I’ve just experienced the coldest November day on record for HK. It felt even colder as it came on the back of a week where sitting made me sweat. The contrast between dawdling into work from the ferry pier one week, so my shirt wouldn’t be sticking to me by the time I arrived, to wearing my long wool coat the following was extreme and gave no chance for acclimatisation.

On Monday, I figured it wasn’t going to be really ‘that’ cold, so went just in my suit. That was a mistake as the wind blew straight through it. When it was time to leave for the day, the wind had picked up further and my hands felt like icicles. I would have liked an electric blanket that evening and for the next four evenings at least.

I prefer going to work in the cold rather than the heat because I generally don’t have a strong desire to be outdoors in this kind of weather unless I happen to be on a ski trip. It means that I don’t stare out the window thinking that I should have become a landscape gardener and can stay focused on what I’m paid to do. I also like that I can put on more clothes but in the heat / humidity, there’s only a certain level of undress that still is professional enough for the work environment.

For that reason, I have been able to complete a lot of work in this past week as I didn’t feel like going outside for leisurely lunches. Next week it’s meant to be warmer again with top temperatures in the twenties and lows in the teens. Looks like I’ll be doing a little less this week.

It’s likely these temperatures have just been a prelude to the real winter given this time of year is usually fairly mild and January is the month I would consider the coldest. Hopefully it will be a gradual temperature decline rather than so suddenly, it won’t feel so chilly then.

Interesting the difference in temperature extremes from HK and Australia this week and it coincided with a lot of media and criticism about the existence (or otherwise) of climate change. I’m no scientist but I’m noticing the cold and the heat are happening earlier each year, at the wrong time of year and that the differences are more extreme. Something must be happening.

* Thanks to Vanilla Ice for the title to this post. I saw on some dodgy gossip show that he currently ‘sings’ this song while pouring drinks at a pub.