Prompted by an oft repeated sentiment wishing for warmer weather, tweeted by a Twitter companion {I don’t really like the terms following / follower}. The tweet, by @marlo_maybe read, “I swear that I won’t complain about summer heat ever again. This snow shit is for the birds.”
While undergoing military service during the Rhodesian counter-insurgency war I had occasion to visit the Zambezi Valley. On one particular day, written vivid within a memory of misery, the temperature reached 47°C. {For those still trapped beneath the tyranny of Imperial measurements, that’s closer to 117°F than 116°F.} No problem, I hear you say – just go indoors into the air-conditioning. If we could have, we would have… Not only was there no indoors in our camps, there was no air-conditioning either. All we could do to relieve the heat was lay beneath tents with all sides raised in hope of some breeze. More than a few succumbed to heatstroke and had to be trucked out.
If you’ve ever heard the expression, “Only mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the noonday sun”, the Zambezi Valley might be where it originated.
So, the next time you make a fervent wish to change your circumstances, make sure you add in a caveat – it might protect you from yourself…
