Monday, 7/17

There's no way it's half over, is there?

Sigh.

If you consider “summer” (and this year, of course, we must use the quotes around “summer”) to be the months of June, July, and August, then this past Saturday, July 15^th, the middle day of the middle month of “summer”, marked the halfway point of the season.

Yup. “Summer” is half way over already.

I don't mention it to bum you out, nor do I mention it to set myself up for an epic session of whining about the unfairness of it all. I just brought it up because my mind is blown by the simple fact that we're now past the halfway point of a season for which I live but, because of whatever, I've yet to even start enjoying.

“Summer”, we hardly knew ye.

This actually all came up while I was off on my meandering Saturday morning run, one of the only meandering Saturday morning runs this “Summer” when it was warm enough for me to be sweating like a pig. Now setting aside the question of whether or not pigs can actually sweat (can they?), it was one of those runs about which I (literally) dream. And as I was running and sweating like a pig, it occurred to me that this was perhaps the first time all year I was doing both—running & sweating, at the same time—and it had taken all the way to July 15^th for that to occur. Once I realized it was July 15^th, the mid point of “Summer”...

Well, that's when the whole thing spiraled out of control.

The sad thing about that observation is that it really doesn’t SEEM like summer’s been with us long enough to be half over. Most of June (and July) was so cold, and so many of us spent the month complaining about it, that it really doesn’t seem like we’ve used up half of our allotment of summer. It just feels like April spilled into May, which then spilled into June, and that, well, summer just started. Not that it’s halfway over.

But since I don’t seem to have the capability to be a pessimist for long, let me share a very interesting weather fact. According to records, Marquette gets an average of four 90+ degree days a year. That means that since we’ve only had one so far, the second half of summer promises at least three more.

Whether that's a promise that'll be kept, I have no idea.

I know there's nothing I can do about it, and I feel like I'm starting to venture into whining territory, so I'll shut up about it now. But if you happen to see gray matter splattered here or there on Front Street in Marquette the next few days, don't worry. It's nothing serious.

It's just what's left over after my mind gets blown.

(jim@wmqt.com)