9/22/2011 8:37:38 PM
PHOENIX - Having lived my entire 54 years in several cities in the state of Iowa, I am very familiar with the weather-related term, "It's not the heat, it's the humidity." It's a reference just about anyone living the Midwest or on the southern Atlantic Seaboard or in the Southeast or along the Gulf Coast can relate to.
After spending only about 1 1/2 days here in the "Valley of the Sun" I can assure you, it's all about the heat.
I arrived here at about 10 a.m. (PT) on Wednesday and after finding my hotel, I walked across the street and talked briefly to a waitress who was serving me lunch. She commented on what a "beautiful day" it was, since the temperature was a mere 101 degrees. She said the temp most of the summer had been in excess of 110. I nodded, and said something like, "Yeah, it's absolutely gorgeous."
I spent Thursday morning pounding out a couple of stories for PG's website, then climbed into my rental with the intent of finding Salt River Fields at Talking Stick near Scottsdale, the beautiful new facility that serves as the spring training home of the Arizona Diamondbacks and Colorado Rockies and at which the PG/EvoShield National Championship (Upperclass) will be held. It is located adjacent to the Talking Stick Indian Reservation and is part of a larger resort that includes a casino and golf course.
I found Salt River Fields easy enough - a good half-hour drive from my hotel - and couldn't have been more impressed. There is this matter of the heat, however. When I hopped out of the rental at Salt River Fields at about 1 p.m. Thursday, the dashboard thermometer already read 103. When I hopped back in a half-hour later, it was 105.
I traveled back down the AZ 101 Loop and AZ 102 Loop on my way back to my hotel, and as I rolled through Tempe I spotted a sign directing me to Arizona State Unversity. I took the exit, thinking a quick tour of the ASU campus might be rewarding. Little did I know that I was about to run into one of the worst traffic jams I ever encountered. It took me a half-hour to move four blocks up the main drag to University Avenue and I was genuinely concerned about the vehicle over-heating. I don't know what the deal was, but I got off on University and spotted a college joint called "Devil's Advocate" and went in for an iced tea. No beer on this trip, young people. There was too way much driving in heavy traffic involved.
Devil's Advocate was really cool. It featured dozens of TVs but also hundreds of books on a rear bookshelf, and an impressive photographic history of ASU athletics. I was disappointed that most of the photos were football oriented - although there were dozens of the tragic Afghan war hero and former ASU and Arizona Cardinals star Pat Tillman I found pretty cool - and almost none from ASU's rich baseball history. If we have learned anything from all the conference shuffling that has been going on the past couple of weeks, it's that football rules.
When I jumped back in my rental at 3 p.m. the car thermometer read 110.
I was reminded of an experience I had in July of 1985 when I volunteered to drive a recently married friend of mine from Mount Vernon, Iowa - where she had just graduated from Cornell College and married a very good friend of mine - to Tucson so she could begin graduate school at the University of Arizona. Her new husband was stuck in Iowa for a few more weeks, I wasn't doing much and decided to drive their 1982 Ford Escort down to Tucson.
Me and my traveling companion took our time, stopping to see my folks in Denver and spending time in Santa Fe and Taos, New Mexico. When we arrived in Tucson it was about 120 degrees. I flew back to Iowa the next day, and quickly wrote the young lady a letter. This was before the internet, before email, before cell phones, before texting. Back in those days, young people, we wrote letters. I made the comment to her that although it was hot in Tucson during my stay there, I found it tolerable because it was a "dry heat." Two weeks later she wrote back with a comment I'll never forget: "Dry heat may ass! It's 114! My (effing) steering wheel is melting!"
My steering wheel was starting to melt Thursday afternoon. I hope all the young prospects playing this weekend at the PG/Evoshield National Championship can avoid melting. I do know, however, they will be well taken care of and their safety will come first. It's not the heat, after all, it's the humidity.