Why, oh why, does life feel like an endless rotation between thinking about death and sweating profusely? This summer—or as I like to call it, The Eternal Sauna—has me questioning the meaning of life, as one does when pondering if you can cook an egg on the pavement (spoiler: you can).
Last summer, as many of us marinated in our own sweat, heat waves behaved like that one relative overstaying their welcome. According to some boffins publishing their tree-hugging woes in Science Advances, heat waves are now slower than my last relationship and lingering longer than my will to live.
Apparently, these slow-moving climate blobs have settled down nicely—decreasing in speed by a tortoise-paced 5 miles per day over the decades. And guess what? They've decided to tack on an extra four-day vacation, because who doesn't love a good heat stroke?
Climate guy Wei Zhang from Utah's Most Overheated University, or something, mumbled something about "strong impacts on public health." No kidding, Zhang. The only thing running fast these days is my fan, and even that's starting to smell like burning.
So here we are, coughing in the dust bowl that was once our backyard, reminiscing about the time when heat waves didn't have the endurance of a marathon runner.
To end on a high note, remember, while you may feel alone in this relentless inferno, at least you're not as lonely as the Maytag repairman or, for that matter, me contemplating the sweet release of death in these sweltering times. But hey, dying alone means you don't have to share the A/C, right?
Based on the original article "Heat Waves Are Moving Slower and Staying Longer, Study Finds".
