Wednesday, June 20, 2012

Monty Python Is My Life Coach.



Some things in life are bad
They can really make you mad
Other things just make you swear and curse.
When you're chewing on life's gristle
Don't grumble, give a whistle*
And this'll help things turn out for the best...

And...always look on the bright side of life...
Always look on the light side of life...
                                                              -words and music by Eric Idle
  
 Occasionally, I'm reminded that I use this space to whine a lot. In fairness, I think my whining is mitigated by the common, frequent, quite a few, one or two examples of me finding the silver lining (no matter how thin). In that vein, let's talk about the weather.


According to those who know, it's about to be very hot here in NY for a few days.  If that graphic doesn't give you the idea of how hot it's going to be, let's try something a bit more visceral.  How hot is it going to be, Matthew?



Normally, I'd use this as an opportunity to bitch, moan, carp, kvetch, gripe, beef, grouse, bellyache, grumble, grouch, and et cetera, et cetera, but I'm not going to do that. I'm going to find the bright side!  So, steamy, hot, sizzling, oppressive weather...how do I love thee?  Let me count the ways.

1. It gives meteorologists something to get excited about.  The ones here haven't been so excited since the last Snowpocalypse (that didn't really materialize).  I swear; Al Roker was nearly peeing his pants this morning!

2. The humidity has some labor saving aspects.  Usually, after I get out of the shower, I grab a towel and I have to do a great deal of wiping all over my body to get it properly wet.  I'm confident that tomorrow morning, my towel will still be quite damp from this morning's efforts.

3.  Anent item 2, I will have the opportunity to conduct some ground breaking research into the benefits of mildew.  It's one of those things that really easy to produce and I'm sure there are some uses we've overlooked.

3. Anent item 3, it's already given me a reason to look up "anent".

4. Anent a number of spots above, the weather has already given my thesaurus** a workout.

5. Many recipes call for extended cooking times with moderate, moist heat.  I plan to put some meat in a covered pot in my backyard.  Without turning on the oven and further heating our kitchen, I should have a delicious meal waiting for me some time tomorrow evening.

6. Free Sauna!

7. Sauna is a funny word and can be pronounced in a number of amusing ways. Saw-Nuh. Sowwwww-Nah. Sah-Ooooo-Nuh.  I bet there's more.

8. Wrinkles will effortlessly fall from my clothes!

9. You can make the occurrence of "frying an egg on the sidewalk" videos into a drinking game.

10. The workmen making all that noise across the street from my house will either take a couple of days off because it's too hot, or they'll be sharing the hell they've been making of my life.  I can live with either.

There's no end to the benefits this heat wave is going to bring.  Feel free to point out some more that I may be overlooking.
-----------------------------------
*No matter how hard I've tried, I've never been able to learn to whistle.

**"What's another word for thesaurus?" - Steven Wright.

8 comments:

John Healy said...

It make it easier to talk about the weather. If it's great, the conversation goes: "Nice, isn't it." "Yeah."
With a heat wave one hears: "Sure is hot!" Cripes, yeah. Stupid global warming!" "No, that doesn't exist. It was hot last year, too."
Great Stephen Wright quote. You may have made my day.

TimBo said...

No need to go to Thrihnukagigur to experience the lava chamber of a volcano.


Anent: A creature living in Middle Earth. Treebeard was anent.

Nathan said...

You may not believe me, but when this heat goes on for a week or more Brooklyn smells worse than a volcano. Mere sulfur is for pansies.

John the Scientist said...

Maybe there will be a garbage strike on top of the heat wave. 95. 678 and 495 will be packed with refugees fleeing one way, and Chinese confused about stinky tofu vendors in the other. :D

Warner said...

At some point in the 80s (1988 perhaps) my wife turned to me and told me to get the house air conditioned, 'yesterday'.

Warner said...

At some point in the 80s (1988 perhaps) my wife turned to me and told me to get the house air conditioned, 'yesterday'.

John the Scientist said...

We have the same heat you do. So I decided to spend the morning shampooing cows and oxen. We used pert. Their coats looks all shiny and shit, but it still smelled about how you'd expect a barnyard in 96 degree heat to smell (i.e. still not as bad as stinky tofu). :D

Nathan said...

I believe I've mentioned that I spent 6 months on a kibbutz when I was 18. After trying a few different jobs, I ended up more-or-less permanently assigned to the dairy.

400 cows. And 95 was considered a fairly cool day. The cows were always ripe.