It happens every year. We spend all of our time complaining about rainy weather and how we just “Need some sun”. The clouds are causing depression in every Portlander and unless some serious ecological change occurs, we’re moving to California. Then… out of the blue… the first heat wave hits. Our entire city changes from wet-frowning hipsters to heat-exhausted zombies.
Walk the streets after the first wave and you’ll find the living dead aimlessly shuffling around. They have just spent the past 8 hours sweating their entire life away, tossing and turning through the very covers that kept them warm throughout eight months of 30-45 degree nights. Never did they consider this drastic weather change would occur, even though it happened to us the year before.
The same goes for retail shops, restaurants and bars. Smaller establishments (which tend to be a Portland natives’ favorite) forgo air conditioning due to the costs associated to it. Therefore we are limited to AC-only locations just to take a break from the life-sucking heat. Our options include movie theaters, box stores, creepy Jamieson Square park and malls. Who hasn’t purchased a worthless item in Fred Meyer to beat the heat? I hate Fred Meyer.
As I aimlessly walk Portland streets because I cannot fit an adequate air conditioning unit in my home, I find myself longing for a drop of rain. If you too suffer from this phenomenon, I recommend Barflymag.com as your NUMBER ONE resource for air conditioned restuarants, bars or pubs. Stay cool!
90’s ha! I love 90 degree days…I live in the middle of the friggen desert I can’t wait to move to Oregon or Washington just to get out of this hellhole of a state and everyone has air conditioning. I friggen hate it here! Try not being able to go outside for more than a few minutes without your hands swelling up and your head spinning from the heat…come on bring me the 90 degree days…hell to the yeah! LOL then again I’ll move there and quickly start bitching about it being too hot on a 90 degree day, ah the wonders of acclimating way the hell too fast for my own good LOL. Trees god I can’t wait to see real trees that aren’t the size of my damn thigh, fuck AZ.
Good points Sid!
Portlanders don’t exclaim in surprise every year about the heat because they’re rugged. It’s just that if they didn’t have some reasonably controllable factor in their lives to piss and moan about, they’d shrivel up and waste away. So the local Fred Meyer is out of window fans and AC units? Well, had anyone considered possibly buying them out of season, knowing that it’s going to get up into the nineties during the day, instead of whining about their absence?
Welcome to the Pacific Northwest, where even on the days when we NEED air conditioning, we tough it out because we are RUGGED. And WE CARE about the environment.
I enjoyed my weekend at the mall, my extended visit at Target, and eating out, thankyouverymuch.