By Jeff Salter
Okay, we’re talking about heat and hate, so I won’t pull any punches: I HATE it. Before I just start listing my reasons, I’ll give you one long example.
I lived some 45 years in high-humidity Louisiana and for 26 of those years I worked in downtown Shreveport, where the summer concrete can fry your eggs for a dozen hours each day. My parking spots varied from 2 to 5 blocks away and by the time I’d dragged myself from my car I was damp all over from sweat and my clothes were sticking to my skin. Then I’d enter the chilled inside climate and my sweat would freeze — everywhere except inside my skivvies. Going home in the late afternoon was worse because the temperature was even hotter than for my morning commute.
My list of reasons to hate heat:
* frozen groceries thaw before you get home
* steering wheel is too hot to touch, much less hold onto
* chocolate candy melts if you leave it in your car for ten seconds
* M&Ms melt inside the BAG … a long time before they reach your hand or mouth
* cats and dogs shed bushels of fur in the summer
* skeeters and chiggers make it their seasonal business to drive me insane
* briars, poison ivy, and fire ants thrive in the heat
* in hot months, you have to mow grass … or pay somebody to do it
* science has no known cure for prickly heat rash
I got help with this list of heat-hating reasons:
Not certain I had enough venom to back up my hatred, I asked my wife (Denise) and daughter (Julie) for other reasons they disliked intense summer heat. Here’s what they came up with:
* chocolate icing melts and runs onto your car seat on the way to the birthday party
* your I-phone gets so slippery with sweat that it scoots out of your hand
* your glasses slip down your sweaty nose
* sweat trickles between your, um, bosoms and tickles … but you can’t effectively deal with it in public
* underarm sweat stains ruin your outfits
* you get butt blisters going down the playground’s metal slide
* no matter how much time you spent on it, your hairdo goes flat as soon as the hot air hits it
* make-up starts melting down your face
* most of your clothing sticks to you
* your bare legs stick to the vinyl car seats when you’re wearing shorts
* ice cream melts faster than you can lick it
* the sweat marks show everything when men or women wear tight, grey Jersey knit exercise garb
* those unusual people at the big-city Wally-World stores wear even LESS clothing in hot weather!
Question:
What do YOU dislike about hot weather?
Angela Schroeder
Patricia Kiyono
Elaine Cantrell
Jeff Salter
Joselyn
Tonette Joyce
Four Foxes, One Hound 
That’s a lot of hate for a bit of sunshine, Jeff. I think I can say most of the above isn’t really applicable to me, even in Australia’s hot summer. I go shopping with my cooler bags, don’t have to go down slides anymore (thank goodness!) and hardly wear shorts. Not sure about poison ivy here, but I do know the creepy crawlers tend to come out as well as snakes. And as we already mentioned on Tuesday with Janette … the increase of BO … yup, that’s a negative!
LikeLike
Glad you reminded me of B.O. — because I have a FB post coming up on that topic.
I definitely need cooler bags from frozen stuff when I shop. I often have my Mom with me and she’s quite slow, which increases the thawing time.
LikeLike
And people wonder why I prefer to spend the majority of my time indoors during the Summer LOL or why I preferred Autumn and Winter.
When we were in Gatlinburg, TN for family reunion last week, I thought being in the mountains would mean cooler weather. I couldn’t have been more wrong. It wasn’t as hot necessarily, but it still was hot–especially if you ended up stuck in the sun for any amount of time. We went to Dollywood and I was drenched in sweat (we all were). My shorts and shirt were stuck to me. Later, we got drenched by a downpour, which made me cold in the car LOL, however, it was nice not to be quite so hot. Swimming the next day felt so good!
LikeLike
Right you are, Bethany. The outdoor temperatures are so intense that the indoor temperatures are a shock to the system. Freezing sweat is an awful sensation.
Glad you made it to the pool that next day!
LikeLike
~No matter how high the AC is set, as soon as the dogs start roughhousing, they suck all the breathable air from the room.
~The shedding dog MUST sit on you or against you and the fur sticks to your sweaty body so you end up tarred and feathered – canine version.
~It drives the blacksnakes inside (versus the cold winter, which drives the rodents inside) and they can be found wrapped around the drain pipes under the sink.
~Kudzu normally grows at more than 1 foot per day but it grows closer to 2 feet per day at temps greater than 90 degrees – so the yard is draped in it for most of the summer, like green shrouds.
~The cable service is disrupted because the heat over-expands the lines at the gazillions of connectors the company uses.
LikeLike
Glad you mentioned kudzu, Kay. I don’t see much up here in KY, but it Alabama (where we have some property) it does truly take over. And if you ever try to walk thru it, you discover there’s an entire ecosystem of bugs, small critters, and other nasty surprises.
LikeLike
ecosystem… yeah, it’s like meeting Yoda in the Dagobah System – only instead of a little green creature wielding the force, it’s black rat snakes in that kudzu.
LikeLike
Right you are, Kay. Some scary things underneath that thickly-knit canopy of kudzu.
LikeLike
This is my first year trying to survive a desert summer. The first time my outdoor thermometer maxed out at 120 degrees, I knew I was in trouble. And that was before the big wildfire rained ash and soot down on my house. Nights like tonight, the wind felt like dragon’s breath, and even the dog refused to go for a walk. Any temperature below triple digits is celebrated.The nights remain in the eighties. On the bright side, I’m getting a lot of writing done because I don’t want to leave the house!
LikeLike
Thanks for visiting, Ariella.
We lived in New Mexico for about 18 months, and it got VERY hot in summer. But I think our elevation made things slightly cooler, overall, than in the lower-lying areas of the American Southwest.
I’ve never had to face a wildfire, and I certainly don’t envy that experience of yours.
LikeLike
As I mentioned on Iris’ column on Monday, given a choice between summer heat and winter cold, I’ll take the summer heat. But the nuisances listed above could be bothersome. I don’t wear makeup, I don’t have vinyl seats, and I can’t remember the last time I went down a slide. Iris had a great suggestion for your chocolate – get yourself one of those thermal packs and keep it in your car! You can get lunch bags with the thermal lining, too – perfect for your M&Ms. And I’m thinking about getting one of those fold up shade thingies for my windshield to keep my steering wheel from getting hot in somebody’s parking lot.
LikeLike
Yes, Patty, those windshield shades were a must in Shreveport during summer. I haven’t bothered with them up here in KY though. I remember when they first appeared commercially and I thought, “Why didn’t I think of making an accordion panel out of cardboard and selling it for ten bucks?”
LikeLike
It’s all in the extremes, for me, Jeff. I hope you are getting the break in the heat I have today;it’s lovely, nearly Fall-like this morning. I will have to squeeze some timeout later for my thought to post tomorrow.
And, Jeff,I always have a cooler in my trunk for warm-weather trips to the store.If the weather is really hot,I put a cold-pack or a frozen water bottle in it before I go, to pre-cool the cooler. Do this; your M&M’s will thank you.
LikeLike
LOL, Tonette. I could no more remember to pre-pack a cooler than I could remember to bring my coupons. Ha.
Yes, we’ve had coolish mornings and evenings on these last two days. Felt nice
LikeLike
The electric bill. ‘Nuff said.
Other than that, bring on the heat. I prefer melting than freezing.
LikeLike
Oh, that’s a biggie, Jenn. Glad you added that to my list.
You know, I grew up in S.E. Louisiana and for 10 of those 11 yrs, we did not have any A/C in our house. Not sure how I survived. Also, our public schools did not have A/C at that time.
LikeLike
You just got soft in your, um, advanced age. HAHA! Just kidding!
LikeLike
Actually, that’s exactly true, Jenn. My body evidently used to have considerably more tolerance for discomfort.
And another thing, though this may be T.M.I., when I was a school kid, I could go the entire school day without using the bathroom. Those days are certainly gone!
LikeLike
I might have a cure for prickly heat. My father suffered from it, and a man he worked with told him to splash the affected area with alcohol every morning. I’ve often wondered if Daddy was a victim of a practical joke because I can still remember how he carried on in the bathroom. It worked though.
LikeLike
LOL, Elaine. I thought you were going to say he was instructed to DRINK the alcohol. You know, medicate from within. Ha.
LikeLike