Emergency!

For only the third time in our history, Aotearoa New Zealand is under a national state of emergency. This occasion has been caused by Cyclone Gabrielle which has closely followed several weeks of extreme weather events that has caused widespread flooding, landslides, roads, homes and bridges being washed away over much of the upper half of Te Ika-a-Māui (the North Island). Even before the arrival of Cyclone Gabrielle, the cost of the damage of the recent extreme weather events has been estimated to exceed the costs of the Christchurch Earthquakes of 2010/2011.

The land over much of Te Ika-a-Māui reached saturation level over recent weeks where some areas have received several months of rain in as little as a day. The forces of Cyclone Gabrielle – winds, rain and low atmospheric pressure – have added to the chaos with emergency services being overwhelmed over large areas of the country. For those who still insist that climate change is a hoax, all they need do is look the frequency of extreme weather events compared to previous decades.

In the Manawatu region where we live, we haven’t experienced much more than a severe storm. However some rivers in the region that have catchments to the east and north are now running above capacity and breaches can be expected. Our home is perched on the lip of the valley overlooking the township of Feilding, so our home can’t be threatened by flooding. The valley wall is not very steep so even if the land was waterlogged, it’s unlikely that significant landslides would occur. Over night we experienced winds with gusts of up to 120 km/h (75 mph), which is not exceptionally strong, and moderate to heavy rain. So in this corner of Aotearoa it’s been almost a non-event, and likely to remain so, unless more bridges get washed away or the Manawatu River rises significantly higher than expected.

True extent of damage yet to be seen as Cyclone Gabrielle cuts off Gisborne | Newshub

Cyclone Gabrielle ‘most significant weather event this century’ – PM Hipkins | Newshub

New Zealand climate minister blasts parliament as Cyclone Gabrielle devastates North Island

Can’t wait for summer to end

I’ve written before about why I dislike summer and today only goes to reinforce that dislike. Firstly there’s hayfever. It starts gently in late September and reaches its peak in mid to late January when without medication the itch in the eyes, nose and ears becomes unbearable, the nose end eyes run constantly and the sneezing becomes painful. By March it has run its course and finally disappears…

Until the next spring.

Then there’s the heat and humidity. Take today for example. The humidity wasn’t too bad at 80% but it was very hot – 30.4℃ (86.7℉) outside in the shade and 29.1℃ (84.4℉) inside, and absolutely no breeze. My comfort zone is somewhere between 18℃ (64℉) and 22℃ (72℉). By 25℃ (77℉), I’m ready to step inside a refrigerator. When it got to around 28℃, I suggested to The Wife it might be time to turn on the heat pump in order bring the inside temperature down to 25℃ or less. She responded with a comment that approximated “over my dead body”. I was tempted, but the heat had drained all my energy.

So to all those bloggers who have posted about the atrocious winter weather they’re having, and think my comments about being in the height of the southern hemisphere summer is rubbing it in, well, it’s not – it’s envy on my part. I so much want the so called glorious weather to end. Tomorrow is going to be more of the same.

Murphy’s law

We’ve had a few days of torrential rain. Of course at started after I hung up several loads of laundry on the clothesline. Then the gods decided to apply Murphy’s law. It wasn’t quite dry when the the skies opened and the rain fell by the bucket load. There was no way I was going out to bring washing that was wetter than when it was hung up, so I left it up to nature to give the clothes an ultra rinse.

I really didn’t expect it to be a two day rinse, but that’s what it was. This morning the sun came out, so we did some more washing and hung that up alongside the loads from two days earlier, which by that time was partially dry. Time to go for a pre-Christmas haircut. The Wife and I duly drive to the Hairdresser a mere 5 minutes away and in less than thirty minutes we’re both done.

The sky looked decidedly grey as we came out, and just as we closed the car doors, a light rain shower started. The washing! We weren’t going to let Murphy get the better of us time. Our plans to visit the pharmacy and a D.I.Y. store on the way home were abandoned as we made a dash to save the washing. It was a futile effort. This is what we found when we arrived home.

Another ultra rinse is in progress. Tomorrow promises more of the same.

Twenty-seven in the shade

Summer is just a few days away. In this part of the world summer “officially” starts on the first day of December. I’m already looking forward to late autumn.

A characteristic commonly shared amongst autistics is hyposensitivities and hypersensitivities when compared to non-autistic folk. Depending on the senses involved being hypo or hyper can be an blessing or a curse. For example I’m mostly oblivious to low and moderate levels of pain. It’s not until it reaches the level one experiences of momentary pain when slamming a car door on a finger, or the ongoing pain when the body unsuccessfully attempts to eject kidney stones, or when attempting to move muscles affected by polio that I experience “real” pain. Breaking my arm or gashing my foot exposing the bones resulted in curiosity about the outcome more than any conscious sense of pain. In fact I experience more pain from the noise of a typical shopping mall or from lighting effects commonly found in modern forms of entertainment.

I do not like warm weather. I have a narrow band of “comfortable”. Below 18℃ (64℉) I start to feel the chill, while anything above 24℃ (75℉) feels unpleasantly warm. As I age, the level of discomfort I experience increases when the temperature goes outside my comfort zone.

As temperature drops, it’s a simple matter of adding an extra layer of clothing to maintain a level of comfort although I have to be careful to avoid spontaneous “attacks” of Raynaud’s syndrome in my fingers and/or toes, which can be very painful as the symptoms wane. Coping with heat is a different matter.

Take today for example. Our indoor/outdoor temperature gauge, shows the outside temperature as being 27.2℃ (81℉) in the shade and inside as being 26.4℃ (79.5℉). I find myself extremely restless, pacing about aimlessly, unable to concentrate much on anything apart from wishing it was cooler. If I had my way, I’d close the windows and doors and switch on the heat pump, and allow it to maintain its default setting of 22℃ (72℉) as it does during the colder months of the year.

Unfortunately The Wife has other ideas. She relishes such temperatures. My suggestion that we turn on the heat pump resulted in a very emphatic “No!” What happened to so called neurotypical empathy? So in order to maintain domestic harmony I find myself wandering aimlessly about our home, keeping out of her line of sight as she finds my pacing “annoying”.

Postscript

The Wife acknowledged my efforts not to annoy her in my discomfort and provided the perfect meal for a day such as today – somen (cold Japanese noodles).

That didn’t last long!

I’m referring to the season commonly named spring. Has anyone noticed that the names of the supposedly most beautiful months of the year – April, May and June (in the northern hemisphere) – are also given to girls? Perhaps not as often as in the generation of my parents, but nevertheless still recognised as being feminine names.

In Aotearoa spring “officially” starts on the first day of September and ends on the last day of November, but yesterday and even more so today, we seem to have reverted to winter. The almost gale force south easterly winds of yesterday have eased somewhat – now only 50 km/h (31 mph) gusting to 61 km/h (38 mph) – but it’s very obvious where they originated from – the Antarctic. Apparently some regions in Te Wai Pounamu (South Island) dropped to -2°C (28°F) overnight. That definitely is Winter temperature!

My indoor/outdoor thermometer recorded the outside temperature at 11°C (52°F) at 1:00pm. That’s 14°C (25°F) colder than this day last year and 5°C (9°F) cooler than average. Thank goodness I had the foresight to turn on the heat pump last night. I appreciate comparing the temperature of a single day in one year with the same day in another year is not going to prove or disprove climate change. However if one chooses to compare temperatures over a few decades, what is obvious is that year on year variations are now more extreme than they were in the middle part of the twentieth century. It’s a trend that only likely to increase over at least the next few decades no matter the outcome of the COP26 summit.

Admittedly Aotearoa is notorious for its frequent, rapid and localised weather changes, but it’s not a reputation I wish to see extended.

Trapped

Well, we were for a few hours yesterday. A cotoneaster fell onto the driveway overnight making vehicle access impossible and requiring foot traffic to duck down to waist height.

The fallen tree. Rain and mist hides the background.

The weekend was marked by gale force winds and torrential rain. And while we thought we had escaped any damage, it seems that their combined forces weakened the ground sufficiently for the tree, roots and all, to topple. It’s always had a preference of growing over the driveway, and no doubt its lopsidedness was a significant factor in its demise.

Fortunately a crew from All Tree Services arrived within three hours of us contacting them, and half an hour later, very little evidence of the tree falling remained, apart from the root stump. That’s too large for their chipper and will need to be ground down. That’s a job for another day.

The tree was destined to be removed in a few years anyway. We’d planted a Cherry blossom tree and Japanese maple close by to replace it eventually, but were in no hurry to remove it as it provided shelter and an abundant supply of berries for birds in early winter. It also provided a measure of privacy, filtering the view of the house from the street. It will quite a few years before it’s replacements are sufficiently large to provide much privacy at all.

That’s better

Although the sun is still struggling to get out from behind the clouds, at least we can (almost) see the mountain range in the distance, the wind has died down and the UHF television aerial has been restored to its rightful place on top of the roof. As they say: Happy wife, happy life.

What a difference 24 hours can make

Unseasonal

In Aotearoa New Zealand, the seasons are very easy to remember: Autumn starts on the first day of March; winter starts on the first day of June; spring starts on the first day of September; summer starts on the first day of December. Easy isn’t it? So how come the weather gods get it so wrong?

Here we are, well into the second week of summer and most days have been like this:

So our television aerial remains lying where it fell during the storm on the first day of summer.

Hey weather, make up your mind!

Just a week ago I was struggling to cope with record breaking temperatures. And in typical Kiwi fashion, I blamed the Aussies for the heat wave. According to my indoor/outdoor temperature station the maximum outdoor temperature over the last week was 37.9°C (100°F). I’m looking for a reason to blame the Aussies for the current state of the weather, but it looks like Antarctica is the culprit. It’s approaching 2:00pm and it’s a very untropical 16°C (61°F) outside, with a steady breeze of 30km/h (19mph) gusting to 50km/h (31mph). That’s a drop in temperature of 22°C (40°F) over a few days, although there’s been no change in wind speed, just in direction.

I guess Trump and friends will claim this is proof that there is no global warning. They conveniently ignore the fact that even small increases in global warming can cause severe climate change, the effects of which vary from region to region. In the case of Aotearoa New Zealand, our very changeable weather is becoming even more changeable with the extremes becoming greater – one example being areas that have been historically safe for habitation are now being designated floodplains not suitable for habitation.

I blame the Aussies

Even though the distance between Aotearoa New Zealand and Australia is the same as the distance between England and Greece, Australia is our nearest neighbour. But honestly, who would have them?

Like a big bullying brother, they claim they like us, but take things for themselves that don’t belong to them such as Phar Lap, the pavlova, the lamington, ANZAC Biscuits, the Flat White, Mānuka honey, Split Enz, Lorde, Keisha Castle-Hughes, Rachel Hunter, Keith Urban and Russell Crowe (scrub Russel, they can keep him – he’s kind of an embarrassment).

They even claim the kiwi originated in Australia whereas in fact its closest relative is the now extinct Elephant bird of Madagascar. The Australian constitution even includes New Zealand as a state of Australia. Section 6 of the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act says:

The States shall mean such of the colonies of New South Wales, New Zealand, Queensland, Tasmania, Victoria, Western Australia, and South Australia, including the northern territory of South Australia, as for the time being are parts of the Commonwealth, and such colonies or territories as may be admitted into or established by the Commonwealth as States; and each of such parts of the Commonwealth shall be called a State.

And of course they’re not above cheating if it means they get the upper hand such as in the underarm bowling incident and ball tampering. So what have the Aussies done this time?

They got bored with their heatwave, so they sent it our way.

Look, if they choose to cover most of their continent with a hot desert, then they are bound to get ridiculously hot days during summer. But when temperatures reach the high 40s and low 50s (Centigrade), it’s not acceptable to send it our way. While the journey across the Tasman Sea does cool it off somewhat, us Kiwis are not used to temperatures above 30°C (86°F). We can manage the occasional day that hot, but a week of it is too much to bear.

Over the past week every day has peaked at over 30°C. That’s just not on. On three days, my indoor/outdoor temperature gauge has recorded temperatures exceeding 36°C, the highest being 37.9°C (100.2°F). Hey Australia! Come and take your heat back!

Orchardists are having to dump tonnes of apples as they are finding them literally cooked on the tree. Railway lines are being forced to close due buckling tracks and failing overhead wires. Roads are melting in the heat. And I’ve resorted to closing all the doors and windows, and switching on the heat pump. In Aotearoa New Zealand, heat pumps are optimised for moving heat into the home. They don’t work so well in reverse cycle pumping heat out. With the heat pump running at maximum, we can keep the interior down to 27°C (80°F) or below, but even that is above my comfort level.

On the other hand, the wife is enjoying the heat. She commented to me this morning how nice it is to have a proper summer just like she used to have in her homeland of Japan. “Bloody foreigner” I thought, but I held my tongue. Had I not, I would have been in an even hotter situation!