It's hot and some of us are running on empty

This will not be a whine.  I have no cause to complain.  For at least two years we had summers so mild they were nearly unnoticeable.  And then it was now.

I am made of flimsy carnival material, not meant to hold its integrity under extreme conditions.  Los Angeles is hot, not Santa Ana winds hot but high pressure system over Four Corners drawing tropical moisture up from Mexico, 78 degrees at 4:45 a.m. hot, make a reasonable mind turn dull hot, forget you ever had a plan hot.  Running on witless sweat and empty hot.  Thank the weather gods that Jackson Browne makes me feel that if I drove fast enough (oh, those were the days) I could become temperate of body and sharper of mind.



It is not just age, thought this 1978 band in which neither Browne nor David Lindley has a single gray hair does conjure days of some now-absent vibrancy.  I come from people, well, some of them, who lose their personalities and memories in August.  I throw out things I need not even 3 seconds later, purchase non-perishables, heavy ones that my son has to carry upstairs, that are already on my shelves.  If the music gods and the weather gods can agree, maybe "Running on Empty" as an iconic summer road song will appease while I'm looking for any unoccupied time machine to give me back my oomph and an undimmed notion of what I was going to do next.