I slept just fine

Yesterday was the type of day that I am glad I live at the bottom level of a three story home. The upper two levels absorb all the heat from the sun, leaving my place relatively nice and cool. It was said that yesterday was the hottest day in San Francisco since October of 2020. Which is to say it was the hottest days I’ve experiences in this new place since I moved here back in November of that same year. Upper 80 degree day? No problem!

I do feel for my housemates upstairs who were absolutely roasting. At least they’ve got a portable AC unit for their office. After work they should have shut it off and turn the room into a sauna. No need to pay heftily for a monthly gym membership!

Joking aside, I too would be running portable air conditioning if my room doesn’t stay as cool as it does. Not for during the day, mind you, but for the precious sleep hours. The body needs to cool down a few degrees in order for us to fall asleep. With indoor temperatures above 80 degrees, it’s nearly impossible to cool down. You’re already sleeping without blanket; there’s nothing more to remove! I know this deeply, because my previous bedroom was on the third floor.

Obviously, sleep is one of the most importantly things to do daily, so the cost to run an AC overnight is completely worth it. I bet my friend, who bought a new house last year and had to take some convincing to install central AC, was loving the decision last night. Even though it only gets that hot for a handful of days per year in San Francisco, it’s only going to get worst, right? Hashtag climate change.

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Puck.

It's so freaking hot

I woke up yesterday feeling rather parched, which was strange because I am the type of person who hydrates properly. Then I remembered: the air-conditioning was on the entire time the day before, and the negative side-effect to having a chilled room is that air-conditioning removes moisture, leaving your skin and mouth dry if you don’t drink more water than usual. So I got up, skipped the coffee (a diuretic that also dehydrates), and made a giant jug of lemon water and promptly drank half of it.

The desperate need for fluids is a small price to pay for the comforts of having air-conditioning. The long three-day Labor Day weekend saw historically high temperatures in much of California, with San Francisco hitting 100 degrees on Sunday afternoon. Since the last such heat-wave, I finally broke down and purchased a portable air-conditioning machine, not wanting to suffer the hot nights of uneasy sleep any longer. Our relatively tiny 10,000 BTU unit did a superb job at keeping our living room at a comfortable (read: not cold enough for multi-layers of clothing) temperature during the day, and evacuating the latent heat in the bedrooms before sleep time.

So glad we bought it in time for this heat-wave, and probably should have done it way sooner.

Traditionally, the long Labor Day weekend is a time for us who work in education to take a breather after the intense opening weeks of the Fall semester. I had plans to the write the August installment of the GT3 diaries, and to devour a few books. The weather gods had other plans of course, and it was entirely too hot inside the house to have any productivity. I feel guilty sometimes being for being such a wimp: temperatures go past 90 and suddenly I can’t work anymore! But you try putting together cogent sentences when merely sitting down and not moving is enough to cause a sweat; my room was a sauna.

It didn’t help I recently just sold my Macbook Pro, so I didn’t have a portable device to bring to the air-conditioned living room to continue working. Instead, I lounged around for much of this past weekend, trying to stay cool and hydrated. Sorry, dear readers: the August update for the 911 GT3 will have to wait another week.

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Weekend position.

Summer hate

Living in San Francisco, we get to enjoy what is called nature’s air conditioning: during the Summer month it stays in the 60s almost all the time. Of course, we expect the few days of high temperatures to give us a good sear once in a while, and this past weekend was unfortunately such a time. The sun was blazing and the weather was in the upper 90s for much of Friday and Saturday. Sunday was thankfully a bit cooler, but it brought on another rare anomaly: thunderstorms. Indeed it was rather weird to open up the blinds in the morning to a darkened grey sky and random thunder strikes.

It was as if someone brought tropical weather to San Francisco. I joked with my friend in Hawaii that we needn’t to come visit her any longer: Hawaii came to us.

Suffice it to say, for a city famous for its mild weather, we are never prepared for mid 90s, no matter the fact these few days of high temperature happens every year like clockwork. I get it: it’s not economical to outfit air-con to buildings for only a small percentage of days out of a whole year. It seems we rather suffer through them than spend the money for central climate control. Thankfully, my friend who lives just south of San Francisco (but not in South San Francisco) outfitted his home with the sweet nectar of air conditioning, and it was there I went this past weekend to escape the brunt of the afternoon heat.

I won’t have to do that for future heatwaves, however: I finally purchased a portable air conditioning unit. I’ve been saying for years that I would get one of these things, but for whatever reason I never clicked the checkout button. What changed this time? It’s not like this particular hot weather pattern was worse than the previous ones - temperatures didn’t even reach over 100! I think the COVID situation finally pushed me over: if I’m going to be stuck at home for work, I would greatly prefer a chilled room in order to concentrate fully. Secondary benefit: I’d get a better night’s sleep.

The portable AC won’t arrive in time for the remainder of this hot weather, but for sure there will be plenty more to come. In the immortal words of John Snow: I’m ready.

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Nice.

Air-con and missing my old WRX STI

In chatting with people today about the Labor Day weekend heat, many have offered anecdotes to support my premise that the reason San Franciscans so loathe the heat is due to the fact our buildings haven’t got air conditioning. The keyword here is respite, and when the temperature is blazing, San Franciscans can’t get any.

Colleagues who hail from southern California all said it felt weird for the weather to be this hot yet when they entered buildings there weren’t any climate control. As I’ve stated in the previous blog post, 100 degree heat is indeed bearable if one is able to avoid prolonged exposure by seeking shelter in air-conditioned buildings. 

Don’t suppose it does the environment any good to sit inside a car for hours with the engine on and AC cranked high. 

With Hurricane Harvey doing damage to the oil refineries (among other destructive behaviors), I guess we should prepare for higher gasoline prices soon. It’s been awhile since I’ve paid over four dollars for a gallon of premium, but with San Francisco being San Francisco and 91 octane already currently sitting at the mid 3′s, I would not be surprised to a see a 4 in front of the decimal point in the coming weeks. 

It’s during gas price surges where I don’t miss my old Subaru WRX STI; averaging 18 miles to a gallon was an absolute pain to the wallet in good times, much less during heightened prices. These days I can romp on the Mazda MX-5 to heart’s content and still manage MPG in the high 20′s. Do I miss the power of the STI, though? Of course, all the time. I don’t miss the 90′s era turbo lag, but once the tach needle is past the number 4, the surge from the EJ257 motor is amazing. 

Cheap horsepower was once the province of WRX STIs and Lancer Evolutions, but if I were to buy today I’d take a serious look at a V8 Mustang or Camaro with their respective performance packs. 400+ horsepower for mid-$30,000 is a mega bargain. 

Climate control is awesome

In what was a tremendous Mother's Day weekend for me got bookended by a terrible case of the sore throat sickness. Obviously, it hasn't been much fun these couple of days. It's definitely passing out though so hopefully I'll be alright by the latter half of this week. 

Temperature has returned to the 90s here in San Francisco once again, which can only be described as torture. At least its forecasted that during the nighttime the mercury will come back down to sane levels, so at the very least I don't have to lie in my own sweat just to get a decent sleep going. Because you're delirious if you think we got air-con here in San Francisco. 

Air-con in the car though, is very nice indeed. Who cares if it degrades my car's already horrendous gas mileage. First world solution to nature's problem, yo. I bet there's a huge subset of people who couldn't care less about climate change because they're so used to man-made climate control in cars, building, and homes.