I live in Scottsdale, Arizona. It is located immediately adjacent to Phoenix, the sixth largest city in the U.S. This place just registered the hottest month–July–for a city in the entire world since temperature records have been kept. UGH!.
Here are the facts: Phoenix’s average temperature for this July was 102.7 degrees, taking into account average daytime high of 114.7 degrees and overnight low of 90.8. That’s every minute of everyday–an average of 102.7! The worst part is not the daytime high, which has averaged 114.7. To me, it’s that nighttime low of 90.8 that is the real killer. And killer it is. People are dying.
Phoenix also set a record of 31 days in succession of high daily temperatures exceeding 110 degrees. The previous record had been 17 days. So, this month crushed that record.
Yesterday ended that record since the Phoenix high only got to a measly 108 degrees. But we’re keeping up our number of successive days without rain–130 days. The record for that is 150.
All this crazy heat reminds me of the book of Revelation in the Bible, which tells us about a bunch of crazy stuff that is going to happen to the environment. For example, “The third angel blew his trumpet, and there came hail and fire, mixed with blood, and they were hurled to the earth; and a third of the earth was burned up, and a third of the trees were burned up, and all green grass was burned up” (Revelation 8.7). What, no more golf!
Here, in what is called The Valley, the monsoon season should have started a couple of weeks ago. That lowers temperatures a little, raises the humidity above the usual 10 percent daytime, and brings rain. But it doesn’t look like it’s going to happen any time soon. So, sweltering in this oven is still on the horizon. I should have stayed in Colorado with my daughters and grandchildren, where I was last week. Oh well, this is still home.
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