Friday, August 4, 2006
is it actually hotter than ever?
Update. The Anchoress quotes Patrick Michaels, senior fellow for environmental studies at the Cato Institute, about the exact same period of time in 1930. Why hasn't this been mentioned all over the place, huh??
I can't help wondering whether it's really hotter than ever or whether we're just less resilient now that we have air conditioning so many places. I mean, I know we have record hot days and all, but I totally remember weeks at a time in the 90s and stretches of days over 100. Why was this last heat wave reputed to be so horribly dangerous? It did feel bad, but east coast humidity has long been famous for feeling bad. When I first went to work (in some year B.C., in NYC), since it wasn't 'done' to wear comfy shoes to and from work (I'll save a discussion of the advent of flip-flops for another time) so you wore high heels out of the house and onto the subway and down the street to the office. Every so often, though, you'd stick in the pavement. Yes, stick. Those cute little stiletto heels plunged straight into heated, therefore soggy, pavement. If you were lucky, you felt it coming before you pitched forward onto the, uh, pitch, and didn't fall on your face. But my point is: it was hot then, really hot. And it was hot in 1988 (I think that was the year) when it hit 90 in May and stayed over 90 until September, with only a few days cooler. And my questions are: if it's worse now, what's the measuring stick that defines this as worse? and is there anything we can or should do about it? and if it isn't worse, why don't we turn the a/c to a higher temperature and learn to live with it better? Let me know what you think.
From June 1 to August 31, 1930, 21 days had high temperatures that were 100 degrees or above" in the metropolitan Washington, D.C., area and he added that "[t]hat summer has never been approached, and it's not going to be approached this year. . . . Between July 19 and Aug. 9 of that year, heat records were set on nine days and they remain unbroken more than three-quarters of a century later.
I can't help wondering whether it's really hotter than ever or whether we're just less resilient now that we have air conditioning so many places. I mean, I know we have record hot days and all, but I totally remember weeks at a time in the 90s and stretches of days over 100. Why was this last heat wave reputed to be so horribly dangerous? It did feel bad, but east coast humidity has long been famous for feeling bad. When I first went to work (in some year B.C., in NYC), since it wasn't 'done' to wear comfy shoes to and from work (I'll save a discussion of the advent of flip-flops for another time) so you wore high heels out of the house and onto the subway and down the street to the office. Every so often, though, you'd stick in the pavement. Yes, stick. Those cute little stiletto heels plunged straight into heated, therefore soggy, pavement. If you were lucky, you felt it coming before you pitched forward onto the, uh, pitch, and didn't fall on your face. But my point is: it was hot then, really hot. And it was hot in 1988 (I think that was the year) when it hit 90 in May and stayed over 90 until September, with only a few days cooler. And my questions are: if it's worse now, what's the measuring stick that defines this as worse? and is there anything we can or should do about it? and if it isn't worse, why don't we turn the a/c to a higher temperature and learn to live with it better? Let me know what you think.
Labels: blogs (others'), modern culture
Permalink | 
| posted by jau at 9:35 AM
DADvocate — at 10:33 PM, August 05, 2006:
jau — at 4:19 AM, August 06, 2006:
| posted by jau at 9:35 AM
3 more:
DADvocate — at 10:33 PM, August 05, 2006:
The info in the update is quite interesting because many metropolitan areas are hotter now simply because they are bigger, and have more buildings and blacktop, etc.
The record temperature for my hometown of Knoxville, 104 in 1930. Record high for Cincinnati (close to where I now live), 109 in 1934.
The record temperature for my hometown of Knoxville, 104 in 1930. Record high for Cincinnati (close to where I now live), 109 in 1934.
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jau — at 4:19 AM, August 06, 2006:
It also occurred to me that there are many more people now and there was very little a/c years ago but many people have it now (and like it, especially when it's hot). Which makes me think that may be the real issue this year, more than the actual heat.
109?! Whew.
109?! Whew.
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