It’s a sure sign of summer if the chair gets up when you do. — Walter Winchell
Greetings to all from the burning fires of eternal hell that used to be known as Central Texas. As of this writing, it has been over 100 every day since July 8. It hasn’t rained since some time back in June. Last night at book club (well, ONE of my book clubs) my friend said it rained a few drops on her as she drove in. I think she was hallucinating, bless her heart. The weather people keep teasing us about our next rainfall, like Wimpy’s famous line: “I’ll gladly pay you Tuesday . . .”
We’re still celebrating winning the recent battle royale with the pool algae. But we’re keeping a very close eye. Let’s just say, that stuff is very vigorous. Black Lagoon-esque. I should’ve paid closer attention in chemistry class.
I’ve been running the drip line in my perimeter bed three mornings a week, and hand-watering a little bit as well. But the lawn? Fugheddaboudit. It’s toast. It literally crunches underfoot.
On a more serious note, yesterday a wildfire broke out between Smithville and Bastrop. Our area had a terrible fire in 2011, plus a few others since then. It is a very serious topic here. We are all on edge. This particular fire seems to be contained, but still.
So I thought we might all enjoy a few minutes spent on a cooler topic: the natural wonder of frozen water, aka ‘ice’.
I’m of an age that I am well able to make my own ice if necessary (assuming a working refrigerator/freezer is available). For you youngsters in the audience, I am not talking about pressing my glass against the lever on the front of the fridge door and waiting for ice cubes to fall. That’s child’s play. If called upon, I can manually empty a plastic ice cube tray. Hint: it’s all in the twist. I can also refill an empty ice tray, which I have observed is apparently quite a daunting task for some of you (probably the same folks who can’t seem to replace the toilet paper roll). I even know how to operate the vintage trays, the metal ones with the lever on top. I actually got my tongue stuck to one of those babies back in the day. But that’s another story.
Technically speaking, I’m not making the ice. The freezer is doing that for me, once I fill and replace the trays. Which got me wondering what folks did for ice back in the day before the miracle of electric appliances.
I am familiar with the massive blocks of ice delivered via horse drawn wagon, mainly because of those horrendous ice tongs. If there’s not a horror movie made about those things, there should be. But I never gave much thought to the process of creating those big blocks and keeping them cold.
Turns out, ice was one of the first earth-friendly, sustainable, renewable resources. Back in the day, no one ‘made’ the ice. Unless you count Mother Nature. People just went to the local frozen lake or river and cut blocks of ice from it. And guess what? The ice just kept re-forming. Back then it was a challenge to harvest ice faster than Mother Nature could make it.
I was also curious about how they kept the ice cold if they didn’t have modern refrigeration. Would you believe they used plain old straw? Hay. The stuff horses eat. Who knew? That, plus constructing the storage facilities underground, helped keep ice frozen pretty much year-round.
Evidence of manmade ice storage facilities has been found as far back as 1780 BCE. Some were built with fancy mortar using ingredients specifically designed to make it highly insular. They also may have used specially engineered structures known as windcatchers to generate passive cooling.
Fun fact: windcatchers were also integrated into ships. They are called Dorade boxes, named after the first ship they were used on. I’ve seen these things many times in movies and had no idea what they were for, other than for the characters to hide in.
The ice import/export biz was big, mainly centered in Scandinavia, until the middle of the 1800s, when most countries figured out how to harvest and store their own ice. But even domestically produced ice often had to be transported to warmer southern locales that didn’t have the luxury of carving up the nearby frozen river in the winter. That’s how the ice house business came about. Ice houses stored ice and sold it to the local residents who didn’t have any way to keep ice cold at home.
In Texas and other parts of the south, ‘ice house’ became a euphemism for ‘beer joint’. It was understood that if a place had a way to store ice, they also had a way to keep beverages cold. The original business model of ice houses became obsolete with the advent of modern refrigeration techniques in the mid-20th century. But many switched over full time to beer/burger joints, like the Paige Ice House not far from where we live. Others went in a different direction, selling various sundries in addition to their original icy mainstay. They’re still around. Perhaps you’ve heard of them? A little operation called 7-11?
I hope this newsletter has helped you keep your cool today. “Oh thank heaven for 7-11”, indeed. We’re all feeling a little twitchy thanks to this ridiculous heat. At least I don’t have to pick any hay out of my drink.
I will leave you with three things:
I just finished reading Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus. Loved it! I’m browsing TikTok for instructions on how to make a #2 pencil look good in my hair bun.
I’ve been prepping for Oppenheimer by watching Manhattan on Prime/FreeVee. Is it wrong that I get impatient with the soap opera stuff and want to see something go boom?
I just discovered we have a food truck the next town over that specializes in pie. That’s a different kind of heaven.
My latest book, Better Living Through Chemistry, is available now on Amazon. It’s the second book in The Centé Conspiracy trilogy.
Brody Morgan grew up starring in commercials for his dad's mega food corporation. What will Brody do when he discovers what he's really been selling?
Super interesting post Lissa. Strangely enough, I also just finished writing a post about climate change, which I will be posting tomorrow. I guess this topic is high on everyone’s minds right now. We also fear the forest fires every summer now in Canada. My mother had ice delivery in England growing up. I had no idea 7-11 had been around for so long. Great photo!
Interesting reading. I wish I could send you some of the heavy rain and cool temperatures we've been having. Did the Native Americans used to do rain dances?