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ysabetwordsmithreadera has a post about heat precautions regarding the heat dome. These are my additions...Check cuisine and especially beverages from sweltering locales. They are designed for this problem.
10 Rich and Flavorful Lassi Recipes
Lassi Recipe (Sweet & Salt Lassi)
15 Cool and Refreshing Agua Fresca Recipes
Cucumber Tomato Salad
This can be made with mint, parsley, and/or cilantro along with various seasonings. Naf Naf sells an excellent version.
There are also cooling foods and herbs:
Top 22+ Cooling Foods and Herbs (and Their Benefits)
25+ Foods to Replenish Electrolytes
What Is The Best Salt For Hydration?
Avoid alcohol, caffeine, and other dehydrating substances! They dry out your body and may cause you to faceplant into the pavement.
Another thing to consider is context. Shade and transpiration both protect against heat. So an area protected by trees will be much cooler than one exposed to baking sun or tall buildings. My yard, which is mostly shaded, averages 5-10°F cooler than the surrounding fields. If you want to visit a park, look for a leafy one. If you have a yard which is not already protected by trees, consider planning ahead to plant some in fall or spring.
Nothing will screw you worse than information that used to be true. High heat can cause acute kidney injury. This used to be, past tense, consistently a temporary problem. Serious, but a hospital could treat it and most people recovered without permanent impact. Such is no longer true. Chronic kidney disease is a signature injury of climate change. The most prevalent seems to stem from two sources: 1) repeated incidents of acute injury and 2) long-term stressors. Less common but also known are cases of heat injury so extreme that a single incident does lasting damage.
Employers often refuse to protect worker safety. In most cases, your job is not worth your life. If your employer forces you to work in dangerously hot conditions, especially without precautions (e.g. a cooling room for breaks, limitless cold water, and bathroom access) then get out while you still can. This is especially true if you experience heat-related symptoms (e.g. dizziness, muscle cramps) that do not go away after cooling off or replenishing water and electrolytes. If you are an employer, don't murder people, take workplace precautions.
(no subject)
Date: 2025-06-20 10:01 pm (UTC)Go to the movies - movie theaters used to advertise "20 degrees cooler inside!" Supermarkets and shopping malls may also be useful.
(Hey, Chef... do you need anything out of the walk-in freezer?)
Kidney damage
Date: 2025-06-20 11:41 pm (UTC)The symptoms are there, but they are subsumed beneath the reasonable everyday logic that handles the obvious issue. Sometimes, it's too late to recover; the damage is permanent. Even a few percent of kidney function can have LARGE impacts on one's quality of life.
Re: Kidney damage
Date: 2025-06-21 01:59 am (UTC)What's dangerous is that increasing heat makes it both more frequent, and more likely to do permanent damage rather than just a couple crappy days in the hospital. It's not just that the public isn't aware of the risks for permanent damage, the medics have years of "he'll be fine in a few days" to overcome and realize that they need to schedule a followup visit and badger insurance to pay for that.
If we don't get the hell ahead of this, we're going to lose a lot of mostly ablebodied laborers to crippling kidney injury, right when we can least afford it.
Re: Kidney damage
Date: 2025-06-21 02:03 am (UTC)I don't trust the medical community to react appropriately to the threat, so it's important to educate MYSELF. If I have to go to an emergency room, it's probably too late to avoid damage.