Hot and bothered: Dana Littlepage Smith on dealing with heatwaves

‘The alarm is sounding, hitting snooze is no longer an option.’

by Dana Littlepage Smith 10th July 2026

Heat does things to people.

Ask anybody. Ask Benvolio in Shakespeare’s bloodbath, Romeo and Juliet. Ominously he warns, ‘The day is hot; the Capulets, abroad; And if we meet we shall not ‘scape a brawl, For now, these hot days, is the mad blood stirring.’ He’s speaking to Mercutio, who is as mercurial and fiery as our twenty-first-century weather.