A long-duration heat wave is beginning in Washington when it will frequently feel as if it’s 100

[Applewood]

Great. So now I’m going to have to shade the ‘maters. After two straight years of early blight, I’m not about to lose this this years crop!

An article that may be helpful:

https://www.burpee.com/gardenadvicecenter/areas-of-interest/flower-gardening/hot-weather-tips-for-tomatoes/article10694.html

Good luck!

[Elderberry]

But I can tell you that figs will be a chore. Your going to have to peel them or scoop them out. You don't want that green skin in your mash.

When I first made fig preserves, I thought I'd have to peel them. It wasn't required. Just lop of the stems and chop them up. What little I've researched fig wine, no one peels them that I have seen.

Thanks for the link.

[Victoria33]

I live in an area that has lots of illegal worker activity who do just about all manual labor. Every morning the local gas station is flooded with work trucks and vehicles of all kinds so they can buy their water and snacks for the day.   I see them stuffed in vans and pickup trucks, bristling with ladders and tools. Painters, Roofers, Landscapers, Laborers. I actually feel a little sorry for those guys knowing that they are going to be doing hard labor under the sun all day. I don't see how they do it, but they do it somehow. I would pass out in a couple of hours if I tried to do what they do every day all day long.

@240B

It was different in the 1970s: Bob was leading seismic crews in the 1970s in the south, think Texas, California, New Mexico, Arizona and illegals would work on the crews.  Company lists of the illegals were given to Border Control.  Border Control buses would come get them at the weekend and let them out at the border to go back to Mexico.  The illegals would get across the line again on late Sunday or early Monday morning, swimming the Rio Grand or sneaking across land to show up to work again.  They would repeat that, work all week, border control would send the buses to take them back on the weekend.

In the 1980s, Border Control was still getting the lists from that oil company, but the buses stopped coming to get them.  The illegals still went back to Mexico on the weekend to their families.  They didn't want to live here because it was cheaper living in Mexico and their families had roots there.  They wanted the money for their families.

Sometime in the 1980s, I went to a good Mexican restaurant for lunch.  The front of the restaurant had police of some kind standing outside.  Then, a number of Mexicans were lead out of the restaurant and put in cop cars.  Those were illegals.  Not long after that, the restaurant closed. During that time period in general, I didn't see/hear in the news about illegals being rounded up.

[Victoria33]

@240B  Have you ever done figs? I'm hoping to have around 20 lbs of figs off my tree soon and we're going to do a batch. I'm picking and freezing them every day. It'll be a first for me and my son. Any xtra and I'll make more preserves.

@Elderberry

We had fig trees when I was growing up.  Mother and I would pick off the figs.  I was about four years old.  She gave me a nickel for every gallon I picked.  Mother had gallons she picked and I took some of hers to make more gallons for me.  That was the first time and last time I stole something.  I didn't realize it was stealing until I was older.

[Victoria33]

   Texas has 3 more months of this $hit, humidity a little lighter in the hill country than on the gulf coast but being a skinny ol fart the cold bothers me much more.

@corbe

My husband had cancer in 2011.  I lived just north of Houston.  I had him in five hospitals during that time.  The temperature was 105/107 every day for a month with no rain.  I was going to the hospital every day, parking my car outside and coming back to it after it was sitting in the sun all day.  I was so hot, I couldn't eat and I lost 10 pounds from not eating.  That area has not seen temps that high for a month since then.

[Elderberry]

Whenever we visited my grandparents in Georgia, we would come back with ma-ma's fig preserves and stop at the cannery in Wayside and get a bushel of cull peaches for about a dollar. We didn't have a fig tree at home. When I got my own place, the first tree I planted was a fig tree.

[240B]

When I first made fig preserves, I thought I'd have to peel them. It wasn't required. Just lop of the stems and chop them up. What little I've researched fig wine, no one peels them that I have seen.

Thanks for the link.

@Elderberry
I saw that looking at the recipe. Also I notice that it seems to be a lot more involved than I thought. I was thinking of a simple mash, but the recipe seems to be making more of a fruitcake wine. Which is fine. It is more than I normally do, but I would like to try it. It looks like the recipe would work for almost any fruit, apples, oranges, ...anything.

As far as peeling, that would depend on how ripe they are. When I said that, I was thinking of harvesting them before they turn completely purple. As a kid, we could never wait that long because the birds or the bugs would get to them first. You certainly don't want anything green from a fig tree in the mash. So, at least cut the stems off.

[Right_in_Virginia]

Well, it was 90 degrees at 10:00 am today ... so this must be true.   ^-^

[Sanguine]

@corbe

My husband had cancer in 2011.  I lived just north of Houston.  I had him in five hospitals during that time.  The temperature was 105/107 every day for a month with no rain.  I was going to the hospital every day, parking my car outside and coming back to it after it was sitting in the sun all day.  I was so hot, I couldn't eat and I lost 10 pounds from not eating.  That area has not seen temps that high for a month since then.

2011 was horrible.  We lost a lot of trees, and animal populations died way back.  And, the fires were awful. 

[Applewood]

Well, it was 90 degrees at 10:00 am today ... so this must be true.   ^-^

I have a cousin in Alexandria.  When her boys were little, I had the bright idea of visiting them...in August!  Won't do that again.  100 degrees plus every day. 

My cousin said, "we love you and are happy to have you visit.  But next time, come in the spring or fall."   LOL

[Silver Pines]

Well @CatherineofAragon since I have a short week I mowed two of my properties and helped one of my guys lug a new hot water heater into a 3rd floor walk up in 95 degree heat and then washed the station wagon when I got home because it looked slightly dusty........AND I AM STILL ALIVE TO TELL THE TALE!!!!!!!

@Frank Cannon
 
You’re doing really well!  You might catch up to my FIL one day (don’t feel bad, no one has yet).

Now, if anybody wants me I’ll be inside in the A/C.  That’s why God invented treadmills and free weights.

[Silver Pines]

        ol Texas Remedy for this excruciating heat:

@corbe 

I really want to try that stuff one day.

[Silver Pines]

Being that I was born in 1976 I've never seen a real soda jerk, but they do actually look like jerks.

@Weird Tolkienish Figure

I guess baristas are our version, but the jerk label still applies.

[WingNot]

@corbe

My husband had cancer in 2011.  I lived just north of Houston.  I had him in five hospitals during that time.  The temperature was 105/107 every day for a month with no rain.  I was going to the hospital every day, parking my car outside and coming back to it after it was sitting in the sun all day.  I was so hot, I couldn't eat and I lost 10 pounds from not eating.  That area has not seen temps that high for a month since then.

I remember that year.  It was bitch hot up in DFW.  They started water restrictions that year for the 1st time.   
Everyone started to panic.  Reservoirs were drying up!  Oh Noes.  The Possum Kingdom burnt up a few years later.  Amarillo was on fire every year for a few years running.  The world was coming to an end.

Then a funny thing happened.    One year I think in 2014, for no particular reason it started raining.  And raining...  In a a couple of years the Lake Ray Roberts was full again as were all the lakes.   

Nature is a wonderful thing.   It does what the hell ever it wants to do.  Man isn't even a pimple on her butt.

[Frank Cannon]

@Frank Cannon
 
You’re doing really well!  You might catch up to my FIL one day (don’t feel bad, no one has yet).

Now, if anybody wants me I’ll be inside in the A/C.  That’s why God invented treadmills and free weights.

I would respond to your post but I walked outside to see what the temperature of the pool was and died from the heat.

From now on please ping Ghost of Frank Cannon, my new handle.

[Elderberry]

        ol Texas Remedy for this excruciating heat:

How about this remedy?

[jpsb]

@corbe

My husband had cancer in 2011.  I lived just north of Houston.  I had him in five hospitals during that time.  The temperature was 105/107 every day for a month with no rain.  I was going to the hospital every day, parking my car outside and coming back to it after it was sitting in the sun all day.  I was so hot, I couldn't eat and I lost 10 pounds from not eating.  That area has not seen temps that high for a month since then.

@Victoria33

My second year in Texas, 79 I think, I was laying 12 inch concrete blocks (Lowes in Texas City) we
had 30 days where every day it was 100 degrees or hotter. That summer I think we had over 90 days
where it was 90 degrees or hotter. That was one hot summer. Shortly thereafter I decided to go
back to college (night school). It took a while but I finally got out of the heat.

I meant 30 consecutive days
and 90 consecutive days.

[Silver Pines]

I would respond to your post but I walked outside to see what the temperature of the pool was and died from the heat.

From now on please ping Ghost of Frank Cannon, my new handle.

@Frank Cannon

Listen, you don't understand fair-skinned women with English ancestry, and that's okay!  Nobody's holding it against you.

[Frank Cannon]

@Frank Cannon

Listen, you don't understand fair-skinned women with English ancestry, and that's okay!  Nobody's holding it against you.

I know all about that shit. I'm married to one. She wears ridiculous sun hats the size of beach umbrellas, but she's hot so she gets a pass.

[240B]

My girlfriend says,
I can enjoy the beach for exactly 90 seconds, and then I sunburn.

[Silver Pines]

I know all about that shit. I'm married to one. She wears ridiculous sun hats the size of beach umbrellas, but she's hot so she gets a pass.

@Frank Cannon

Do those hats come with refrigerator units under the brim?

[Victoria33]

@Victoria33
My second year in Texas, 79 I think, I was laying 12 inch concrete blocks (Lowes in Texas City) we
had 30 days where every day it was 100 degrees or hotter. That summer I think we had over 90 days
where it was 90 degrees or hotter. That was one hot summer. Shortly thereafter I decided to go
back to college (night school). It took a while but I finally got out of the heat.
@jpsb  I meant 30 consecutive days
and 90 consecutive days.

@jpsb

In 1988-89, I was the Director of Handicapped Students at College of the Mainland, Texas City.  I lived in League City which is north about 12 miles from Texas City.  Texas City is on the coast and the humidity you would have had would be high all summer.  That would put your 90 degrees feeling like 100, not a place to be working outside as you were.  Glad you got out of that.

[WingNot]

@Victoria33

My second year in Texas, 79 I think, I was laying 12 inch concrete blocks (Lowes in Texas City) we
had 30 days where every day it was 100 degrees or hotter. That summer I think we had over 90 days
where it was 90 degrees or hotter. That was one hot summer. Shortly thereafter I decided to go
back to college (night school). It took a while but I finally got out of the heat.

I meant 30 consecutive days
and 90 consecutive days.

I just moved to North Dallas in 79 near the TI campus.  It was the next summer (1980) when we had a 42-day string of 100 degree days - the longest heat wave by far in the region's history - was broken. For one day. More triple digits followed, and when autumn mercifully arrived, temperatures had hit the century mark 69 times.  The rich people were buying all the block ice and dumping it in their pools!  It was wild.   People were croaking right and left.  The Dalls city morgue was over flowing with the dead.  They had to pack them in Ice to keep them from rotting in the hallway.

[Silver Pines]

@jpsb

In 1988-89, I was the Director of Handicapped Students at College of the Mainland, Texas City.  I lived in League City which is north about 12 miles from Texas City.  Texas City is on the coast and the humidity you would have had would be high all summer.  That would put your 90 degrees feeling like 100, not a place to be working outside as you were.  Glad you got out of that.

@Victoria33

How are you feeling these days?  PM me if you'd rather.

[corbe]

   So @jpsb, @Fantom and I share with you that we have all been in the Masonry industry at one time.
   Loved the sense of accomplishment at the end of the day, unlike being a Coder the rest of my Life.