Nordic Days

Heat Drove the Englishmen Mad

It was said that early English settlers or visitors to the American South used to suffer hallucinations from the ungodly heat. Their time there was one long acid trip until they returned to their temperate zone.

It's been in the upper 90s since late May here. It was 100 degrees in the last week of May.

My Canadian cousin was glad to hear from me because she said I hadn't posted on this blog for a while. The U. S. northeast and lower Canada are getting the heat blast this week, while it's a little cooler here. So this one's for the cuz.

She said this weather was rough on Nordic peoples. While I thought of myself as deriving from French stock, I never thought of myself as Nordic. Cool! We (our family) originated in Normandy, after all.

It explains to me why, after a lifetime of living in Florida, the summers get harder on me rather than easier. Pi yimini, I'm Nordic!

My studio (the garage) has only a couple of early-morning hours before turning into a kiln. So I've stayed in the cool of the computer room and played with the quick capture-and-retreat imagery from the back yard.

Photoshop tools and magic make me feel (a little) like I'm painting, and they are the images I'd be painting anyway. The difference is there's no toxic stuff to dump when I'm done and storage is so easy. I just burn it to a disc.

The 'painting' above is "Summer Waterfall". It is a view of a little waterfall I fashioned out of rocks and hand-formed concrete. Wife contributed the plants. What's shown here survived the coldest winter in years to bounce back with great vigah, as the Kennedys used to say.

If I can survive the rest of July, all of August, September and October, I too plan to return with great vigah.

Stay cool, dudes.