Sauna, FREE!

OK, now we really know we're in Minnesota. It wasn't just that by crossing the border it suddenly smelled of green (and don't ask me why that border thing works, but it does). It isn't just that the days are longer above 45 degrees north than they manage in Arizona in the summer, though that's true too. It's not just that Steve has already drowned a few worms in pursuit of a number of tugs on the end of his fishing pole, although technically worms don't drown, they just get nibbled to bits. It's not just arriving to violets, lilacs, tulips, dandelions, ripening cherries and overgrown grass, most of which I take credit for from years of landscaping this yard, after leaving behind the glare of the sun off rock lawns.

It's not even seeing family again, all of whom have remained behind in this state while we ventured south to avoid winters. But we are in the process right now of seeing more family, in honor of Father's Day. Showers and  wardrobe hunting for the day are done, with me choosing something cool and flowery and Steve locating a t-shirt stating "If fishing were meth, I wouldn't have any teeth", which is funnier the better you know Steve.

The car has been loaded, gifts for the little ones, tackle boxes and jewelry for the big ones, charcoal and beverages tucked in odd corners, jellies from Paul finally on their way to be delivered. In its own way, all of that is ordinary.

But you see, Minnesota's been blessing us with seasonal thunderstorms, the kind that color the TV maps in brilliant moving patches from the radar, and require scrolls running across the bottoms of the screens. These are the kind where even in this porous soil and high levels of vegetation surrounding 14,000 lakes great and small, flood warnings are issues when they suddenly dump up to 8" of wet stuff, either running through new trenches or smashing windshields, packing repeated nights with my favorite lullabies, aka thunder. So when you open the door to start loading the car for the trip, you're smacked with heat and humidity levels that start you looking for a route to swim up out of it to breathe again.

We measure humidity in dew points up here rather than some kind of percentage. Yesterday those hit 80 in the metro, and that was before another round of overnight storms covering the northern 2/3 of the state, with a southern afternoon blast predicted. To give us a comparison, the meteorologists inform us a dew point of 80 is higher than either Miami or the Amazon basin. It curls straight hair and straightens curly hair, unless you're me and everything frizzes it anyway.

It's all a great reminder that, while we can avoid Minnesnowta, we always manage to return for Minnesauna. In fact, we've been very successful in timing it each year for about a week after the  return of Minnesquito.