"OUUUUUUUCH!!!!!" with an extra "eeeeeee"! I have been watching the weather like mad since I put some trees in the ground last weekend. Last night it started raining fairly good and it hasnt let up yet.....though I am sure it will stop soon. But I was doing a happy dance all night!!! In NE ok we are showing light rain for thursday 90/71 and friday 95/74 then sunny sat 98/77 and sun 96/75. The storms were only upper ne ok if i remember correctly from the news station last night. It was weird, just north of Tulsa was mid 50's last night and just south of Tulsa was upper 70's, almost a 30 deg difference within a few miles!!!! Can we say tornado weather uggggg??? But I hope everyone is extremely careful with this heat and takes it serious. Hopefully there wont be as many fatalities this year as last.
Sorry to be the downer lol

~Danni Girl

Danni,

One thing about the hot weather that worries me is that in many areas it came on suddenly so people's bodies haven't had a chance to become acclimated to the high heat.

It's been bad here all week (today is a nice break) so I've been drinking tea, water and Gatorade like crazy.

I was watching those storms on the radar at 4 or 5 a.m. and wishing they would make it down here to us, but they didn't.

That was an odd temperature difference in a relatively small geographic area.

We did get lucky last night...rain-cooled air from the big storms in Texas cooled us off a couple of hours early so that the evening hours were really pleasant. Around here, a cool hour here and there keeps us clinging to hope that summer 'won't be so bad' after all.

Dawn

So much for Weather.com, last night on the local news they said no rain for us today. I guess I will be out watering trees tonight. Sometimes I wonder how I missed the calling of being a weather person, if you have a 50% chance .... your always right.

~Danni Girl

Ick. I have to be outside next week. The kids and I are going to camp. I'm off to stick all my bottled water in the freezer. Looks like I may need it.

Yes, I'll echo what Dawn said earlier. Please, please be aware of the heat.

Years ago I had something close to a case of heat frustration while playing "lawn-boy". I felt terrible for around two weeks even though I was trying to rest, drink plenty of water, etc. I stayed weak and exhausted and simply could not shake it. I finally went to the doctor and explained what happened and they immediately switched me to 3-4 bottles of Gatorade per day (which ironically, I can't stand) as the water simply wasn't replenishing the electrolytes and nutrients fast enough and was strongly advised to only go outside in the early or very late hours for a month. It took almost that long before I started to feel like myself again.

Now, the reason for my 'please be careful' message. Ever since that time (and we're talking a decade ago), I get overheated much, much faster than before the lawn-boy incident and get very sick, almost to the point of passing out, if I can't get indoors quickly enough. It comes on extremely fast and stays around for awhile. I don't understand the acceleration rate but I just can't take the same amount of heat as I used to. My poor husband once had to drive his pickup past police barricades and darn near into the lake to rescue me (we were attending the annual rowing regatta held on the river downtown) because I simply could not make it back to the parking lot on my own power.

Now, I'm not historically a "weenie" and can usually power through just about anything but this heat thing simply kicks me in the booty every time.

Lynn

Yes, everyone be very careful!!! Lynn - I experienced the same thing a little over 20 years ago. Thought I was "Superwoman" and started mowing early one day to save my kid's Dad the chore when he got home. It heated up quickly that day....and so did I. I was stupid and didn't go in until I literally lost my breakfast. Having always been an avid sun-worshiper, I just couldn't believe that was what had happened, until my Dr confirmed it the next week. Since then, I over-heat easily, usually before my energy runs out. I have to take frequent breaks, drink pleny of fluids, keep my head covered and head inside the first time someone says - "Gee, your face is really red. You ok?" Call me a weenie - but I've learned to be a Smart Weenie!

Our forecast for tomorrow is a squelcher. 101 is forecast so I'll get out early to water and come back in before 10. My house needs my attention anyway and it's nice and cool inside. Back out after 7 if it's down in the low 90's to continue to spread mulch.

Paula

Lynn,

The same thing happened to me in the summer of 2006 when I was at a grassfire in the middle of summer trying to give the firefighters enough water, Gatorade, ice and wet towels to keep them cool and hydrated. How's that for irony? It was on a day when the high temp was 105 and the heat index was higher than that, and the fire made us even hotter still. I was so busy taking care of everyone else that I wasn't taking care of myself. I haven't been able to tolerate excessive heat since then, so I've learned to pace myself very carefully. I try to always wear white clothing on those hot days, especially if I'm going to a fire and I take a pop-up 10' x 10' shade canopy. Still, even doing all that, it is hard to stay cool sometimes.

Today we made a 'drink run' and stocked up on cases and cases of Gatorade and water for the firefighters, and I'm going to pick up 6 or 8 bags of ice early tomorrow morning so we'll be ready for anything. We have an icemaker at the fire station, but it is disconnected because the firefighters are putting a real kitchen in the fire station so they had to move the ice machine out in order to put all the kitchen cabinets in.

Paula, Like you and Lynn, my body has never been the same since the heat exhaustion incident. I always heard that if you ever got heat exhaustion, you could have trouble dealing with excessive heat the rest of your life, but I didn't believe it until it happened to me.

Our forecast is about the same as Paula's, but today we stayed 2 degrees cooler than forecast, so maybe that will happen tomorrow too. I'll tell y'all one thing I've already noticed this week is that our EMS people are running ambulance calls all day long...much more often than usual. I know they carry extra ice and electrolyte replenishment drinks on the hot days too. Yesterday at work, my DS's fire station crew had six medical calls while trying to eat dinner...I think they finally gave up on the idea of having dinner.

If this is 'late spring' and we're having this weather already, what in the world will summer be like?

My smallest pond has gone dry and the frogs and turtles from it have moved into my garden...I guess because they know I've been watering it. I've been putting a pan of water down on the ground for them there. I hope the turtles behave themselves and don't start eating low-hanging tomatoes, or I'll have to pick them up and transport them to another pond elsewhere on the property.

Dawn

I had the same problem as a teenager in southern Oklahoma, and it took about 5 years to get over that sick feeling everytime I got too hot. I got up at 5:30 and spent a couple of hours outside this morning. It's now 7:45 and in the mid 70's so it isn't too bad yet.

I became less tolerant of the heat when my DS was in high school playing classic team soccer. I got overheated at a game in Dallas, and they had to drape towels and ice over my neck. The temp was 105 degrees and no shade. The boys even had to take breaks every 15 minutes of play. We always fed them oranges and gatorade. Since then, my heat tolerance is very low.

Today wasn't too bad in OKC. It didn't seem like there was as much humidity. I got out and dug a very small bed to plant my Turk's Cap and a couple of perennial Salvias, scuffle hoed my bed of Tropical Milkweed, watered as much as I possible could stand. Was out from about 7:30 to 12 noon. But, I drink lots of water and take lots of breaks. I could tell by noon that I was reaching the point of retreat, tho, so came back inside.

So much to do, so little time.....especially in the heat. Will try to get out again this evening.

Susan

It wasn't too awful here...we hit 97 by about 3 or 4 p.m. and we were out in it all day long working at the fire department Garage Sale/Fundraiser. We were inside the fire station most of the time (except for the guys cooking hamburgers and hot dogs, but they had a shade canopy), with the doors open to facilitate air flow and large industrial fans blowing air. The humidity started out high in the morning but dropped to probably the 30s by afternoon, so I don't think our heat index was nearly as bad as they said it would be.

We did drink water, Gatorade and tea like crazy, and I brought Bluebell Ice Cream to the station for an impromptu ice cream party during the afternoon which revived us all a little bit (who can be cranky while eating Bluebell Ice Cream?) and got us through the last couple of hours, which were the hottest part of the day.

One of the main topics of conversation throughout the day as community members stopped by to browse the sale, eat a meal or drop a donation into the fire boot, though, was how hot and dry it is here and how everyone is worried they won't be able to keep watering as much as they need to if rain doesn't fall soon. Some folks with wells are having problems maintaining adequate water pressure. It is just too early to be this dry. On the bright side, we didn't get nearly as hot as they said.

Tim's at work in Dallas, where they hit 100 around 4 p.m. and his car thermometer was showing 117, so I guess it was really soaking up heat from all that concrete.

Everything was pretty wilted by the time I arrive home around 5 p.m. but I only watered plants in containers. Everything else perked up as the sun began to set.

Dawn