July Heatwaves

So, I hear that the western United States is again on fire, and this time I only mean metaphorically, as summer highs range in triple digits all over the place out here.

Restaurants in Washington state and Oregon have needed to shutter because they can't keep the kitchens cool enough to be safe for the cooks. That information I found interesting, because in my time in the kitchens the temperature on a busy line routinely sits between 130 and 140 degrees.

I mentioned above that "I hear" about the heatwave because I'm lucky enough to live where we live. We did have a few hot days recently, but it never got above 85. The humidity was brutal, and it felt like Manilla or Hanoi outside, but the scorching days that we can get, we haven't been getting right here. 

On NPR in the morning when I take Camille to daycare (so Cass and I can attack the day as two biking blue-eyed weirdos), they mention that "today's going to be another scorcher" and then rattle off the temps that many local locales will be hitting: "118 in Palmdale, 114 in Riverside, 107 at LAX, at the coasts it should be a bit cooler, in the mid 70s." 

People are dying in this heatwave, but our days have been...oddly pleasant? The last few So. East Asian days have been less than ideal, but I've too much other shit going on to have too much survivors guilt.

We leave for the Cabin after some procedural stuff this week, and while the trip up the valley towards Dan's and Sacramento leads us right into the heat, it will bring us to a cooler spot, Mill Creek. Thanks elevation!

On a bike ride with the fam the other day, I stopped and snapped a cropped picture of the remnants of the last piece of natural beach/estuary that exists in the South Bay/Long Beach area:

Surrounded by city and ports, this tiny piece of wetlands was what the majority of the waterfront looked like around us, and now...?

Anyway...

I had a weird idea of how to explain the horrors of what happened during the siege of Chateau Gaillard, when the townsfolk were expelled and then not taken in by King Phillip of France, but I'll need to toy with it a little to see if it has any traction. (Just gotta love Curiosity Stream!)