*What is the trend here as the climate crisis grows more intense, poverty increases, and energy becomes harder to find? It's a record-breaking 107 degrees Fahrenheit in the capital of Texas today.
*A society that fails to confront blatant physical realities has a death wish.
"A fan, like tilting at windmills, can only go so far in the swelter of summer.
"So Janice Bell cooked her day's meals in the mornings, before the heat grabbed everything in a headlock, choking the air with an unrelenting ferocity. She took frequent cold showers and hung black trash bags behind the blinds of her windows, giving her small apartment a cavelike glow.
"Flora Ruedas keeps her home dark, too; she drinks iced coffee and shuts her doors and windows. She has gone so far as to try chilling her bedsheets in the freezer before bedtime.
"With Austin on pace for possibly its hottest summer ever — Thursday was the 51st day of 100-degree heat; the record is 69 days — Central Texans are dealing with the punishing heat any way they can. Air conditioning is the magic elixir, but for some like Ruedas, it is a luxury they cannot afford. Many cope without even a fan. For them, the heat wave presents a sweaty, marathon test of will, and the tips they employ aren't intended to beat the heat, just to end in some kind of well-fought draw.
"Ruedas, 74, actually has a window air conditioner. But save for the rare occasions when she has company or when the heat is too much to bear, Ruedas chooses not to use it, to save on her electric bill. She estimates that running the air conditioner every day would add at least $100 a month to her electric bill, an expense the retired sorority housekeeper can't afford on her Social Security income. As it is, her electric bill last month was $104, taking a big bite out of her fixed income, Ruedas said.
"Cold air gets costly
"The nonprofit, Austin-based Family Eldercare, which provides mostly fans but also some air conditioners to low-income seniors, adults with disabilities and families with children, said Ruedas' experience is hardly unusual. Slightly more than half of its clients have air conditioners but can't afford the high bills in the summer, Eldercare's Krystal Wilson said.
"If you're on a fixed income of $700 a month, you can't afford a $300 electric bill. That's money you would need for groceries, gas and medicines," Wilson said. "The majority of our clients can't afford to run it, or their AC is broken."
"With the heat wave, Family Eldercare is seeing high demand. It has distributed 5,620 fans, already more than last summer, and 90 window AC units, with at least a month to go in this year's drive.
"Among the fans Family Eldercare distributed this summer, two were for Ruedas, who keeps one in her bedroom window — so it can direct the summer wind indoors — and another in the living room at her home near Airport Boulevard in East Austin. That one keeps her cool enough to watch TV, she says.
"Like Bell, she takes cold showers — "You don't even turn on the hot water. What for? It comes out hot."...
http://www.foodte.ch/post/8512034620/texas-in-worst-ever-drought-hottest-ever-heat
