Dog Days
According to the Old Farmer’s Almanac, the northern hemisphere is in the middle of the Dog Days of summer, the 40 day period between July 3rd and August 11th.
The Dog Days are marked by extreme heat and were thought by the ancient Greeks and Romans to bring with them a period of craziness. From my vantage point here on the front stoop, they’ve been living up to their reputation.
Earlier this week, the sun was blindingly bright, high temperatures were boiling hot, and the humidity, an entirely unwelcome feature of a West Virginia summer (don’t @ me), only added to the muggy misery.
My hometown in West Virginia’s Eastern Panhandle registered highs in the low 90s on Monday. And it was even hotter less than 100 miles down the interstate, where I work in a Washington, D.C. newsroom. The Washington Post’s “Capital Weather Gang” said Monday was the hottest day of the summer so far in the nation’s capital. The District topped out at 98 degrees.
I’m no conspiracy theorist.
I’m a journalist. We deal in facts.
But it didn’t escape my notice that as the district sweltered in Dog Day heat and humidity, the Trump Administration was in the middle of an imbroglio following the President’s remarks at his summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki.
The two don’t have anything to do with each other, except they both induced flop sweats. And if there is one thing I dislike more than sweating when I haven’t done anything physical to merit it, it’s when the newsroom in D.C. follows me home.
I generally prefer to leave my job at work, but smart phones have made that virtually impossible. Last weekend, in the middle of the heat wave, I scrolled through my Twitter feed to find a thorn in President Trump’s side had turned up in my small town. One of the prominent stories in the Sunday edition of the local newspaper was about Stormy Daniels, the busty adult film star and stripper who is engaged in quite the legal battle with Trump.
Daniels spent the weekend in town capitalizing on her notoriety. She performed at a local strip club just two days after her arrest in Columbus, Ohio.
I was in the newsroom the night Daniels was arrested and now it seemed as if she had purposefully figured out where I live just to make sure I knew the charges against her had been dropped.
Between Stormy Daniels and President Trump in Helsinki, it’s been a quite a news cycle. But at least the rain that moved through this week put a damper on the heat wave. High temperatures have been knocked down a few notches and the humidity that made taking my morning coffee out to the front stoop such a sweaty trial, has moved on.
But, traditionally speaking, the Dog Days don’t conclude for another three weeks.
The misery of scorching heat seems sure to return.
It’s summer, after all.
There’s nothing for it but to find a nice spot to remain cool for when things start overheating again.
