Remember when I was complaining about rain? I do hate rain. I also detest fog, because no one will slow down in it, which makes it horrendously frightening and dangerous to drive in. Luckily, we rarely get fog in Fairbanks.
However we did get beaucoup rain, in fact I measured 4 inches of rain in a 24 hour period. But when the rain left, the temperatures skyrocketed.
We have been having gloriously yellow-sun-blue-sky summer weather, complete with temperatures of at least 80 and today over 90. After the first couple days of Real Summer, forest fire smoke took over and there has been intermittent End of The World skies. I think the worst was when the sky was thick with smoke and many of us, myself included, were wheezing around, coughing and getting headaches, and then the humidity climbed up to 60% and up. That might not seem like high humidity to you, but as a person who a) lived in the desert for twenty years and b) is used to a dry climate here in Alaska too, 60% (and I am sure it was much higher) was just awful. Sweating from room to room, drip drip drip. You couldn't move a muscle, blink an eyelash, that it didn't create a stream of sweat.
I love hot weather, but it has to be hot and dry. That old saw about "but it's a DRY heat" is actually quite true!
My studio has been 100° for the last two days. Or higher, because the thermostat only goes up to 100°. For the previous days it was 90°-95°. Yes, that's correct: it was hotter in the studio than outside. Eighty degrees outside equals at least ninety degrees inside. And with the way the building is constructed, there is no way to create any air flow. I have made desperate pleas for the loan of an air conditioner, but to no avail! I'm sure every a/c unit in Fairbanks is in use, and rightfully so. Lessons had to be given in the jet stream of the fan. There was no other way to even be in that place.
So today I went to Sam's Club to see what an air conditioner cost. I decided I could not survive another day in the studio, and neither should the dogs have to! I don't have the money, buying an air conditioner in Fairbanks is really silly, because we usually don't have weather that requires one for more than a couple weeks. But I'll forgo paying the full payment on something, some utility or something, I don't know which yet, so that I can continue to work and do business in a normal fashion.
But wait. I thought to myself.....I don't have to give any lessons until next Monday. Today is Wednesday. Who KNOWS what the weather will be like then? It could change within the hour!
So I went home and the dogs and I were hanging out on the balcony, cooling off, Buddy Bird was chattering away, and then I saw the sky getting darker, and darker (remember, it doesn't GET DARK in the summer in Fairbanks)...then smoke started pouring into the sky...the sky was still much darker than smoke makes it and then I saw the thunderheads. And so we had a grand cooling off and a little sprinkle of rain, imagine that!
As far as I'm concerned, my deferring the purchase of the air conditioner that I can't afford was a good thing. Who knows what tomorrow will bring? Hey, I love hot weather, hot DRY weather, that is! One thing is for sure, life isn't boring!
