Hot Day in Melbourne

Jan 11

Although it had been cool enough in the night, John woke to hear that, true to the forecast, Melbourne was due for another very hot day. He could almost feel the heat as the sun came up from the horizon.

Janice was already up and working. She has had so much to do trying to get her house up to the condition she wants it to be in. Today she had planned to clean the second sliding patio door that had been left in a very grungy conndition by the tenants who had lived here before.

It was already hot when she started. She took the door apart and started to clean every part of it from the rail at the bottom to the one at the top outside in the garden. John offered to help but he was wimping out because of the heat. It must have been over 30 by 10am.

Midway through the job, Janice had a building contractor she calls 'John The Builder' come over to give her an estimate on constructing two pergolas. These are kind of like permament awnings and are as strong as the regular roof. This left the patio opening wide as the day really began to cook.

At noon, Gail called John and they talked while Janice and John 'The Builder' walked around talking about pergolas and other construction type things. Gee, there are a lot of 'Johns' around here!

After `John the Builder` and the `Fan Man` who also came - to fix the remote control fans in the bedrooms, yes, remote controlled - had left, John (the backpack carrier) helped Janice to finish the patio door job because by that time it was becoming unbearably hot. You could not walk barefoot on the patio stones without burning your feet.

The TV was saying that the Wimmera region of western Victoria had declared a catatastropic fire alert also called a code 1 emergency, click here for more details.

John watched a lot of TV in the cool living room while leaving me upstairs in the hot bedroom. After coming back from his workplace Stewart took Janice out to buy her a birthday present before he goes back to the UK. John watched tennis in the cool.

Meanwhile Barney the beagle noticed that Janice and Stewart had gone out but had forgotten that John was still there. He had had his eye on a piece of cake that was too close to the edge of the counter. When John heard rustling plastic noises and went to investigate he found Barney in the middle of the kitchen floor his muzzle deep into the cake. Although John said the `bad dog` words he couldn`t help but smile at the initiative and cleverness of the dog.

Later in the day, John ventured outside just to say he had been out in 43 degree heat. He took his videocamera and talked about what it was like outside. He only walked a few hundred metres before turning back, happy to come back into the air con. However, his stomach felt a little upset. You have to make sure you`re well hydrated in these temperatures.



Later on, Glenn and Rachel, Stewart and Janice went out for a `birthday celebration` and `farewell to Stewart` dinner. John was happy to eat some dry toast at Janice`s place. He will be happy if it goes away before he heads out for Sydney early in the morning.

Our next blog post will be from Sydney.

TRB