David August ❌👑Space weather is bad, air quality is bad, mood is bad.
☹️
Likely Jan LukasUp here at Lat 53°N I've always relied on our long summer days to recharge from our long winter nights. ❤️
Now that every spring and summer is #FireSeason across the #prairies, along with repeated extreme #heat events, winter's passing leaves me deeply anxious.
Little things like adding tiny Xmas lights in rooms darkened to block the heat help lift spirits, but choking and gasping from what seems more #smoke than #air is a misery I wish on no one.
😢
@likelyjanlukas that makes sense. I hope the wildfire smoke does not get too bad for anyone.
Not my favorite.
We've been incredibly fortunate in our city for the past month: pure dumb luck of the wind has kept the air pretty good until a few days ago, despite evacuation-necessary wildfires both nearby and more remote.
The bad days feel surreal -- a lot like that scene in Blade Runner where the older woman makes a comment about how they used to say 'right as rain' (but don't anymore) except there's damn little rain either. 😢
@likelyjanlukas I hope you can breathe easy. The smoke has been blowing around us too, but not so much it is blade runner like.
Thank you.❤️
For many it isn't so bad -- on the surface. Wildfire smoke has a lot of nasty stuff in it in addition to the fine particulates that silt up the lungs, but people with healthy lungs may not be noticeably impacted for a long time.
For me, I had well-controlled #asthma until the 2021 wildfires and every summer since has been pure hell.
I wear an #ElastomericRespirator outdoors and do my best to kludge together powered filters for the windows.
1/3
I've learned a lot about pragmatic issues wrt filtering air coming into my residence and am thankful some coroplast, a glue gun, and lots of packing and duct tape can work wonders, in addition to affordable high-quality filters meant for IKEA air purifiers.
Trouble is, our local #disability pensions haven't increased since c.2018 and all consumables have doubled or tripled even prior to the present tariff war(s). 😐
2/3
I'm fortunate enough to reside in #SocialHousing so at least my rent is affordable compared to income, but the balance of my income no longer covers food and OTC meds/CPAP materials. 😐
Worse yet, we continually experience long extreme heat events in summers now and our lease agreements explicitly *disallow* in-window AC, so cooling options are limited.
We didn't really need AC hereabouts most of my life, but now it is a matter of life and death for many. 😢
3/3
PS: I don't mean to catastrophise … I expect healthy folks may have a different POV on the seriousness of this, as they may not be so sensitive to extreme heat or toxic air.
The thing is, everyone becomes #disabled if they live long enough. And then all those "little" things that abled people ignored affect them, they'll discover there isn't any help coming for them, either.
We absolutely have the knowledge and tools to mitigate *for all*; we choose not to. 😡
@likelyjanlukas you are quite right. We could, and don’t, make things better. At least not yet.