Posted by
Matt Purple on Wednesday, June 11, 2008 11:47:27 AM
Or perhaps Melting Colossal Concrete Frying Pan. Whatever cooking-related metaphors you use to describe DC, it's nearly impossible to overstate the intensity of the heat down here. Yesterday the temperature hovered in the low 210s with solar winds blowing at 20 mph and a 45-50% chance of late-afternoon fire raining from the sky. Washingtonians have reacted drastically, removing the full-length peacoats that they wear for ten months of the year, an indulgence usually reserved for casual Fridays and sleeping. Metro employees are also feeling the heat, rerouting the air conditioning from the passenger cars to their cabins and continuously crashing their trains into concrete walls. The orange line, which bisects the city east-west and is the most convenient route to the Capitol, is particularly besieged. Crime is also on the rise, prompting the District Police to wildly overreact and establish coming and going checkpoints in problematic neighborhoods (see previous post). It makes one ponder: if you were hypothetically founding a nation, would you locate its capital somewhere temperate or, say, directly in the center of a swamp? My fondest affections for Washington, Jefferson, and the whole gang, but come on guys, there had to be some better real estate out there.
Meanwhile it's 72 back in Connecticut! Gotta miss home at a time like this.