July 17, 2010

Heat Damage

It's been very hot in Los Angeles and will be very hot again today. If I had an air conditioner that was reliable and effective (I don't), I couldn't afford to run it more than a few hours a day anyway. During heat waves, you need to run an air conditioner most of the day to have a significant effect, and that results in forbiddingly huge electric bills, on the order of several hundred dollars a month at a minimum. So during periods like this, the temperature in my second floor apartment hovers around 85 to 90 degrees most of the time.

And when it's very hot, my permanent symptoms get significantly worse (difficulty breathing, swelling extremities, and more and still worse). It's all I can do to lie down and let a fan move 90 degree air over me. At least the air's moving. And I wait for darkness to fall, bringing a few hours during which I can move around a little bit.

It's supposed to be cooler next week. I hope they're right. In the meantime, I'm in primitive survival mode. Except for dumb little posts like this, writing isn't possible. So I'll be back whenever. For now, apologies, regrets, etc. & so forth.

The cats are also extremely uncomfortable. We keep each other company in our shared unhappiness.