(From the AP) As a triple-digit heat wave in Southern California broke records Tuesday, residents gave thanks to the area’s cooling centers and the advent of air conditioning. “I wouldn’t live here if I didn’t” have air conditioning, said 91-year-old Esther DeDecker, who has lived in Blythe near the California-Arizona state line since 1940. She said she thought of moving over the years, but her family’s work was there so she stayed in the city, which is about 270 miles east of Los Angeles.

Blythe reached 117 degrees on Tuesday.

DeDecker, who has the cooling system in her home, volunteers at the Blythe Senior Center, where the cooling center is open nearly every day. Volunteers don’t have to teach residents how to cope with the heat, she said. “That’s not necessary. They know it. They learn it real fast when they get here.”

The heat will be a wake-up call for many in the Los Angeles area, which had been unseasonably cool for most of the summer.

It was a different story on Tuesday, when the city ended the day with a high temperature two degrees from its record of 96 degrees, set in 1931.

Read more here: Southern California swelters through record heat

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2010/08/24/state/n153153D87.DTL#ixzz0xb4Ya4EZ