Muggy, Hot, and Buggy

I have obviously been out of the South too long. I have become a wimp. I thought living in Okinawa for three years would make our return to the South a breeze, but I was wrong.This past week has been so hot. But even worse is the humidity and the bugs. The kids,especially Camille can't play outside without getting covered in bites which then get infected and it looks like she has a terrible skin disease. Don't get me wrong. Okinawa was hot and it was humid, but being an island there also seemed to be occasional breezes and I don't remember the mosquitoes being quite so large or aggressive (perhaps West Nile does that to them?). We are now officially prisoners in the house, except for our daily library trips(we've all been gobbling up books and we are all happy to have an excuse to be out of the house). There need to be more indoor play spaces and I don't mean those insanely tall indoor climbing structures or scary bouncy things where the big kids could easily crush smaller ones. I mean an air conditioned tent set up over an outdoor park...somehow I don't think the local Parks and Rec Depart can afford that, but a mama can dream, right? And what about air conditioning the paths at the zoo?

I know I have really lost my southern endurance because I can not imagine living without air conditioning. But this wasn't always the case. I remember very clearly the day my elementary school got ceiling fans in each classroom. It was a big day. We did not have air conditioning at school or at home (except for one window unit that we only ran at night). My body is now so acclimated to air conditioning that the thought of being without air conditioning makes me cringe. Amazing how quickly a luxury can become an absolute "necessity"!

I realize how boring my life is to be writing about the weather (and central air) but it has really been a big factor in our lives this week (except for Adam who doesn't see the outside world between the hours of 6am and 8pm). The other big weather issue for us lately has been dramatic summer storms. The kind I remember from childhood. Those daily afternoon storms that blow in on huge, dark thunderclouds. Sunny one minute, ominous and dark the next. Followed quickly by a dazzling (and scary) lightening show. I have to admit to still being a little scared of lightening but I realized yesterday that I need to get over that really quick because both kids are picking up on it. Despite telling them everything was fine, they didn't buy it because I was cowering in the hallway when I was positive lightening had struck the house. I don't remember having thunderstorms in the northwest. And I thought for sure we would have them in Okinawa but I really don't remember that many storms with lightening. Certainly lots of rain and typhoons,but not much thunder and lightening.

So now that we are stuck inside more, we spend a lot of time by the windows observing the wildlife in our back yard. Daily breakfast appearances by the squirrels, lunchtime with the lizards, and yesterday we watched a pair of cardinals enjoying our birdbath. We have also had a snake sighting in our neighbor's driveway and of course there are lots of resident mosquitoes. Summer in the South...muggy, hot, and buggy.