Loose Lips Sink Ships

“Most days I find myself in a knot - unsure of many things. It may be because we are not getting any younger. And time is fickle so we have to make the most of it. But what is left of us when we rush our lives? I wish I could unravel me.”

“Perhaps you’re just different. It’s not a sin, you know, though you may have heard otherwise.”

“The purpose of literature is to turn blood into ink.”

The world is hot, on fire, and flooding. Climate change is here.

Horrific fires have ripped through homes in Greece, floods have submerged parts of Laos, and heat waves have overwhelmed Japan.

grist.org

[…]It’s the hottest month of one of the hottest years in the history of human civilization, and unusual wildfires are sprouting up all over the map. Sweden has called for emergency assistance from the rest of the European Union to help battle massive wildfires burning north of the Arctic Circle. Across the western United States, 50 major wildfires are burning in parts of 14 states, fueled by severe drought. The wildfires burning in Siberia earlier this month sent smoke plumes from across the Arctic all the way to New England, four thousand miles away. Last year, big wildfires burned in Greenland for the first time in recorded history.

And then there are the rains. In Laos, after days of downpours, a hydropower dam that was under construction collapsed on Tuesday. Hundreds of people have been reported missing. Higher global temperatures increase the evaporation rate, putting more water vapor in the atmosphere and making extreme downpours more common.

In recent weeks, high temperature records have been set on nearly every continent. On Monday, Japan had its hottest temperature in recorded history — 106 degrees Fahrenheit — just days after one of the worst flooding disasters the country has ever seen.

Algeria has recorded the highest reliably measured temperature in Africa, 124 degrees Fahrenheit. In late June, the temperature never dropped below 108 degrees Fahrenheit in Oman — the highest overnight low temperature anywhere in the world.

Even in normally temperate places the air has been sweltering: Temperatures approaching 100 degrees Fahrenheit hit parts of Canada, overwhelming hospitals in Montreal — where another heat wave is imminent this week.

“Yes: I am a dreamer. For a dreamer is one who can only find his way by moonlight, and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world.”