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You can find the current article at its original source at https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/aug/13/how-to-enjoy-the-heatwave
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| How to enjoy the heatwave! | How to enjoy the heatwave! |
| (10 days later) | |
| 1 Pikachu hunting in your scanties | 1 Pikachu hunting in your scanties |
| Of late, it’s been hard to differentiate between those playing Pokémon Go and those interrogating their dating apps; both require intense concentration, determination in the face of obstacles and an ability to snap to attention in sprightly fashion. (Insert joke about inserting joke here.) With the mercury rising, perhaps it’s time to elide the two, and turn a bewildering video game into a chance to meet future friends outside. Potential chat-up lines: “Come up and see my Bulbasaur sometime”; “Hey, you say Wigglytuff, I say Jigglypuff”; and the old faithful, “Wanna hatch an egg with me?” | Of late, it’s been hard to differentiate between those playing Pokémon Go and those interrogating their dating apps; both require intense concentration, determination in the face of obstacles and an ability to snap to attention in sprightly fashion. (Insert joke about inserting joke here.) With the mercury rising, perhaps it’s time to elide the two, and turn a bewildering video game into a chance to meet future friends outside. Potential chat-up lines: “Come up and see my Bulbasaur sometime”; “Hey, you say Wigglytuff, I say Jigglypuff”; and the old faithful, “Wanna hatch an egg with me?” |
| 2 Learn how to relive the wonder of 1976 | 2 Learn how to relive the wonder of 1976 |
| Those of a certain age and a nostalgic disposition will find themselves hankering for the sight of cracked mud, standpipes and Denis Howell, appointed emergency drought minister as Britain roasted. It is hard to explain this to the young, but bottles of San Pellegrino were much scarcer in the “old days”, and nobody you knew belonged to a gym with a cooling rainforest shower. To go back in time you’ll need a paddling pool in the yard, Dancing Queen on the radio, Taxi Driver at the cinema and Brendan Foster running around the track in Montreal. Remember to share shallow baths and use the bath water for your begonias. See? Simpler, gentler times. If you happen to live near a hipster zone, be discreet: one false move and your house will morph into a 70s cafe filled with beardies with ironically knotted handkerchiefs on their heads. | Those of a certain age and a nostalgic disposition will find themselves hankering for the sight of cracked mud, standpipes and Denis Howell, appointed emergency drought minister as Britain roasted. It is hard to explain this to the young, but bottles of San Pellegrino were much scarcer in the “old days”, and nobody you knew belonged to a gym with a cooling rainforest shower. To go back in time you’ll need a paddling pool in the yard, Dancing Queen on the radio, Taxi Driver at the cinema and Brendan Foster running around the track in Montreal. Remember to share shallow baths and use the bath water for your begonias. See? Simpler, gentler times. If you happen to live near a hipster zone, be discreet: one false move and your house will morph into a 70s cafe filled with beardies with ironically knotted handkerchiefs on their heads. |
| 3 Pull the curtains closed and watch other people sweat | 3 Pull the curtains closed and watch other people sweat |
| There is a certain finger-wagging that goes with pleasant weather: the sense that you must be out in it, for the pragmatic reason that it might be dreich and chilly tomorrow, and the less obvious reason that the gods of nature have sent it to you and to repudiate it would demonstrate ingratitude. Nested within this is the childhood memory of being told to go and play in the fresh air, essentially because your parents or teachers wanted five minutes free of your company. But you are an adult now and you don’t have to care about this. You can sit inside with the telly on and the blinds shut watching the Olympics, cricket, Premier League football or the latest grand prix. Why not make a viewing chart? Who’s to stop you? | There is a certain finger-wagging that goes with pleasant weather: the sense that you must be out in it, for the pragmatic reason that it might be dreich and chilly tomorrow, and the less obvious reason that the gods of nature have sent it to you and to repudiate it would demonstrate ingratitude. Nested within this is the childhood memory of being told to go and play in the fresh air, essentially because your parents or teachers wanted five minutes free of your company. But you are an adult now and you don’t have to care about this. You can sit inside with the telly on and the blinds shut watching the Olympics, cricket, Premier League football or the latest grand prix. Why not make a viewing chart? Who’s to stop you? |
| 4 Stimulate the economy, one festive bauble at a time | 4 Stimulate the economy, one festive bauble at a time |
| Selfridges on London’s Oxford Street has already opened its Christmas shop, in large part to satisfy the summer tourist trade and – although it might seem incongruous to be stocking up on the tinsel – there’s wisdom to counter-intuitive consumerism. In the way that women are said to forget the trauma of childbirth between pregnancies, shoppers blank out the torment of standing, trapped within a heaving mass of desperation, holding an overpriced milk-frother that’s destined to end up in the hands of an aunt who’s only ever drunk tea. Seriously: go when it’s quiet. | Selfridges on London’s Oxford Street has already opened its Christmas shop, in large part to satisfy the summer tourist trade and – although it might seem incongruous to be stocking up on the tinsel – there’s wisdom to counter-intuitive consumerism. In the way that women are said to forget the trauma of childbirth between pregnancies, shoppers blank out the torment of standing, trapped within a heaving mass of desperation, holding an overpriced milk-frother that’s destined to end up in the hands of an aunt who’s only ever drunk tea. Seriously: go when it’s quiet. |
| 5 Give the swerve to eating alfresco | 5 Give the swerve to eating alfresco |
| OK, there are exceptions. By all means eat a salad at the little table just outside your kitchen door, or the most basic of sandwiches on a park bench. Anything more elaborate, forget it: the inhabitants of this drizzly island are simply not cut out for outdoor troughing. Countless magazine articles will try to convince you otherwise, with pictures of salads dotted with pomegranate seeds, micro herbs (whatever they are), haunches of slickly marinated beast roasting beneath the stars and groups of friends laughing glamorously over cocktails. Hot-weather truthers tell it like it really is: egg sandwiches, warm Foster’s, wasps, unexpected gusts of wind that blow salt over everything, and a row about how to use the parking app. | OK, there are exceptions. By all means eat a salad at the little table just outside your kitchen door, or the most basic of sandwiches on a park bench. Anything more elaborate, forget it: the inhabitants of this drizzly island are simply not cut out for outdoor troughing. Countless magazine articles will try to convince you otherwise, with pictures of salads dotted with pomegranate seeds, micro herbs (whatever they are), haunches of slickly marinated beast roasting beneath the stars and groups of friends laughing glamorously over cocktails. Hot-weather truthers tell it like it really is: egg sandwiches, warm Foster’s, wasps, unexpected gusts of wind that blow salt over everything, and a row about how to use the parking app. |
| 6 Key to surviving the office: bosses must buy ice-creams | 6 Key to surviving the office: bosses must buy ice-creams |
| It is vital that office workers should not dwell on what home-based colleagues might be up to: a spot of light gardening; floating around in a cool kaftan; bunking off early to watch cricket on the green. It’s not even accurate. Most of the time they’re not bothering to work at all. Think instead of what they’re missing – the camaraderie of the commute, with its opportunities to revive someone who has fainted; the moment the boss appears with ice-creams for all, as if a Solero could make up for the sheer humiliation of being sat, dripping with sweat, in front of a monitor; then there’s the morale-boosting outings to the packed pubs for a “cold one”; and the shared hatred for holidaying colleagues. And remember the rewards, for the powers-that-be are sure to notice your dedication. | It is vital that office workers should not dwell on what home-based colleagues might be up to: a spot of light gardening; floating around in a cool kaftan; bunking off early to watch cricket on the green. It’s not even accurate. Most of the time they’re not bothering to work at all. Think instead of what they’re missing – the camaraderie of the commute, with its opportunities to revive someone who has fainted; the moment the boss appears with ice-creams for all, as if a Solero could make up for the sheer humiliation of being sat, dripping with sweat, in front of a monitor; then there’s the morale-boosting outings to the packed pubs for a “cold one”; and the shared hatred for holidaying colleagues. And remember the rewards, for the powers-that-be are sure to notice your dedication. |
| 7 Catch up on your reading | 7 Catch up on your reading |
| The sensation of being becalmed during a hot spell has often inspired fiction writers, notably LP Hartley whose novel The Go-Between is set during a sultry Edwardian summer. Plunge into a bit of Hartley then meander into Maggie O’Farrell’s Instructions for a Heatwave via Ian McEwan’s The Cement Garden. And don’t miss Alexandra Harris’s Weatherland, a survey of writers’ and artists’ relationship with the climate that includes a wonderful description of Jonathan Swift sweating through a heatwave and eventually diving into the Thames at night (not recommended). | The sensation of being becalmed during a hot spell has often inspired fiction writers, notably LP Hartley whose novel The Go-Between is set during a sultry Edwardian summer. Plunge into a bit of Hartley then meander into Maggie O’Farrell’s Instructions for a Heatwave via Ian McEwan’s The Cement Garden. And don’t miss Alexandra Harris’s Weatherland, a survey of writers’ and artists’ relationship with the climate that includes a wonderful description of Jonathan Swift sweating through a heatwave and eventually diving into the Thames at night (not recommended). |
| 8 The fine art of complaining | 8 The fine art of complaining |
| Few topics are as fun to complain about as the weather, a pursuit that is both entirely futile and boundless. There is always something coming out of the sky, and always will be until there isn’t, and then we really will have something to complain about. There is also much fun to be had with, say, air conditioning – lack of, as compared with fortunate America, and ecological evils of; the garden – who can keep up with the watering and everything’s over by August anyway; clothes shops – the ludicrousness of their being filled with autumn wear; pub gardens – the impossibility of getting a seat; neighbours – the inconsiderate nature of open windows; and sleep – who even bothers to try. That lot should keep you going until January. | Few topics are as fun to complain about as the weather, a pursuit that is both entirely futile and boundless. There is always something coming out of the sky, and always will be until there isn’t, and then we really will have something to complain about. There is also much fun to be had with, say, air conditioning – lack of, as compared with fortunate America, and ecological evils of; the garden – who can keep up with the watering and everything’s over by August anyway; clothes shops – the ludicrousness of their being filled with autumn wear; pub gardens – the impossibility of getting a seat; neighbours – the inconsiderate nature of open windows; and sleep – who even bothers to try. That lot should keep you going until January. |
| 9 Speaking of which … | 9 Speaking of which … |
| Take a rest from politics, or at least politics as currently conducted on social media. Bawling at people about Brexit, cavilling about Jeremy Corbyn – it’s a pastime surely best saved for when the evenings close in. Take a leaf out of Owen Smith’s book: last weekend saw him on Twitter posting a selfie taken after a swim at the London Fields Lido in Hackney, somewhat daringly given the prevailing political wind in north London. But while the heat is on the street, better that the hot air on Twitter should cool down, and everyone calm down, with some soothing pictures of animals having a paddle; it’s not called the silly season for nothing. Meanwhile, those referendum leaflets you haven’t got round to recycling are perfect for fanning a fevered brow. | Take a rest from politics, or at least politics as currently conducted on social media. Bawling at people about Brexit, cavilling about Jeremy Corbyn – it’s a pastime surely best saved for when the evenings close in. Take a leaf out of Owen Smith’s book: last weekend saw him on Twitter posting a selfie taken after a swim at the London Fields Lido in Hackney, somewhat daringly given the prevailing political wind in north London. But while the heat is on the street, better that the hot air on Twitter should cool down, and everyone calm down, with some soothing pictures of animals having a paddle; it’s not called the silly season for nothing. Meanwhile, those referendum leaflets you haven’t got round to recycling are perfect for fanning a fevered brow. |
| 10 Eat, drink and be merry, because tomorrow it rains | 10 Eat, drink and be merry, because tomorrow it rains |
| If you have absorbed all of the above and find it wanting in joie de vivre, feel free to toss it out of the window. In reality, we know that, following a short season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, and a few pre-solstice jabs at jollity, courtesy of Bonfire Night and Hallowe’en, we will soon be plunged into greyness, rain, thermal vests and darkness by four. To some, this is very heaven, but it has the rest of us reaching for the SAD lamps and Googling sun-drenched beaches. So, grab this opportunity to play Frisbee in the park, sip long, icy drinks and generally do all manner of things that only usually appear in romcom montages. | If you have absorbed all of the above and find it wanting in joie de vivre, feel free to toss it out of the window. In reality, we know that, following a short season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, and a few pre-solstice jabs at jollity, courtesy of Bonfire Night and Hallowe’en, we will soon be plunged into greyness, rain, thermal vests and darkness by four. To some, this is very heaven, but it has the rest of us reaching for the SAD lamps and Googling sun-drenched beaches. So, grab this opportunity to play Frisbee in the park, sip long, icy drinks and generally do all manner of things that only usually appear in romcom montages. |
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