It�s Not The Heat...It�s The Humanity

Jimnotmike became my friend as a byproduct of Fire Pit Frenzy.� We disagee on much (I will probably love Vegas when I see it this summer) if you have followed any of his comments but we agree on enough that he is a keeper!





It�s Not The Heat...It�s The Humanity

As I type this, I have just returned from Las Vegas on a Red-Eye Flight. There is a really really good reason they call them that! So, bear with me, I�m running off 4 hours of sleep on a plane, a 3 hour time difference, and very little else at this point.

Las Vegas, my least favorite city in the world! For years I have had to travel there for work. Thankfully, only about once a year. I�ve always thought it was the flashing lights, the casinos, or the incredibly expensive �everything� that turned me off. Maybe it was the fact that no one seems to be �From� there, even though the suburban sprawl spreads out for miles around The Strip. Finally, after 10 years at this job, and probably the same number of trips to this �Hive of scum and villainy� I have come up with the answer. I dislike Las Vegas because of it�s utter lack of humidity!

Stepping off the plain in the desert makes one immediately start searching their pockets for the lip balm they forgot to bring with them. The combination of hot dry air outside and the air conditioned cold dry air inside, I�m sure, is what keeps the lotion industry in business. Water evaporates so quickly there that people have to have Auto-Fillers on their swimming pools.

Your nose winds up feeling as tho it is lined with sand paper. Your eyes develop the complete inability to create tears, and I won�t even go into the chaffing that occurs on �other� areas of the body. It was 104 degrees yesterday in Las Vegas...104! I know, everyones says, �But it�s a dry heat.� Im sorry, but heat is heat is heat in my book!

None of this really occurred to me until I arrived back at Dulles today. Stepping off the plane in DC, I was greeted, as I always am, by the pollen. But amazingly enough...for the first time in 5 days it reminded me that my nose is on my head to create and produce mucilaginous fluids, that and hold up my glasses. There was finally something there to sniff back or blow out! That wasn�t the least of it. I hurried outside for my first cigarette in 4 hours(addict!) and as I exited the door I found myself wrapped in the warm moist blanket that can only be identified as East Coast Summer. As strange as it sounds it sent a chill down my spine. It was if I could feel every pore on my body drinking deeply of the humidity�s heady brew. I was flooded by such a mixture of relief and joy I wanted to take off my shirt (which I hardly ever do) and spin around like Mary Tyler Moore, tossing the hat I wasn�t wearing into the air. The fountain of humidity had revived me as my cells lapped at it�s intoxicating richness.

I, quite suddenly, felt human again.

JimNotMike