Feelin' HOT HOT HOT.

Seriously. I'm burnin' up over here! On the East Coast we're in the middle of day three of triple digit heat. (I'm warm just thinking about it!) Right now outside my 70 degree climate controlled office, the sun and haze is beating down on the city, smothering EVERYTHING.

Photo from accuweather.com

Lucky for us East Coasters, this heat dome was suffocating the Midwest for a few days before it moved it's way East. While it's scary to think of the dangers associated with heat waves, it was nice to be able to plan early AM workouts knowing that lunchtime would be unbearable. [It's over 100 right now, right outside my office. blllllleh.]
Yesterday morning I was able to get 40 minutes of running/ walking intervals in with Rocky, and this morning Mom joined me (as well as BOTH puppies!) to walk before I left for work. Even at 6:30 A.M., it was over 80 degrees at my house.

This is the heat index for the Eastern half of the country:

Photo from Washington Post Online

The news coverage of the heat wave in the Midwest continued to highlight the possibility that this current heat wave could become like the Chicago Heat Wave of 1995. During one week in July 1995, over 700 people died in Chicago. SEVEN HUNDRED. The temperature was 106 degrees, with a heat index of 126. Absolutely stifling. All this media coverage brought me back to freshman year sociology where we read "Heat Wave: A Social Autopsy of Disaster in Chicago" by Eric Klinenberg.
photo from http://www.press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/H/bo3641018.html

A phenomenal read, this book covers research the author conducted to determine why the week of heat in Chicago was so deadly. The most shocking things are that most of the victims died at home, and the number dead was "more than twice the number that died in the Chicago Fire of 1871, twenty times the number of those struck by Hurricane Andrew in 1992." Unbelievable.

There are weather tragedies that don't involve hurricanes and tornadoes, people!
Stay hydrated and be safe!

xoxo