Last week Eric offered a tip for Houston-area newbies for surviving Houston’s fearsome heat and houmidity. (And no, that’s not a typo.) That inspired many of you to offer your own suggestions for dealing with summer. We’ve compiled the best of the best so you can work on your climatological coping skills.
As a native of SE Texas, summer is hot and that’s the fact, Jack! But…I have found that, if I talk or complain about the heat in June or July, that just seems to prolong the summer unnecessarily. Instead, I avoid those water cooler conversations about the heat…until August, then I let it all hang out! Because sometimes fronts start making their way into H-Town a few weeks into September, and it cools down to like 88 degrees and everyone starts thinking it’s fall and pulls out their sweaters! This strategy of denial means you only have a month in a half of hot weather…August and maybe half of September! All our our newly arrived neighbors thank me when I share this strategy with them!
– Sharron Cox
I don’t know if it truly helps any, but my psychological trick to get through the summers recently has been to count the weeks instead of the days. 9 weeks til September just on some psychological level feels better than 74 days. Maybe it’s because by this point, we’re typically mowing once a week, and I really don’t wanna by the time August comes around. And I know we’re getting close to only needing to do single digit cuts left.
– Josh Sorensen
Face the heat head on. Go outside for a walk at 3 PM. Go for a run in the morning and greet the rising sun. Lay in the grass at 2 PM. Feel the radiation. Sweat through the humidity. Learn to love that which we cannot change. This is the best way to deal with summer heat in Houston. Before you know it, you will think 90 degrees feels moderate. A slight breeze and you will have goose bumps. September starts to feel chilly.
– Humidity connoisseur
I am a native, and have lived in two other places, Los Angeles and Saudi Arabia. When I start to feel as though summer will never end (and honestly, it’s hot through sometimes mid November here) I remember how I felt when I stepped off the plane onto the tarmac in Dhahran, and the humidity slapped me in the face. It was 110F in the summer there with 80 to 90% humidity. I will never forget that. Houston is absolutely awful, but that was just a smidge worse (at the time – we’ll see how things change 🙁 )
– Ashley
I also try not to complain too much until August, go swimming at night to reset my body temperature, and my new summer hack is hanging out in the cheese aisle at HEB. Even colder than a movie theater and can grocery shop too.
– Cheryl Detten
My Summer Survival Strategies:
1. Sit outside sometimes, to become acclimated, as another commenter said. The following two steps will help with this.
2. Cold iced Cafe du Monde made with tons of brown sugar and milk at 2 pm, outside. It’s the worst part of the day but you get to have coffee!
3. Wine and Chips O’Clock at 4 pm, outside. The worst part of the day’s heat is over! (I prefer white wine and potato chips.)
4. August 14: official Changing of the Morning Light Day. The sunlight in the morning changes from harsh blue-white to a softer yellow-white.
5. August 28 CHANGING OF THE LIGHT DAY!!! The light is noticably softer and golden. You have made it thru the worst. Only a month until the moveable feast that is COOL FRONT DAY!!!
Oh, and visit the gem and mineral section of the Science Museum. Like being in an ice cold glittery sparkly cave.
– Bea
One thing that gets me through the Houston summer is just knowing that for 8 months of the year between mid September and mid May the weather is actually quite decent and tolerable. Just gotta get through July and August and Fall will be right around the corner.
– Anthony Stott
A trick I do is make it a point to get out for 20 or 30 minutes during the peak heat of the day. 3:00 – 4:00 p.m. I’ll get out and go for a motorcycle ride or do a little bit of work in the yard. Maybe just 15 minutes! lol. What this does is allows me to be absolutely scorched during that time and comparatively it makes the mornings and evenings feel much better.
– Scott Smith
Lived in Texas most of my life, especially the Houston area. Long enough to grasp the Biblical nature of this area: Dust to Dust, or Noah’s Ark.
– Shawn Harrison
If these pearls of heat-related wisdom inspire you to offer tips of your own, please do so in the comments!
My solution is simple. I eat popsicles with my grandkids!
LOL. “Hanging out in the cheese aisle at HEB”!
So true! Lol
Become friends with someone who access to a pool 🙂
I grew up in a cooler and less humid climate. At the beginning of summer I get out and do yard work and get a good sweat going, making sure to rehydrate. I turn up the thermostat to 73-75 degrees. After a few days, I’m well acclimated. Our ancestors were tough people. We all have it in us.
I lived here my whole live and my thermostat is never set so low as 75. I even dress right for heat and humidity, unlike nearly everyone else. It’s still awful out there.
Especially if you have kids, you’ve got to be strategic with the day. I’m thinking of weekends here. Consider not sleeping in, to wake up early and get everyone outside when it’s bearable. By 11am, the outdoor time is pretty much over, so that’s the time for your indoor activities. I know we usually take our time waking up, kids watching cartoons in the mornings. But save that until after lunch. Then after dinner you can head back outside for a little while.
Don’t wish your life away! So what if it is hot? You are alive and in Houston, Texas! Baseball season. Football not far behind. Just tell yourself it is better than dark days, snow and ice. ‘Cause it is. If your air conditioner goes out go to Trader Joe’s. Place is like a meat locker.
Being alive and in Houston is worse than being dead and in hell.
Gallows humor: also a legit strategy.
Love this!!! I’m a believer in getting out in the heat and humidity several times a day…and enjoying pools and rivers any time I can…
If possible, plan a trip for the first half of September. It gives you something to look forward to in August and when you get back you can say “it’s almost October” and by that time 90-92 feels like a break.
Yes! On the 1st of September, I head up north to the Midwest, to get a head start on cooler temperatures and stay up there through the time the leaves change. 🍁 I’m already looking forward to it. In the meantime, thank goodness for air conditioning. 🥶
When I am walking in the park early morning with my dog – sweating at 7:30 AM – I like to think about how much we will enjoy the 8 good months!
Throughout the month of August, I like to pull all the curtains (the heat blocking ones) crank down the AC, and snuggle up on the couch to watch my favorite genre of TV: Murder Shows Set in Places Where They Always Have to Wear Jackets.
Shetland. The Fall. Broadchurch. Luther. Happy Valley. The accents are a bonus.
I find that soaking in a bathtub full of cold water and ice does the trick pretty well.
Half of September? I’ll settle for half of October thank you! And, no, I can’t stand the long nights after the time changes. The only benefits of summer are the longer days that we get to play.
I agree. September is usually the hottest month to me with the exception of a few cold fronts some years. Late October is when it usually starts being bearable. I remember one year wearing shorts in December.
I decorate for fall as soon as school starts. I burn all my cinnamon spice candles and drink pumpkin coffee. It tricks my brain into thinking it’s cooler outside than it is during the dog days of summer.
I’m a native Houstonian, born in a hospital downtown and never lived farther outside the loop than @3 miles… A couple of things that keep me from feeling the summer heat: 1) excellent air-conditioning at the office, at home, wherever. 2) Remembering that all the humidity keeps my skin dewy and young-looking and I don’t have to spend anything on moisturizers, etc. (more $ for #1 air conditioning!).
I worked in Arizona one summer week for 38 days and it got to a dry 120 degrees. I actually couldn’t walk across the street for lunch. When I got off the plane in Houston 90 degrees and high humidity felt like exactly what I needed to live.
I will never forget when I was on the flight down here from the Northeast, to move here. It was August. Someone asked the flight attendant what the weather was like in Houston that day.
“Oh, you know, it’s like living inside a dog’s mouth,” he replied.
Still makes me laugh.
Oh, and my mother, who keeps her TV tuned to the weather channel, will call in the summer and say, “I see it’s 109+ degrees down there.” I wait until winter and return the favor. “Oh, I see it’s 17 degrees there, and doesn’t it get dark by 4 pm?”
In Houston of course you have two people on speed dial, other than your Mom and bff’s: your bug person and your aircon person. And if you’re fortunate to get good ones, keep them and send them home with a loaf of homemade bread. Effective aircon is the answer to surviving the Houston heat. And you know you’re a true Houstonian (born or otherwise) when you can tell the difference between 68F and 70F in less than 3 seconds.
I remember back in August 1992, we had an extremely rare cool front come through. The dew point plummeted and the highs for a few days never got out of the 80s. That was coincidentally when the GOP convention was in town. Despite the great weather, it didn’t do them much good in the year of the Perot.
We had those a couple years in a row in the early 2010s. The teens. I don’t remember when but I did used to volunteer at an urban community farm and remember the odd days when it was tolerable past 10 am.
I guessed it was a weakening of the Gulf Stream letting cool fronts make it to the coast.
Yes and Houston had record lows in the low 60s. We had a cool front like that in August 2004 as well.
I just returned from NYC where the rooftop cafe of The Met was closed “due to excessive heat”. It was a mere 86 degrees. Houston would never be open under those parameters!
Thanks for the suggestions! Back in the 40s and 50s when I was a kid in San Antonio, we had some pretty hot summers but they were always with dry heat. I didn’t know humidity until I moved here and yet when I have gone back to San Antonio over several decades, I now feel the humidity there. Can someone explain this? Thanks.
Very good advice! ☀️💛🌻
I count down the weeks between July 4th and Labor Day. It does go fast. The last week of August, I bring out all of my indoor fall decor. Fall colors and the AC going almost nonstop brings positive vibes and the knowledge that our first coolish front is less than a month away.
What heat?
mind over matter approach, nice
I have relatives in NM, so I just remind myself of the feeling of having every drop of moisture sucked from my skin when I visit out there.
Then I embrace the humidity. Women in Phoenix and Albuquerque pay top dollar to get the kind of youth-giving steam facial that I get for free every day just by walking outside! And not to brag, but I do have a remarkable absence of lines on my face for someone my age!
I went to a spa in Virginia a couple of years ago and my friend was sad I didn’t want to go in the really hot steam room with her – it was labeled as 103° & 60% humidity.. I asked why I would escape to true winter weather to then experience what I get by walking outside my house in summer? She went in for a few minutes, walked out and said, “yep. That felt like home.” (She was born & raised here, but had moved to UT then PA 20+ years prior)
I cannot ever go into a steam room or sauna. Seriously I will panic. I really don’t see how anyone can stand it.
Binge watch Life Below Zero & High Arctic Haulers! Works!😁
ALL GREAT IDEAS! A friend sent this bit of communication.
New Yorker moving to Houston: “I hear it’s really hot in Houston. Can you tell me how hot?”
Houstonian: “Have you ever been cremated?”
Nothing forged me in the fires of Houston heat like summer of 2023. Everything pales in comparison. I’ll echo others on the pool; this is our first year with a pool and it makes a night and day difference. Hopping in at night and getting out and its actually quite cold. It helps you forget how bad the summer is and you get a reprieve from what feels like never ending heat.
I think the comments about acclimating are worthwhile. My first year here was interesting. I thought if aliens visited here they would report back that the planet was too hot for human habitation. I just came from North Louisiana not the North Pole!!! Then I started school at U of H in September. Around October I got out of my car in their parking lot in tee shirt and jeans and watched a woman in front of me zipping up a parka with a fur lined hood. The next year did not seem so hot. My coping skill is to work about 30 minutes in the heat and come in, hydrate and cool down for about an hour, then do 30 more minutes, etc. I get a good bit done that way and me and my partner walk 2 miles each day at 7 PM. That’s splits the difference on temp and humidity. Back in May , I could not walk 15 minutes under those conditions. I have noticed that I acclimate and Im 83.
I dress right in loose floaty dresses all summer long. I don’t know how everyone else can stand all the spandex & clingy knits. And black!!! The other day I watched someone presumably walking from a bus stop dressed in black tightfitting clothes with a black backpack on their back walking towards the underpass of 610 apparently to cross the dozen lanes to get to something on the otherside.. I imagine they had a ways to go and would imagine this is a routine occurance for them.
Everyone I know knows I don’t wear pants all summer long if I can help it. But as it got hotter, I also don’t wear anyting with a wasteband. Which leaves out half my wardrobe of cute skirts and tops. And no knits in the summer. Knits cling.
In an unairconditioned era, stacking hay in the barn and picking cotton in late August conspire to help today’s Houston milder (well under 100) temperatures seem survivable. The greatest challenge seems to be parking in the shade. Houston is warmer in the winter and cooler in the summer than North Texas. Better restaurants now, too.
If I’m out running errands, I always put my groovy windshield shades up and crack the car windows about an inch every time I park the car. When it’s time to get back behind the wheel, at least it doesn’t feel like a furnace!
Also… I do my grocery shopping after 8pm in the peak of summer (less meltage when I get the ice cream home). Unfortunately, that’s when HEB starts putting the seafood and butcher counter goods away… and locking certain entrance doors. It’s nice that the store is less crowded with shoppers, but it also becomes hard to navigate around the stocking crew HEB unleashes at that hour. Pros outweigh the cons, I guess!
I think of positive uplifting quotes. Like this:
“Everything good, everything magical happens between the months of June and August.” ― Jenny Han
My summer hack was to go to the mountains for 4-6 weeks every summer, but it was my remote work situation made that possible–not everyone can do that. It’s much cooler in the mountains. In Santa Fe, upper 80s most summer days with very low humidity. In Breckenridge, upper 60s most days. In both towns, I made friends with locals who would rent me a room or apartment for $100/night. They will reduce the nightly rate for longer-term renters. That was typically my summer vacation. Instead of that whirlwind 7-day trip to Europe (or elsewhere) that many people take, I would take a good month or more in a reasonable and scenic climate… I hear the area around Mexico City is beautiful and cooler in summer (today’s temp is 68) and nightly rates may be even better there. The rest of the time in Houston, I found that early mornings, before 9am were very temperate and actual felt reasonable outside. Then stay indoors the rest of the day.
Getting a boat is the answer. I could live on a boat enjoying the best weather the planet has to offer. Drive over to the Caribbean, look around, spend a few days enjoying the sights before toddling off across the Atlantic to the Mediterranean, stay at one of the Greek islands, then over to Scandinavia to take a look at the fiords, drop down to Ireland and hike the hills before mooring near Cape Wrath or Lisbon for the autumn, Yup, that will be the life and then who cares what Houston’s horrible weather is doing?
My Mom always told us to think “cool thoughts” because once you say it’s hot, the mental battle is lost. She grew up outside of Beaumont before residential A/C was affordable.
I’m a 6th generation native of the Texas Gulf Coast, and the biggest cold weather weenie who ever lived, so whenever I think about it being hot I just remember winter and I’m happy again. The hotter it is, the less it’s winter.
I have lived in Houston 50 plus years and in New Orleans before that. I have a covered porch with ceiling fans so I will sit out there for a bit each day. I keep Mimi fruit pops in the freezer to have when I take a break from gardening. Before going outside to work I put a large glass of ice tea in an insulated glass on the porch table along with cookies, turn on the fans and take frequent breaks. I work early and late and avoid the heat of the day. Otherwise I take full advantage of my AC! Betsy
My personal philosophy- I lived in Idaho and Norway for 27 years and Houston for 22 years. You can complain about the hot OR the cold but you’re a griper if you complain about both. Choose one!
I notice that the light changes from white to yellow, too.
My whole life has been spent inside in the summer with heavy drapes drawn and fans blowing. It’s dark like a cave. And so very quiet in the winter when there are no fans and no ac noise.
Slap on sunscreen on face, ears, neck, upper torso (wear an old shirt) and legs..
But some Hawaii shirts from Rima Inc. And always have fans going. I don’t need AC. Yes it can feel hot but AC feels unhealthy, like living in cold damp coffin!!
To add to what I said re: my memory of living in other places that are a tad worse, may I also suggest a haircut that includes an undercut. It makes putting long hair up easier and keeps you cool when you need it!
I carry my emotional support insulated water bottle with me everywhere filled with ice water, especially on my morning soup walk with my dogs.
Definitely cools you off
And my husband and I always play the guess the humidity game
He’s gotten really accurate