There follows a lesson in keeping a city centre apartment cool in the summer without the aid of air conditioning. Or at least, keeping it at bearable temperatures. There is a point to all this, though you have to skip to the bottom to find it.
1. Open all windows at night, to allow as much cool nighttime air in as possible. Doesn't help much if there is no breeze, as has been the case recently.
2. As soon as the sun starts shining in through the windows, close them and and close the shutters or lower the blinds.
3. Keep closed until late afternoon when the sun no longer falls directly onto them.
4. Open the windows again in the evening as soon as the temperature outside is lower than inside. Which at the moment isn't until bedtime.
Anyway, there I was, late afternoon yesterday, slaving away in a sauna-like study in front of a hot computer (heat generated by the friction of fingers as I melt the keyboard in a creative frenzy of writing)... Ok, stretching artistic licence a bit there, but what follows is true...
I was raising the blinds to let in more light when I was greeted by the sight of a man, leaning out of a window opposite, smoking a fag. Not an unusual sight you may say, but the image is made unsavoury by the fact that he was dressed only in underpants and a pair of stockings. Not the sort of view one dreams of having from one's front window. And before you ask, definitely male (30ish), definitely stockings (black nylon). Ahem, not that I dared look closely.
To add to the intriguing scenario, the window in question is equipped with what look like dark red satin curtains. I shall refrain from speculating about what was going on in there...
