As a spy, I speak with a terrible French accent (some might say "outrageous") and wear slick tailored clothing with just enough 'give' to allow me to slither and sidle, to leap and slink.
I am a very good imaginary pseudo-French spy, complete with wisecracks, a long cigarette holder, platinum hair done in a fantastic 40's do, and stiletto pumps that double as weapons (detachable heels kitted with a few 22 caliber rounds, safety's engaged whenever they're attached to the shoe. Had a few missteps with the design, but Cato the lab guy only lost the end of one toe in the development phase due to premature firing. He's fine now).
But don't let the name fool you, for as a quasi-gallic agent of espionage I do not so much resemble the endangered rotund aquatic critter (the 'dugong' bit, obvs) as I do a leopard or python. Smooth, powerful, calm, and deadly.
Crouton Dugong, at your service.
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Y'all. It's going to be in the upper 90's today. Heat index of 100 or so.
Gads. That's hot enough to melt even the frostiest of foreign (or domestic) spies. 100 degrees Fahrenheit...that's a touch over 37C, which sounds cooler, perhaps even frosty, but when you consider that normal room temp is about 22C, you get the idea that 37 is fekking HOT.
Pavement begins to soften at 100 degrees. Birds cease chirping, preferring instead to pant worm-scented breaths in a desperate attempt to keep cool. Dogs find porches under which to pant their pants (whatever scent they may be), and cats stay indoors, for cats are smart like that.
Humboxes of all sizes and types kick on, creating a chorus of consumption to accompany the sizzle of baking sidewalks. When it gets hot like this, it takes no effort to sweat; the slightest motion pops out a sheen of perspiration, irritatingly slick against office wear.
And yet, the landscapers are out. In long sleeve shirts and long pants, hats and vests. The landscapers know no heat, they are not intimidated by the triple digits, they forge on, mowing and whacking and edging so that we in our corporate rat maze can gaze out from out air-conditioned work spaces at perfectly manicured greenery brought to us by the sweat of the landscaper's back and brow.
Unfair, you say? Perhaps. But hell, the company yard was looking ratty, and I sure as heck am not going to go out there and sweat my sizable butt off just to ensure each blade of grass gets a manicure. That's just crazy talk. It's HOT out there!
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I just learned that the guy the US Gubmint suspects of being the ringleader of the 9/11 attacks went to school at 'a small Baptist college in North Carolina.'
Then he went to school at the NC school of agriculture and something.
Then he joins al Qaeda.
SOMEWHERE in there is a huge disconnect for me. He went to school here, got the benefit of what I can only imagine was a decent education, and then joins a terrorist group. Oh sure, he started out by wanting to evict the Russians from Afghanistan, and so woot for that I guess (leaving aside the US's role in the whole affair (because there was one)); but somewhere along the line that desire for change morphed into a religious zealotry aimed against some of the very people who afforded him the education that made him so valuable to the jihadists, and isn't he just the little bit chagrined by that?
Isn't he the least little bit ashamed that he plotted a plot that killed several thousand people who live in the country in which he lived and learned for years? Or has the indoctrination of al Qaeda been so thorough that it all seemed fair to him to kill the infidels that introduced him to another way of life, another way of being, an alternate reality to his own?
One wonders, and one scratches one's head, but not too vigorously, because my goodness it's hot out.
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Over'n out for now, my friends.
Oh, and for all y'all who were busy planning a dinner party in the comments yesterday - come on over around 7. We'll have the grill going by then. ;)
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