Hotter Than...

For those of you living in Philadelphia, you realize that we are in the midst of yet another heat wave, also know as Philadelphia summer.  Each time I check the weather on my phone there is a rather upset looking exclamation point warning me of extreme heat and begging me to stay indoors, keep hydrated, and check on my elderly and disabled neighbors and loved ones.  Now I realize that my friends in the Southwest will scoff at our meager double digit temperatures, and roll their eyes in disbelief as I describe the excruciating heat and the stifling humidity that is associated with a summer in Philly, but I tell you it is as hot as hell here for 80% of the summer season.

Being married to a man with the lowest heat tolerance I have ever come across, I hear the phrase "Hotter than hell" more often then KISS sang it in their aptly named hit..and it got me to thinking about hell.  Now, I realize that hell is most likely a puritanical construct created to keep people from stepping out of line.  It's that ultimate of ultimatums ...if you do that, you'll go to hell.  But every once in awhile I try to imagine what my own personal hell might be like -- you know, for sport.

Understand that there are plenty of situations that would qualify as hell on earth -- living in the slums of India, the African countries left desperate by drought, the underbelly of the the Russian sex trade -- this is not what I am thinking about.  I like to consider the Sisyphus-ian version of hell.  What is the thing that would drive you to the edge of madness, what menial task could punish you for all of eternity?

I've come up with a couple of scenarios that would top the list of personal tortures:

• Being forced to run on a treadmill for all eternity facing a TV that only plays the Fox News channel.  
• Having mosquitoes sting every part of my body and then having my hands tied so I could not scratch the offending bites

Now, of course there are other more "Fear Factor" like tortures that might send me over the edge for the rest of my infinite time trapped in the underworld, but these are the top two recurrent nightmares that leave me quaking at the thought of perishing with a tarnished soul.  Maybe while I am trapped inside my climate controlled house I should think about repenting before it is too late.

I Want to be an Executive Cat

As I write am sitting on your typical office chair.   It is black, has wheels, is most likely ergonomically designed to best support my lower lumbar and all that junk.  It might sound alright, but as is usually the case, there is something wrong with this chair.  It is missing the left arm.  My poor chair has only a metal plate on the left stump instead of a supple plastic cover.  I mention this not to complain, but instead to draw a comparison between my office accommodations and those of my CATS!!  


Were you to come and visit Casa Shraxwell, you would most likely find at least one cat curled up in an executive office chair.  Not the basic black model that I am relegated to, but a warm leather chair with padded support and features that are far superior to my own current seat.  Our cats have annexed each of the finer chairs for themselves and will go as far as to growl at you if you presuppose that the furniture in this house is for human usage.  Now you may be asking yourself why in the world we have so many office chairs in the house and the answer is to be expected -- we cannot get rid of the extra chairs, because the cats like them so much.



Catch 22?  Maybe.  Stockholm syndrome more likely.