when it rains, it's 90

at some point, many months ago, i ceased regular blogging. not because i don't love to blog (and read blogs) as much as the next cyber-savvy person. but because i moved. to arizona.

now why in god's name would any self-respecting (and disrespecting after a few cocktails and under the thick cover of night somewhere in hollywood) angelino up and move to phoenix?

the answer, my metropolitan friends, is simple. i was offered a job teaching at a research institution. and, as any academic worth his salt (or his SSRN page) knows, when a big school tells you that they'll give you an office, a research assistant, and -- bestill my heart -- a paycheck, you do what any sane person who's spent a million years in school hoping to make enough money to live just above the poverty line would do: you move.

and so i find myself, not unhappily, enshrined in the desert, where it turns out, there are these strange sorts of semi tropical storms. i was at the grocery store, waiting in line, when the kindly but tragically midwesternly clad woman in front of me drew my attention to the falling rain outside the store's big plate glass windows. egads! it was raining. so much for that 90 degree weather, i thought, gleefully planning my afternoon java run. (because reasonable weather should always be celebrated with an unreasonably priced latte.)

said kind hearted woman continued to talk to me, regaling me with the details of her recent trip to michigan. (we flew there, we flew back, etc.) luckily i was spared any fashion tips and escaped into the parking lot, where my dirty, rain splattered, i'm a californian-and-i-recycle-more-than-you toyota prius awaited me.

back in the car, ac pumping against the sweltering heat, i noticed the winds, tearing at palm trees. if it hadn't been for the rain's subsiding to a veritable drizzle, certain palms could have been cut directly from footage of some more minor, non-deadly hurricane. caught in the midst of this mini-storm, hours from hawaii, i did the only thing a sane californian could do: i panicked. and raced home. groceries stored and my person safe again, i adjusted my central air conditioning, put on a pot of coffee and prepared to wait out the afternoon. and perhaps the entire summer.