Summer in Phoenix

There are some things you do in life that cause you to get burned. And I don’t mean that metaphorically. Grabbing a skillet by the handle moments after taking it out of the oven, brushing your arm against a hot iron while reaching for a clothes hanger, or just leaning in a little too close while cooking over a charcoal grill or campfire. These are things everyone has done at least once in their life. You get burned, Unilocal in pain, curse yourself for doing something so careless, and then proceed to applying ice, butter or whatever home remedy for burns that you subscribe to.
In a Phoenix summer, the list of ways to give yourself second degree burns extends far beyond the above examples. Getting into a car with leather seats while wearing shorts is a common one. As is asphalt or sidewalk on bare feet. Also, touching anything metal that has been left outside for more than 5 minutes; this includes patio furniture, playground equipment, pool net poles, etc. Just stepping outside in the afternoon on a cloudless day will inevitably lead to burning. Long before the chapped lips, light headedness from the glare and headaches and nausea from dehydration; before your body even has time to start to sweat you will feel it. That sharp burning sensation extending over all of your exposed skin. An acute, throbbing heat brought on by exposure to the intense 118 degree Phoenix sunshine. I don’t think anyone who has not experienced this for themselves can truly understand what this feels like. The word «hot» just doesn’t cut it.
Yeah, it’s great that we don’t have to shovel snow in the winter. Yay. Whoo-​hoo. You will have a hard time convincing me that there is any climate in the continental US more miserable than Phoenix in August.

i just saw some facebook posts
friends bitchin’ ’bout the heat
snapshots of thermometers
taken from driver’s seats
that shows the temp at one-​o-​eight
it’s summer, simmer down
rantin’ ’bout how much they hate
their lives now, in this town
but i can’t rebut it better
an ode to phoenix heat
then i did, this time, last year
so allow me to repeat…
call me a contrarian,
i love my sweaty ass
pressed against the naugahyde
foot down on the gas
screw the a/​c, windows down
it’s cool, y’all ain’t here
it’s california calling
and poof, you disappear
summer’s when suburbans
lemmings, hit the road
loaded up, with boogie boards
off to, coronado
and i’m the only sucka left
to deal with the ‘zona heat
barefootin, morning paper
as the driveway, burns my feet
but it’s all good, i wasn’t duped
when I bought my lot
the realtor didn’t lie to me
and say, ‘it’s never hot“
in summers, hello, it’s phoenix
please people, suck it up
either move away, FOREVER
or just shut, the fuck up

With apologies to one of the original Unilocaler’s, «Billy S» :)
«Now is the summer of our discontent
Made glorious summer by this sun of Arizona;
And the brown clouds not lour’d upon our valley
In the deep bosom of the airshed buried»
If spring is the season of rebirth and new beginnings, then summer is the season that matures… the time when you firm things up in the oven (an apt metaphor if ever there were one) …roast it up and put a nice thick crust on things:)
OK, enough metaphor and allegory… let’s get down to brass tacks… hot, hot brass tacks:)
I understand that it gets warm here in the summer, I kind of knew that when I moved here a few years ago:)
I like it:)
The Beautiful Carin spent part of her youth here in sunny Scottsdale… her family lives here and I have had business interests here since I lived in Portland… I was one of the people who got to spend a few extra hours at Sky Harbor (much less to do in the terminals back then) when the temp hit 123 and the dew point minimum’s got to the 737 fleets:)
I still like it:)
Restaurants that I like aren’t crowded:)
I can safely walk around Scottsdale without watching so intently for the odd Cadillac with the Yoda look alike driving on the sidewalks through the park, peering intently from under the steering wheel, thinking they are driving to their doctors appointment:)
I can still go running in the mornings (it works up quite a sweat:)
I can still play golf (no, I don’t need oven mitts to hold my clubs, the courses aren’t crowded and the nice warm golf ball goes a mile:)
I get to take little vacations, right here in town at some of the better resorts in the country, for next to nothing (I’m trying to work a out a few deals where they pay me to come and stay at their resorts, but so far, no go:)
Summer in Phoenix (and, by extension, Scottsdale) may not be everyone’s glass of sun brewed Iced Tea, but having fought tooth and nail to avoid coming here (I wanted to move to Park City, UT and Carin wanted to come here… I’ll leave to you to figure who prevailed in that discussion:), you couldn’t pry me out of here with a spud bar:)
I really do like it:)

I fucking hate you. LOATHE you!
Thanks for bringing us ONE monsoon today. seriously, you selfish bitch.

Dear Phoenix,
It’s over.
You make me want to cry, but the tears just won’t come… just like any other source of water in this place. It used to be that your tacos and your hip ice-​cream places and your summer rainstorms made up for your sweltering summer oppression. But this year is different. This year, you’re unrelenting.
This year, I quit.
Oh, and you can have your Scottsdale back, too. I really don’t care anymore.

Bitch.
I barely write reviews anymore but you are pissing me off. Seatbelt sweat stripes with barely any rain as a consolation? I knew you were psycho the first time I met you, but I’m reaching my threshold with you this year. Once, like clockwork, the clouds rolled in at 5 pm and pretty soon the temperatures would drop as a massive, insanely wet Mainstreet Electrical Parade on crack would take place in the sky. But now, you give me nothing. What have I ever done to you (except for dumping you, that is?).
Go back from whence you came. But call your sister Winter over first. She’s the Salma Hayek to your pre-​marriage toothpicky Nicole Ritchie.
Ciao.

Most of summer here is great, especially since it means I can enjoy my state without the damn snowbirds ruining everything — the highways, parking lots, restaurants, movie theatres, coffee shops, and golf courses. I savor being able to play 18 holes of golf, with cart, with complimentary lunch, and without snowbirds for less than $ 30 at a few decent courses. Summer bushes/​flowers are great, and the heat is what gives this place character.
Let us all not forget that it is summer that prevents our real estate market being even more blown than it is, perhaps to levels like you see in many parts of California.
Summer in Phoenix… thank you.