Today the temperature has reached 44 45.1 deg, after 44 yesterday, and 43.4 the day before...At least, we haven't had any air conditioning problems today, nor any power outages, at work anyway, but lots of places are suffering with no power as well.
There is a cool change predicted at any moment...
But the respite will be very short, tomorrow is predicted to be 35...
That almost seems like cool weather after three days over 43...
Postscript: The temperature reached 47 deg in the Wimmera...
Yesterday got to 44 degrees in Melbourne, but somehow we survived, despite a couple of air conditioning break downs in the morning at work. Pity the poor technician who was on the roof when the outside temperature in the shade was 39 deg. Any faint hope of being sent home was extinguished by lunchtime, and it turned into a long day, but the upside was that traffic was not too bad when I left work.
It seemed cruel to leave Mischa locked up in the upstairs bathroom overnight, where the air conditioning does not penetrate, so she has been running free the last two nights. This has caused a little bit of adventuring and noise, as she knocked over the laundry basket, and several failed attempts to jump onto the window sill in the wee hours of the morning.
The heat wave continues, yesterday's top was 43 degrees, with another one predicted today, and more hot weather to come over coming days.
According to the weather bureau, the current heat wave is expected to be the hottest for something like 100 years, and there is little chance of any relief until the weekend, and even then, there will only be a brief respite before the heat rolls in again.
Apparently this heat wave is caused by a blocking high pressure system over the Tasman Sea, drawing hot Northerly winds across Victoria and South Australia from central Australia. The heat changes lots of things in the way we go about things: our houses are not built for extended heat waves, as we normally only get one or two hot days in a row before a cool change. The affordability of air conditioning systems means that many of us do have them installed these days, in contrast to my childhood when the best that we could manage was a fan.
The most extreme day that I can remember, as a child was when it reached 116 deg F or 46 C. When you don't have air conditioning, there is nothing that can be done to make the house cooler. During the heat of the day, my brothers and I sat motionless on our wide shady verandah in our cotton shorts and shirts, spreading our limbs out so that there was the maximum exposure of bare skin to any stray breeze that came along. We tried to sleep at nights, but pillows felt unbelievably hot, and after a while, nothing made a difference at all. Even sleeping on campbeds on the verandah didn't help, as the beds really only allow you to stay in one spot on the bed, in contrast to normal beds when you can move around to a spot that has not been heated to body temperature.
Eventually the temperature will drop, things will return to normal, and the events of this week will go into folklore: Do you remember how hot it was in January 2009?
Having a long weekend to relax always seems a nice way to end January.
Saturday was a bit of a nothing day, with a sleep in until I could not put up with kitten games in the bed.
Sunday, retracing steps we returned to our old stomping ground to catch up with old friends. Yesterday was a public holiday for Australia Day, and as is traditional there was cricket, and tennis to watch on the TV and an impromptu lunch at Pink Ukulele and Y's place
In an update on small felines, thankfully our temporary house guest stayed only one night, as a keen buyer was found very quickly. And our permanent residents, Coco and MIscha are getting on quite well, but still not prepared to sleep in the same space. All the same, there has been a lot of thundering about, up and down stairs, and from one end of the house to the other, with each of them taking it in turns to be the chaser.
I bought a lovely blue collar on Friday afternoon, but Mischa's verdict was "Not for me", and I have yet to find it, as it was shed sometime on Saturday, somewhere in the house.
I have enjoyed the cooler than normal temperatures that we had been experiencing, but this week we are in summer with a vengeance, with 38 deg the prediction for today, and 41, 40,40 to come, before a cooler change late Saturday, and some relief with 30 on Sunday.
Spare a thought for us, as we swelter in the heat.
We've been experiencing a very mild summer, by usual standards, until yesterday, when the thermometer hit 37 degrees, the first hot day of the summer. This causes a bit of chaos in the public transport system, as trains are cancelled or delayed due to faults, but as a fair proportion of the population are still on holidays, the road network was not crowded, and the trip home wasn't a long one.
Warm temperatures prevailed overnight, with a minimum of 28 degrees setting us up for another scorcher, today, with a predicted top of 39 degrees, prior to a welcome cool change later in the day. It's good news that the change has already reached Warrnambool, so relief is not too far away.
Hot weather does not deter Mischa the kitten from playing games, although she, like us, approves the airconditioning on a hot Melbourne night.
