Too Hot to Fish

When I was growing up in the South, on days like the ones we've been having so far this week, my grandfather would sometimes remark, "It's too hot to fish." If you don't know much about older Southern gentlemen like my grandfather, let me enlighten you. It has to be mighty hot to be too hot to fish. They love going to a creek bank or a pond somewhere and spending all afternoon in the sun waiting for that tug on the fishing line. For it to be too hot to do that is saying something.

I went to see the movie Adventureland on Sunday (good movie, by the way), and when I got in my car to go home, the temperature gauge inside the car read 109 degrees. It was 3 p.m. I immediately cranked up the air conditioning and rolled down every window in hopes that I would not burn to a crisp immediately. Of course, the gauge is a reflection of more than just the actual temperature; it also is heavily influenced by the amount of sun, so I know it wasn't truly 109 degrees. However, we did go over the 100-degree mark on Sunday.

And in the city where I work, we topped out at 100 degrees on both Sunday and Monday. Monday was a particular delight because I got to walk from my office to class several times during the day. Then, on the drive home, between 7 and 8 p.m. or so, the gauge in the care consistently read more than 90 degrees. For most of the ride, it hovered around 95 or 96 degrees. This was after the sun had gone down, a time when the temperature usually drops to something more comfortable.

This morning it was already 71 degrees when I got up at 4:15 a.m. It never cooled down last night, and today was still near the top of the thermometer. I don't know if we set another record today like we have the past couple of days, but I wouldn't be at all surprised.

I'm realizing more and more that these extremes of temperature (way too hot or way too cold) are what truly bother me, and it gets particularly bad if the temperature rises and falls a lot during the same week (wich is apparently going to be the case here this week). If it stays relatively consistent, I'm fine with the weather in California. However, it's April and we've already hit 100 degrees a couple of times. I'm coming home exhausted and sweaty and more than a little smelly, I'd imagine. (Sorry for anyone who's had to stand or sit close to me the past couple of days.) I need more moderate weather.

Yes, I know I grew up in the South where the temperatures are even higher and the humidity creates another charming factor. But I've not lived in the South for 19 years now, and I know I wouldn't survive a full summer there. A week in New Orleans one May a couple of years ago almost killed me. It was already 100 degrees with 90 percent humidity at 8 a.m. How anyone lives through that is beyond me. (Well, I know how they do it. They stay indoors where the air conditioning is working.) I have all of the windows open here and a fan going, and I still think it's too hot.

Relief is on the way, according to the weather forecast. I'm hoping the cold spell we're about to face (dropping to a frigid 78 degrees tomorrow) will be more permanent than this 90-100+ stuff we've endured recently.