s the prairie dog burrow principle:

Even a small difference promotes some air flow.





Edited to add:
Driving a car, once you are over 50mph you are using more fuel to drag on open windows than the air con with closed windows would use.

 

[chimpy leon]

Been working out in it today despite having the remains of a stomach bug / food poisoning in my system, so sweating profusely before I even step outside.
The best I can suggest is stay hydrated, don’t rely on other people for hydration and just enjoy it, because soon enough we’ll be talking waterproofs and long John’s.

 

[Lean'n'mean]

Living in a stone house I tend to move downstairs on the ground floor during heat waves, where the temp. is usually around 15° cooler than outside. Upstairs though, it's way too hot, not just for me but for the electrical equipement too. I only open the windows once the sun goes down, otherwise it's like opening the oven door on gas mk 4.
El Niño is on the way so it risks being an even more brutal summer than usual, looks like southern England won't escape it either. So prepare for periods of 40°C +, droughts, hosepipe bans & Tik Tok babes flooding the Net complaining about the heat.

 

[Jagged77]

We bought a couple of portable aircon units a few years ago and haven’t looked back. They are a chunk of money and not cheap to run but I think it’s a small price to pay for a comfortable nights sleep.

Our bedroom is particularly bad - it catches the full afternoon and evening sun meaning bed time temps of 28 to 30 degrees without it. I wouldn’t be without one in the bedroom now.

 

[TLM]

Well, the one apparent way is to practice in a sauna, in this case you might want an especially bad one as 35 C is not a real sauna temp.