It's a Hot Heat

I am lucky to be here today, sharing my tale of woe. I almost expired from fried brain syndrome on Sunday. And I'm not talking about global warming.

You'd have thought I was a prospector, setting out across the Arizona desert with my pack mule to lay in supplies, braving the 120-degree heat in order to obtain food. But no. I was a modern-day housewife, merely grocery shopping at an establishment that I refer to elsewhere as the idle-hands workshop of the kingpin of the blazing underworld. Even now, the thought of the ill-fated trip brings perspiration to my pores.

You would think, would you not, that upon entering the whooshing automatic doors of a large retail outlet on a sunny day in June, you would notice a difference between the 87-degree outside temperature, and the climate-controlled inner atmosphere? Au contraire. There was no such distinction. That, alone, should have signaled me to abort the mission until a more opportune time. But time was of the essence. I needed my trusty assistant, who would not be available on weekdays. And our earlier decision to cool our heels in the movie theater had delayed our sortie until 4:00. It was now or never. Or at least until next weekend.

It didn't take long before this lady was glowing all over the place. Truth be told, I was sweating like a pig. If pigs sweated. Because I assume they would do so in copious amounts. My tresses were soon dripping wet. I could have sold Gatorade by the keg, had I been cast on the spot in a commercial. Buckets of underboob sweat poured down my torso and legs. I'm surprised nobody needed rescue from those salty rapids flowing off my feet. Bass Pro Shop in Springfield, Missouri, could take a lesson on indoor in-floor streams just by observing my emissions.

I had a thought of stripping down to a thong in an effort to diffuse my body heat. The only thing that stopped me was the fact that I wasn't wearing a thong. Too bad. Because I was going to take my be-thonged body straight to one of those free-standing freezers and hop in to cool down. To avoid a fever seizure. The Blazin' Chunks bin would have been good. I like chicken. And while regulating my body temperature, I was planning to remedy my near-disastrous dehydration situation with a Capri Sun IV. So simple, really. To impale the blue vein of my front-elbow with the pointy end of that hard plastic straw, and jab the blunt end into the foil pouch.

Dang! I was HOT! A lady of the evening, a master craftswoman of the world's oldest profession, visiting a house of worship, could not have held a candle to the amount of perspiration exuded from me. That place really needs a cooling station. Short of piercing some two-liter soda bottles on the top shelf, and dancing in the multicolored spray, I'm not sure what other emergency measures I could have employed. Heat stroke was imminent. But fortune smiled upon me. Even Steven and I are on good terms. Only one person was ahead of me in line.

What a relief it was to finally exit, and feel the cool 87-degree breeze on my brow.