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Old Dude, Samaire, Bob, Brugger, & Yvonne |
For at least the past month, our southern Virginia weather has been fucking insane. For most of my life, this has been a temperate area, rarely suffering extreme weather, but now it's absolutely tropical. 100% humidity and in the mid- to high-90°F range every morning, and powerful, oftentimes damaging storms later in the afternoon/evening. Rinse and repeat (literally) every single day. It's never been like this here in my lifetime, and though there's naught one can do about the weather (especially since the Orange Fuckturd has basically declared climate change a hoax), I'm absolutely over it. It's wreaking havoc on our house, and the constant, excessive water is eroding away all the topsoil, particularly around the trees that surround our lot (any one of which might take us out if it falls — and a lot of trees have fallen in the neighborhood in the past few weeks). Not to mention there have been several record-level, damaging floods in this region (though at least they haven't reached scale of the recent Texas disaster, which killed people and ruined livelihoods).
So, when friend, fellow writer, and publisher of Fugue Devil: Resurgence, Samaire Wynne, invited Brugger and me, as well as friends Bob & Yvonne, to an afternoon cookout at her place, we all wondered whether the weather would simply up and squash our plans. But we nonetheless decided to proceed, and — despite the weather's earnest efforts — we had a hell of a fine, fun gathering. Yep, it dumped rain, and it hit us with thunder and lightning, but we persevered. Samaire had a large stand-up canopy that we braced to keep the wind from sweeping it away, and, fortunately, it kept us — and our feast — safe from the rain and generally comfy (excepting, of course, the 90°F temps and 100% humidity). We had some fabulous burgers, chicken skewers, egg salad, pasta salad, drinks aplenty, and other goodies. It felt like a much-needed balm for the raw nerves we've all felt over the past days, weeks, and months.
It's going to be a busy week, with some serious home repair/maintenance to do as well as a fuck-ton of writing (I've got two novels in the works as we speak). I hope we don't get washed away or flattened before this most unloved season is over and done with.