Hot Hot Heat

We’re in the middle of a short heatwave here in Virginia.  There’s some relief coming on Thursday and thereafter, but in the meantime we’re preparing for highs in the low 90’s today and tomorrow, after a high of 87 degrees yesterday.  While we’re still licking our collective heat bill wounds from the brutal winter, it just seems unfair to have to kick on the air conditioning just yet, right?

We came home yesterday to a house at a reasonable temperature, although that quickly went downhill as soon as we opened the doors and windows, allowing the small bits of trapped chilly air to escape.  It was about 80 degree when we went to bed.  If you had asked me months ago when I was slowly dying of hypothermia in the middle of the night when we lost power due to the snowstorm, I would have sworn that dying at the hands of a heatwave was a more humane way to go.  I think my mind changed sometime around the time where I was falling asleep last night with the ice pack (usually reserved for ankle injuries and the like) nestled around the back of my neck.

Now, see I’m a hot-blooded person on any given day of the year.  And pregnancy, as expected, has cranked up my internal thermostat to somewhere around HotterThanHell.  As in, if my palms touch my wife, she jerks back, assuming I’m armed with a hot iron or boiling tea kettle.  Even pre-pregnancy, I’m not allowed to hold things like chocolate bars, since they will quickly disintegrate right in my hands.  You can see how much I’m looking forward to going to my non air-conditioned home this evening.

We left this morning after closing all of the windows and blinds, hoping to trap in as much of the cool morning air as possible.  In the summer, when this kind of heat is more seasonable, our house is usually covered by a shady canopy of mature oak tree limbs and leaves, but we’ve still got a few weeks to go until our trees are well-equipped.  So it’s at the mercy of the 92 degree full on sunshine today.  Tonight will be a different story, but not one unlike last night’s heat extravaganza.  I’d give in to cranking on the A/C for just a couple of days, but my wife’s alternative is one that involves sleeping on the futon in the much cooler basement.  Aside from strapping ice packs to all of my extremities (seriously, my feet might burst into flames at any moment now), either sound preferable to burning alive for two more nights.