Cooler and more feminine

 In these past two weeks we have had a few rain showers. In fact, we have had almost as much rain so far this month as in all the rest of the year, which hasn't been much! But the welcome effect is that the temperatures this weekend are much more as they should be - about 28C (82F) by day and 24C (75F) by night. That's just right and it's a real relief after two months of unchanging excess heat both day and night.

So these last few days I (and most other people) have stopped living in just our swimwear and gone back to wearing clothes! My favourite dress is out of the wardrobe again and some light skirts too. I've swapped flipflops for shoes with a bit of a heel. 

Don't get me wrong, I love hot weather and I tolerate heat much better than most people, but like most TGirls I love my clothes. They are the most obvious sign of my femininity and of how I express my gender. The more clothes I wear, the more female I appear! I love winter clothes as they are the most satisfyingly feminine, but I hate winter; I love hot summer, but then I find it harder to feel feminine. The more I crave warmth the more the masculine emerges; the more I cringe from the cold, the more my coverings make me look and feel a woman. Nature is annoying!

Creature feature

Laura the Lizard continues to thrive among the herb pots. I'm sure she's grown. A while back I would occasionally see a grey-blue gecko, too. But this week I found its body by the drain. I don't know why these sad things happen. But I have recently seen another gecko instead, a brown one. One thing passes another arrives. As above, it's nature doing its thing in its own way.

One related story is that I have successfully grown a chilli pepper this year after a complete failure last year and many dud seeds earlier this year. When I finally got one plant growing well, I planted more and now I have six plants. It takes a lot of heat, I reckon. I expect lots of spicy sauces for winter now!

Lazy

This week is the main holiday week of the year and everyone's on holiday so all I can do is join them! I have been catching up with a lot of reading. To contrast the heat I have been reading Gerrit de Veer's description of the Dutch expeditions to try to find the North-East passage to China in the 1590s and how their ship became trapped in ice and they had to overwinter in the Arctic, trying to combat the cold, scurvy and polar bears. Even though it was written 400 years ago, it had me hooked. An extraordinary tale of bravery and survival. And a good antidote to heat and drought!

Enjoy the rest of your summer.

Sue x