It's not the heat, or the humidity

OK, call me crazy if you want. I like this weather.

No, my brain is not fried. I have not been sitting out in the sun too long. I have, however, been enjoying these steamy temperatures, safely ensconced on my screened-in porch.

Granted, I don’t exactly do a lot, other than sit and read. By the way, am I the only one who finds it increasingly difficult to read for any length of time without nodding off? It now takes me forever to read a book. For the most part my book reading is limited to weekends. I set up shop on the screened-in porch, fire up the iPod (actually it’s my wife’s; she got me a docking station to play it for Father’s Day), and I usually polish off a few pages before the eyes start to go south. The next thing I know someone is dashing out of the air-conditioned confines of the house to see if I have lapsed into a coma in the heat.

This weekend I also managed to catch all three Phils’ games on the radio on the porch. Not that it wasn’t painful. Not the temperature, the way the Phils are playing.

My wife and I are walkers and we try to knock that out fairly early in the morning. But I have to admit that at the height of yesterday’s heat, I grabbed a golf club, headed for the local park, and worked on my chipping and pitching. Hey, I never actually get to play golf, so why not pretend that I do.

Besides, I had just witnessed a guy who’s a year older than I am suffer still one more incredible collapse on a golf course. Of course, Greg Norman wasn’t exactly hacking it around some muni.

Norman started the day as the leader of the British Open at Royal Birkdale. One of the things I love about this tournament is that because of the time change, most of the action airs live here during the morning hours. You can catch the tournament and still have most of the day in front of you.

When Norman strode to the first tee, anyone familiar with his career kind of feared what would happen next. I was pulling for him, but you sort of knew this was going to be a train wreck. Norman, who has won two Open championships, did not disappoint. After being the unlikely leader at 53 years of age, Norman looked every day of it Sunday.

He’s been there before. His collapse in the Masters, after being up by eight strokes and then throwing it all away to Nick Faldo, is one of sports’ epic collapses. Then there are the number of miracle shots that cost him titles.

Of course Norman immediately posted two bogies to fall into a tie. To his credit, the Aussie once known as the Great White Shark actually rallied to retake the lead, but he gassed out down the stretch, finishing third.

For us, we’re looking at still one more day of life in the 90s. We are due to hit the low 90s again Tuesday, which would make it seven straight days.

Doesn’t bother me in the least. Bring ‘em on. I’ll be out on the porch tonight. Poring over the papers. At least until I nod off again. And force another member of the family to venture out into the heat to rouse from another midsummer night’s dream.

Comments