:-D
Andrew, are you totally mad?
Fortunately we've got air conditioning in the shop. At home it's a different story - haven't slept properly for ages! That's the only down side - not sleeping well, otehrwise business as normal, did a 95 km ride yesterday with some big climbs in 35+° and still managed a decent average speed :-)
2120 and our indoor temperature is 34°C! I have just watered what I think I can rescue (thus also save water). This morning I stayed at the riding school and watched my daughter. It was 32° and we were saying how cool it was, partly because there were clouds and a breeze. This afternoon, I was soaked working downstairs in a cool room. This weekend is 'cool' whereas next Saturday is going over 40°. I am enjoying it actually, but the poor dogs are not and the family heading south Monday before dawn. What will they have between here and the Alps? I think they will spend a fair bit of time up in the family's cabin where it rarely goes over mid-20s. It has been hotter though but if summers keep doing this, then sooner or later our 44°C record will be broken.
Never known it as hot as it is here atm. We live at 750m altitude, just south of Clermont Ferrand & normally have a nice breeze blowing while the valley suffers, but the temps are reaching the 40s even here. I too am glad we have no guests in the B&B or gite just now. It means I can wander round in very little clothing without scaring folk!
On the subject of public toilets, Russia in the early 2000s was not the place to be caught short away from home. Particularly memorable was a stop-off on a long coach journey. All the women queued up to enter a gypsy caravan billed as the wc. When my turn came I went in to find bare floorboards swimming...
Another time we went to watch the a football match - FC Fakel Vonronezh, a national league side with a seated stadium. Half-time, a friend and I went in search of the toilets. They were all urinals. A lady came in to the bathroom and seeing us looking around blankly, she cheerfully said, "It's okay, I'll keep all the men out while you squat in the corner and then you can do the same for me"!
Both times I saw the attraction of being a man. Sounds like they get a better deal with headgear too.
Hahaha La dolce vita, Brian..reheated dessert hey? Hyper-U's Semoule de riz, 4 pack, is my best effort, for the dog and me... But... Here's the best idea...freebies!!!...almost...
The next, best.. *No Dosh* 'cooler' solutions, after 3 metres of wet muslin - http://www.provident-living-today.com/Alternative-Refrigeration.html
(Together with hay box cooker of course)..
Got the Mobicool already and got €12 off! I think it is normally about €108, but it both chills and warms (not hot though) so great for making food to take to somebody else's house if you make the pud. Nothing can be worse than a reheated dessert that goes dry :-( I bought it well before warm weather entered anybody's mind, I'd recommend it to anybody looking for one a bit up market but cheaper than the car fridge/freezers.
Absolute agreement, Brian, ref grown lazy and forgotten stuff. Really...I'm sure of it.. !
Death of creativity...except for the ability to google search online shopping... looks possible until you consider alternative solutions already flourishing..
Remarkable solutions to life's most basic probs...have already been tried and found... for millions of years.. Finding water, growing food, composting...making clothes and every bit of basic home kit...just pick the very best personal solution...out of thousands..all...without any dosh at all...
But...the Norauto bi-energie 12v/ 230v glaciere.. Is only..49.95, Brian...
Plus you get 10e knocked off ....over 50es worth....I think that means...
No. I'll leave out the sums...
No pee for a fortnight....hmmmm....honest?
I thought no pee for a few days...must mean top level toxicity...I suppose sweating a lot achieves approx same healthy condition...as peeing...
One Tunisian village, public WC stays with me, always.
Wonderful ref the wet turban...this explains a couple of continents of male headgear...but wonder why females usually make do with head scarves...they can't work nearly so well....
Jeanette, the Glacière Mobicool is superb.
Heck, brave, brave, brave! Perhaps foolish too. But you were young and survived, so perhaps there is another way rather than the Tuareg formula ;-)
I spent a fortnight in August riding a bike around Upper Egypt when I was 19, I strapped 6x2l bottles of water on the bike & had a load of muslin on my head which I soaked regularly. Didn't pee for a fortnight, which was a bit worrying but also convenient as there are no loos unless you're in a village (& you don't want to go near those ones).
Only the last paragraph. I have worked in Saharan and Sub-Saharan Africa enough, although it used to be the UN's fleet of Dodge pick-ups, occasionally Landrovers and now ubiquitous 4x4s with a couple of tries (painfully) riding a camel for amusement's sake. After all, what kind of anthro would I be if I did not go into what they wear, do, eat and all the rest of it.
But not an oasis, just a palm tree or clump of and it needs to be the right kind of terrain, not fine sand, but an oasis is the water bit not the trees. It would take a lot of spitting to make an oasis - but let's not even go there ;-)
Water in the desert. Yep, a sheet of corrugated iron, kind of made into a bridge, supported on a couple of stones at one end with a pan under the middle of the other end that the condensation drips off. It collects a little, but where there is otherwise none it seemed ingenious to me. There are lots of similar ways of doing it I believe.
The most adverse conditions really do bring out the best solutions. We have grown lazy and forgotten far too much. Survival skills are now treated like a TV reality show ability rather than a life essential.
Sounds easy enough...of course...the head wrapping is brilliant...
Did you make that up? It sounds like it would work...leaving out the bit about creating another oasis...it sounds like its from the Tuaregs...I remember the 'oooo-er nev-ah!'...experiments ref heat reflecting/absorbing surfaces from skoool...and ..same lesson..not believing in the (very thick, not lightweight) dark clothing of desert people... Wrapping heads in muslin could be good...espec. if wet and iced in the fridge, first?.... I'm convinced...people who live with worst conditions...have already discovered best solutions...or they would not have survived... I remember...same lesson..how to get water in the desert..overnight condensation......
Needs some in depth research....and do not resort to sales of gadgets online...(though I'm impressed by Norauto's mini portable coolers, especially if you get the Leclerc 10e off all over 50es, of that store...
Wrap three meters of muslin cloth around your head, wear loose dark blue because dark coloured clothing absorbs heat and light coloured reflects but gets hot itself, so never white. Dark coloured clothes absorb both external and internal heat, drawing away the heat your body is emitting. The slightest breeze on the dark blue clothes convects the heat away from the cloth faster than it is absorbed. Then drink very hot, sweet (yuck!!) tea several times a day and only over take small gulps of water the rest of the time. Put a date (fresh) in your mouth, suck lightly until the skin has disintegrated then let the flesh melt into your mouth slowly then keep the stone in your mouth until you have a gulp of water, then next date in. First bit of rain and the well sucked date seed will germinate, making a new 'food station' in the desert.
Nope, don't think it works in France. Shortage of camels probably being the main reason. Not to mention prohibitive VAT on cotton muslin for the clothes and head wear no doubt. There is also probably a law against spitting out date stones as well ;-)
Bit better today temperature-wise. We even got the dogs out for a walk at 7am while it was only about 20. We'll fare better once we get another room downstairs habitable. At the moment we're living/working in one room which is lovely and cool in the morning but gets the full sun in the afternoon. When my partner gets the other living room finished, we'll be able to spend afternoons on the other side of the house.
We have a spring but it has slowed down over the last few days, so I don't think it would sustain us in a drought. I would be interested to know on the question of water whether people drink the tap water here or buy bottled. I would prefer to drink the tap water but just can't get to like the taste - too hard for me.
Unless....that was a complaint.. ref creating illusion of nubile ladies in damp cotton on the seashore in moonlight. Sorry...if so...think instead...
damp-protége-matelas..full of giant spuds..