And very likely, my toast is…toasted.
Yesterday afternoon I enjoyed a fine heat stroke. Yes, I do know what that is. Yes, I do know the symptoms. And Yes, I do know what it feels like… Because I’ve had one before.
In Arabia, when I was about 10 or 12 years old. It’s a hot and humid sand pit, Ras Tanura is. Horrible place, not meant for human habitation. That particular day — I remember it vividly — I’d been playing outside in the heat.
“The heat” was nothing new for the locals. And so even though it was hotter than usual and probably more humid than usual, I paid little attention to it. By the time my parents called me in for dinner, I was reamed, steamed, and dry-cleaned. Especially steamed!
Today, your parents would take you to an ER or a doctor’s office if you did that to yourself.
Out there, though…not so much. There was no ER. No doctors on duty at 7:00 in the evening. And the clinic was way to Hell & Gone on the other side of camp, down by the refinery. Nor did we have a car: my parents would have had to call a cab to schlep me to the hospital.
So we had to sit down and wait it out. And y’know what happened?
Nothin’.
Yep: the usual. Nothing.
Today, with Pool Dude no doubt on his way, I can’t strip off my clothes and plunge in the drink. That would give the poor man cardiac arrest… So: get in the house and cool down in the AC.
S-l-o-o-o-w-l-e-e-e…