Dear Kid,

It is about 6 zillion degrees in the shade and it’s not even the middle of the day. We have skipped directly from Monsoon Season to August in the Desert without stopping for Lovely Summer Days. Crazy midwest weather.

110 in the Shade is a musical about hot, dry weather in the southwest and a con man who says he can make it rain. (It was written by the same team who wrote The Fantastics.) I saw a production of it at the City Opera in New York and I am convinced that there was a song in it called—or with the refrain—My Skin Don’t Fit. However, I can find absolutely no record of this particular song and even Uncle D just shrugged when I asked him about it many a moon ago. Since I am not a composer, I’m pretty sure I didn’t make up the entire song. I am equally sure I have mixed up the facts thoroughly enough that I may never figure out what song I’m remembering (or misremembering). If you stumble across it, please let me know.

Have you heard of exoplanets? Someone has made up a new word (and a new field of study) for planets that revolve around stars other than our sun. I have no idea why they are not just called ‘planets’—it seems rather exclusionary to call them exoplanets and there are a LOT of them.

This week, astronomers proved that HD 189733b (astronomers need to take lessons from the people who name nail polish imho) is deep blue and covered in clouds of liquid glass. The scientists are twelve kinds of excited about the deep blue part (it has something to do with this being the first time they’ve been able to use the Crayola box when describing an exoplanet – feel free to go investigate that more on your own). I love blue—which you know because you’ve lived in a house with a blue dining room for a long time but that’s another story—but it seems to me that ‘clouds of liquid glass’ is much more interesting. Think about it: I don’t know that I have ever seen clouds of liquid anything. I’ve seen molten glass (I LOVE Corning, NY) but never liquid glass. I’ve never contemplated clouds of glass, liquid or otherwise. The entire phrase makes me want to redecorate. The deep blue is just an added bonus.

Since the temperature is already so ridiculous, I don’t even plan to pretend that I might tend to some of the weeding today. Instead, I think we’ll go shop for towels and pillows and other college necessities. Then perhaps sweat at the gym.

I’m also hoping to get some cooking done for the week so we can stop opening the refrigerator and staring at empty shelves hoping something resembling food will magically appear.

Love, Mom