Hotter than the Hubs of Hades, as my father liked to crow. And holeee mackerel, it sure is hot. And humid. Here on the first day of July, August has come early, only without the briefly relieving afternoon rains. As we scribble, come 7:30 in the morning, Wunderground says it’s 88 degrees out there, with a predicted high of 112.
That would be fine, if the air were not wet as a sauna: 15% humidity, which strikes me as a low estimate. August weather has come early, but without the afternoon rain breaks.
Out the door with the Dawg at 5:30 a.m., hoping to dodge the worst of the Doggie Parade.
Wrong!
Everybody else had the same idea: the ‘Hood was overrun with dog-lovers and their pooches. So that meant dodge dodge dodge dodge dodge dodge….AAAAAGH!
Truly: I hate zig-zagging across the street trying to evade nitwits and their “fur-babies.” Some people are dangerously stupid about dogs.
No sign of Wile E. Coyote this morning, though. Probably because so many humans were tromping around, the poor beast had to take cover. Nor was there any sign of my pal Marge, the superannuated hiker. She’s been absent for awhile…I fear she may have reached the point where she’s no longer up for lengthy strolls through the morning heat. T’other day the neighborhood Facebook site went on about her 93rd birthday…she really is an amazing lady.
We walked for an hour through the swampy early-morning heat. By the time we got back, I was too walloped to eat breakfast. Which probably was a good thing, actually. 😀
Meanwhile, over in the tonier precincts of east Phoenix, a berserk fire is consuming a neighborhood around 40th Street and McDowell. This is close to where my stepsister and her family used to live — on the outer edge of the tony Arcadia district. At first when I saw the news coverage, I thought it was very close to their house. But now I don’t think so.
In fact, it appears that none of the heirs to the parental estate live there any more. Stepsister — a Superior Court judge — and her husband passed away, as did their son. Their daughter finished an MBA, married, and got a fine job with the State of Arizona. Apparently she’s living happily ever after — handsomely relocated to Paradise Valley. Good for her!
That means, then, that even if the house is turning into a pile of cinders, it won’t affect her. Or her brother, if he’s still living.
My father’s new wife’s daughter & hubby had two children: this sharp young lady, and a male offspring who was less incandescent. They sent him to Northern Arizona University — about like sending him to Play-Skool — where he did graduate. But not to much: with a bachelor’s from NAU, he ended up in a career as a delivery truck driver.
But hey! At least he did have a job! They had plenty of money to put in trust for him, and their daughter apparently agreed to look out after him as he proceeded through life. Meanwhile, his sister got an excellent job with the state, married, had kids, and is living happily ever after.
As Ruby and I trudged through the muggy heat, we were serenaded by a cop copter fly-over, by ambulance sirens from Gangbanger’s Way, by traffic roaring across Gangbanger’s and along Conduit of Blight Blvd…ugh! What a place! The Richistans are pretty, and my part of the ‘Hood is blandly pleasant…except for the unholy racket from Conduit of Blight, Main Drag South, and Gangbanger’s.
My thoughts turned to the idea of moving away from this place.
But where?
To Fountain Hills?
All very nice, in a tract-y way. But…it’s right under the flight path of passenger jets flying in to Sky Harbor, one of the busiest airports in the world. The racket from the jet planes would be as bad or worse than Sun City’s noise from Luke Air Force Base. And that, my friends, is bad. When Mr. & Mrs. Fireman were living in Waddell, about the same distance from Luke as Sun City, the racket could be heard inside their home! Sun Citizens complain incessantly about the noise from Luke, and it doesn’t look like the population of Fountain Hills is a lot happier.
Sooo…what’s the difference? Traffic racket or airplane racket? 😀
Sun City is not my Thing: no interest in a ghetto for old folks. Scottsdale by and large is too far from where my son lives. Prescott would be a nice place to live, except it also is too far away. And it snows there. Ditto the Oro Valley, near Tucson.
One option might be a high-rise on North Central Avenue. A new one is going in right across the street from AJ’s, though I think it will be out of my price range. A little further south down Central, though, several of my friends live in an older high-rise amidst the office buildings. They have an awesome view and they’re as centrally located as you can get.
Problem with that, though, is spelled R-u-b-y-t-h-e-C-o-r-g-i…. How exactly one would cope with a dog in a high-rise apartment escapes me. Apparently some people have trained smaller dogs to go in a cat box. That might work with Ruby, if she could be persuaded. But she’s not so young anymore, so that trick might be difficult or impossible to learn. The prospect of schlepping her downstairs in an elevator several times a day does NOT appeal. It could be done…but it would mean you could never leave home for more than an hour or three…and what would you do if she had an “accident” in the elevator???
Heh… Looks like what it boils down to is either I get rid of the dog (and move to a high-rise apartment) or I stay here and put up with the crime and the reformatory across the street.
