I lifted the hair off the back of my neck, just to try to get some air to move back there. Long hair is great, but a curtain of long hair is just not a good idea right now. Streams of sweat trickled down the back of my legs. My shirt was suctioned to my back.

I looked around Waterloo Station and saw that I was not alone in this-we were all wilting.

If you've been reading the papers or browsing other websites, you'll see that England is currently in the midst of a bad heat wave. With the exception of a week of rain we had in June we've been faced with hot weather everyday.

Americans have one topic that they leap to upon meeting other Americans-that enigmatic "Where're you from?" It's the one thing that brings the Yanks together, and no matter how many times I explain it to people, it doesn't seem to sink in-America is so damn big that the greatest commonality is seeing if the person you're talking to is on the same wavelength, having experience from the same place.

The English seem to have their own version of community, and that is the weather. Without fail, if we bump into another English family while travelling, the first words out of their mouth will have to do with the weather. While the Americans tug at their baseball caps and squint, trying to recall if they've ever been to Dallas or Lincoln or Boston, the English smile and relay similar sentiments-have they ever seen this much rain, this much heat, this kind of sunset.

The weather here has united us all. Truthfully, we've been in a drought for months. We live in southern England, where Thames Water has put us under what's called a hosepipe ban (which illicits immature laughter from me everytime I hear the word "hosepipe".) This basically means we're not allowed to use the hoses, no watering of lawns, washing of cars, etc.

Our beautiful garden is nearly burnt to a crisp. The grass is brown. Everything is basically dead. We're lucky in some ways-we'd been warned that we may have to face what's called a standpipe ban, which basically means that the water to everyone's homes would be turned off, and we could only collect water from a single standpipe that Thames Water would put in each neighborhood.

The idea of collecting water in buckets for household use was enough to assure us that, should that happen, the rest of the summer would be spent on the continent.

The summer has been fantastic-warm, sunny, and lovely. But yesterday was just too much-we hit 97 degrees yesterday. I remember that in Texas that's considered a light breezy day, but there's one thing to remember-there's no air conditioning here. So while I know other areas have similar heat, at least you have respite. Here we just chug down frescatos during the day and beer at night (mmmmm.....beer....).

My beloved coffee has become something that you have one cup of in the morning to wake your ass up, then you don't go near again, as it will almost certainly cause your pores to go into meltdown mode.

We have one fan in the household, and it's going 24 hours a day. Even if work and Gorby needs meant we could sleep in, once the morning sun hits the house it's too hot to sleep. The windows are flung open to try to allow any kind of breeze whatsoever, but the upstairs (which we loved for being so full of light) is a little too full of light-Angus' study is up there, and yesterday he was working in this underwear (the day that video conferencing becomes a regular occurence is the day that I stop working from home). There's little movement in the house. The animals don't come to life until dark, they spend the day collapsed on the cool kitchen tiles (the kitchen gets very little sun so is luckily the coolest room in the house.)

At least I think it's the animals.

They just look like piles of hair, but that could just be my lax vacuuming.

London yesterday was a nightmare. Ironically, I have been in England on the hottest day in history, which was in August 2003. Yesterday felt no different. Most of my team showed up in shorts for a two hour meeting in central London-the idea of wearing a suit wasn't even debatable. I myself was in a tank top and skirt-it's just too sweltering to try to dress professionally, and we're all too hot to ogle. Everywhere we look everyone is dressed down, and suddenly you see loads of tattooes and more baps than you ever thought possible.

In this kind of heat you have to walk to where you need to get to. You just can't take the tube or buses, because the tube in this heat is really just an aluminum container used for cooking people-think mcrowave popcorn bag and you'll understand how it feels. Waterloo, with it's huge gaping glass and metal structure, felt like an oven. We all cart around bottles of water and pretend we don't see the sweat stains running down everyone's shirts because if we don't see theirs, they can't see ours.

It's hot, yes. It's unbearable, yes. The papers could be accused of sensationalism to some degree though-while it's true that some of the roads are, indeed, melting and true that people are dropping like flies in the midday sun, they make it sound like we're running around the streets with our faces melting off. Reading the headlines of papers around here, it would seem that there is a touch of madness, albeit with the proper British slant:

The Guardian: We Do Go a Bit Mad in the Sun

Or The Times: A sweltering day that outshone the glory of July 1911

It's true that life with this kind of heat means patterns have to alter. Angus and I don't cuddle when we fall asleep now, but that's because we'd spontaneously combust from the heat. I wave feebly at him from my side of the bed, and he lifts an eyebrow in response. This is "I love you" in tropical language. Sex is something that sounds good in theory, but we only indulge in it if it means neither of us has to move very much. The argument for who'll be on top suddenly takes on relationship proportions-I love you baby and I really want your body, but only if it means I can hold still in doing so.

The heat will go away.

Get back to me in November, when I'm freezing my breasts off and wishing for a good 97 degree day.

-H.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 08:28 AM | Comments (13) | Add Comment
Post contains 1128 words, total size 7 kb.

1 So I'm moving in August, to England. Awaiting response from the British Consulate as to whether or not I have my spousal visa. But selfishly I don't want to move until the heat wave ends! I was there in August 2003 and it wasn't pretty. Roll on some proper English summer weather! Hope you can survive it without spontaneously combusting!

Posted by: Juls at July 20, 2006 11:51 AM (ka1Yp)

2 ugh, sounds horrid. Another thing that is sure to elicit anti-cuddle behavior is mutual sun burns.

Posted by: jadewolff at July 20, 2006 12:29 PM (cH5GO)

3 I am the heat miser because everytime I come to England it has a heat wave (this one is NOT my fault). The last time I was forced to wear a cocktail dress for the entire week because I had packed for London, not Costa Rica. It makes a girl paranoid, wondering if all the talk of cold damp London is just to throw people off since I have spent weeks in London during various years and never once has it even rained. -your suspicious American friend (from NJ who knows people from Austin)

Posted by: That Girl at July 20, 2006 01:21 PM (QzfsY)

4 Heh. Baps. I love that word. Hell, I love baps, themselves. I cut my waist-length hair when I moved to Texas in June of 2000 because the heat was so unbearable.

Posted by: Ms. Pants at July 20, 2006 01:31 PM (r6SJw)

5 I remember August 2003. I spent a lot of time drinking pims while sitting in Soho Square with a gaggle of gay men.

Posted by: some girl at July 20, 2006 02:43 PM (+3BZS)

6 I've been thinking about you everyday as I listen to Radio 1 and they go on and on about the heat. Yesterday was supposed to have been the hottest day of the year, and perhaps the hottest day in England's history. Although, I guess that didn't pan out or I'd have heard it on the news this morning. Try and stay cool. I'll be thinking about your plight as I lounge around in my air conditioned apartment.

Posted by: amy t. at July 20, 2006 02:44 PM (zPssd)

7 Um...so, dumb question. WHY no a.c. there? We, too, are having a heat wave, but thank goodness for a.c.!!!

Posted by: sue at July 20, 2006 02:47 PM (WbfZD)

8 If you can get a good enough plug converter (that can handle the load), I would be more than happy to send a window box (or two) as they are on massive sale at costco. You're an American, so why stiff upper lip it? Cave to the glories of the window AC!

Posted by: caltechgirl at July 20, 2006 05:59 PM (/vgMZ)

9 I'd much rather be hot than cold, but I agree, this current heat wave is too much already!

Posted by: kenju at July 20, 2006 07:16 PM (2+7OT)

10 If 97 qualifies as a heat wave, then I want to live there rather than Southern CA where it has been over 100 for the last week! Luuuuuucky. Although from experience, heat in the UK is far more humid. Hope you have some good AC!

Posted by: Ari at July 21, 2006 03:46 AM (/C7zM)

11 Don't be too sure about being able to flee to the continent. We're breaking heat records here in Holland, the entire country is miserable and water problems aren't all that far away... what I wouldn't do for airco...

Posted by: Hannah at July 21, 2006 07:31 AM (oHKkc)

12 Hehe.. a couple fans positioned just right and a partial tub of tepidly cool water would probably give you both reasons to move about a bit.. (Classicly wicked Grin). Lucky me it ONLY hit 100 one day last week.. and I had just installed my very first ever Air conditioner. Its not big enough for my apartment but as big as the VERY old fashion wiring will handle.. managed to keep the temperature down to the 80s in most of it... I sacked out on a sleeping bag right in front of it and cheerfull ignored the ocasional water it spit.

Posted by: LarryConley at July 24, 2006 01:54 PM (YH2rV)

13 My car has an outside thermometer, and you can read the temp in Celcius or Fahrenheit. 106º F, or 41ºC. Joy. Joy. Apparently, the Netherlands is experiencing its hottest summer ever. The temps are in the 70s! I think I can make a suggestion if you want to go to the continent...

Posted by: B. Durbin at July 26, 2006 01:49 AM (tie24)

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