The Heat is Not Funny Anymore

The heat index in my area reached 46'C today. I felt dizzy and had to use an ice pack to cool down. I think maybe it was made worse because I took a diuretic. Even with hydrating more I felt off for a few hours. The ice pack helped. I put it on my armpit and nape. A friend said to also put it on your groin. I moved to the living room since it was cooler there. 

I think things would be worse if we didn't have plants around our house. Good thing I decided to delay having our front lawn landscaped. The bushy bamboo trees are helping keep our area cool. Good thing they are not water guzzlers and can survive with minimal watering. I moved my potted plants under the bamboo in our pocket garden to provide them some shade from the terrible heat of the sun. 

I have also been keeping an eye on my boys. I remind them to drink after they come back inside whenever they step out. We also starting making ice using ice bags. The ones in trays are not enough to cool drinks anymore. Maybe I should make some ice candy too? 

#BeKind #StaySafe

Old Metro Manila Paper Map

Found an old paper map while sorting my Mom's things. It was a map published by National Bookstore in 1988. Only street names could be found on the map. To find a street you could follow the designated grid from the list on the back of the map. 

Of course, if you look closely, the map features more of Manila, Pasay, Mandaluyong, San Juan, and Quezon City. My city, Paranaque, is at the bottom of the map and just covers half of it. Marikina, Las Pinas and Alabang are nowhere to be found. Apparently, Alabang used to be a farm land. Las Pinas used to be part of Manila. Marikina, on the other hand, was part of the province of Rizal (same as Paranaque). I'm not sure when their status changed. 

The map also shows Taguig as an empty lot. It's where BGC is now located. When I was growing up, the area where BGC is now used to be part of "Fort Bonifacio". Most of it was empty and just housed the American Cemetery, AFP buildings and golf club, and the Libingan ng mga Bayani. I used to go with my Mom there to visit Tito Ben and eat yummy pancit at the AFP golf club. The area is now filled up if you look at Google Maps. 

Aside from this paper map, I also found a thicker street map book-slash-magazine. Sweetie was excited to see Marikina in the map. Unfortunately, half of the book was missing! Haha. Maybe we'll find it as I go through more boxes. I told him, we almost never went to Marikina even though Tito Bert lived there. My parents thought anywhere outside of Makati is far. 

Kids nowadays would be surprised how we used to find places. Google Maps was only introduced in 2005 and I worked on getting more things mapped only in 2007. Back then smart phones were also not rampantly available yet. I remember I used to print maps from Google Maps before going out (and yes I found a few print outs while sorting). 

There's no need for us to keep the paper map and the street map book (and it's missing pages) since online maps have richer information. Things also change a lot. The main thoroughfare near us has changed a lot since I was a child. And I'll save that story for another day. 

Do you still have paper maps?

#BeKind #StaySafe