Oh the Wretched Fucking Fucking Heat Part 2
True story from last night's baseball game:
Monday through Friday, our paper has a P.M. deadline, meaning that I usually have time to head to the locker rooms after the game for quotes. On Saturday nights, however, we're writing for Sunday morning, meaning that our deadline pressure is quite intense. I spent about 60 minutes on the field before Saturday's game, watching batting practice in 105 degree heat and gathering quotes from large sweaty men. Upon entering the elevator back to the press box, I had this paraphrased conversation:
Team employee: Beautiful night for baseball.
Me: Yeah, maybe if you've spent the last two months in the Ganges River Valley it is.
Other Reporter: The last thing I expected to hear about in this stadium was the Ganges River Valley.
Quickly realizing I was going to have to banter about this for the rest of the night, I hit the stadium's wireless Internet connection, and came up with these numbers. These are actually Monday's forecasts, which were a little warmer in India than Sunday's, but you'll get the point
Varanasi: 95 degrees, 95 percent humidity
Allahbad: 96 degrees, 94 percent humdity
Sacramento: 108 degrees, 40 percent humidity
So it's 12 degrees hotter outside my apartment than in the Ganges River Valley, which I discovered is actually called the Ganges River Basin. And while the humidity makes a big difference, I think my point is pretty clear. Summer in the Central Valley sucks beyond measure. Other interesting facts about the Ganges:
Monday through Friday, our paper has a P.M. deadline, meaning that I usually have time to head to the locker rooms after the game for quotes. On Saturday nights, however, we're writing for Sunday morning, meaning that our deadline pressure is quite intense. I spent about 60 minutes on the field before Saturday's game, watching batting practice in 105 degree heat and gathering quotes from large sweaty men. Upon entering the elevator back to the press box, I had this paraphrased conversation:
Team employee: Beautiful night for baseball.
Me: Yeah, maybe if you've spent the last two months in the Ganges River Valley it is.
Other Reporter: The last thing I expected to hear about in this stadium was the Ganges River Valley.
Quickly realizing I was going to have to banter about this for the rest of the night, I hit the stadium's wireless Internet connection, and came up with these numbers. These are actually Monday's forecasts, which were a little warmer in India than Sunday's, but you'll get the point
Varanasi: 95 degrees, 95 percent humidity
Allahbad: 96 degrees, 94 percent humdity
Sacramento: 108 degrees, 40 percent humidity
So it's 12 degrees hotter outside my apartment than in the Ganges River Valley, which I discovered is actually called the Ganges River Basin. And while the humidity makes a big difference, I think my point is pretty clear. Summer in the Central Valley sucks beyond measure. Other interesting facts about the Ganges:
- It is home to a rare breed of freshwater shark
- It is the most holy river in Hinduism
- It is 1,560 miles long
- 8 percent of the world's population lives along the river
- The first steam vessel on the River was called the "Sitka" arriving during the gold rush
- Development of the River Delta began in 1861 and was eventually overseen by something called the "Board of Swamp and Overflowed Land Commissioners"
- 407,018 people live in Sacramento, appoximately .00006 percent of the world's population
- The river runs past Old Sacramento, which, while not exactly a holy place, seems to attract the tourists
1 Comment(s):
- Posted by
Jeff'y at July 19, 2005 9:44 PM |
Permanent Link to this Comment
No one expects the Ganges River Valley! Our chief weapon is freshwater sharks. And Hinduism. Our chief weapons... among our weapons are chiefly sharks, and Hinduism. And ninjas.
