BOB KORNEGAY: I should’ve called in hot today

Whew! I should’ve called in hot today. Where’s a cold trout stream when you need one?

From my position the only positive thing about Gulf Coast summertime heat and humidity is that they spawn some really good excuses.

“Catchin’ any?”

“Nah. Too dadgum hot.”

“Hiking today?”

“Uh uh. This is chigger and rattlesnake weather.”

“Get your column done?”

“You kiddin’? Write in this heat?”

“Cold beer? At 9 a.m.?”

“Heck, yeah. You looked at the thermometer lately?”

My guide and story source, a fine and knowledgeable angler, unhooks a small redbreast and says, “Flowing water’s your best bet for bream fishing in the summertime. Deep, running water is always consistently cooler and the oxygen content is greater than the water in lakes and ponds.”

Good quote. I need to write that down. I will, too, as soon as I find a page in my notebook that isn’t sweat-soaked and totally useless. Forget the tape recorder. The cassette melted an hour ago. That might pique my scientific curiosity if I wasn’t right this minute having a heat stroke and looking for a soft place to land when I faint. My companion, whose heat tolerance is obviously far superior to mine, has not yet noticed that we took a wrong turn at the last slough and ended up in equatorial Africa.

He’s a nice guy, though, and notices my plight. It’s hard not to notice a hairy, bearded man with a ponytail who’s just removed all his clothes and emptied a 48-quart cooler full of ice on his head.

“Wanna crank up and run awhile?” he asks. “Maybe that’ll cool you down.”

No, thanks. I’ve ridden in his boat all day. He thinks it’s an F-16. I’d just as soon die from the heat as from terror.

“Let’s pull up under those trees over there, why don’t we? They say it’s 10 degrees cooler in deep shade.”

Let’s not. The heat index is 147. If it drops to 137, I’ll have to go home and get my overcoat.

He stops trying. I’m ashamed of my sarcasm and lousy attitude. I put my clothes on again. He appreciates it. Anyone would, especially right after lunching on two cans of mustard sardines and half a bottle of Crystal hot sauce. We continue fishing. Bless his heart; he’s making a supreme effort to ensure I get a good story.

It’s true what they say. There’s some good in the worst of us and some bad in the best of us. My “bad” always surfaces in June and hangs around until the first frost. I hate hot weather. It makes me want to break things. It makes me yell at dogs and children. It makes me angry at people who thrive on it, tanned men with washboard abs and bulging biceps who unashamedly cool off by baring their bodies in public.

I’m a bit more tolerant of hot, bikini-clad females who do likewise.

Still, the “show,” as they say, must go on. I must persevere. Legendary outdoor journalists have a duty, after all, to suck it up and brave Nature’s elements, inclement or otherwise. Readers hunger for my sage advice and timely information. They ceaselessly yearn for my eloquent prose. I cannot think ill of them for failing to understand the supreme dedication and self sacrifice it requires to fulfill their needs.

And I must not offend those who ultimately make that possible. My sources, my interviewees, are of paramount importance.

Especially now that this one has put me on a shellcracker bed. Geez, there must be a million of them.

“Wanna let’s stay here and fish awhile, Bob, or go find an air conditioner?”

“Pass me a pond worm, Bubba. A little hot weather never hurt anybody.”

Bob Kornegay writes about the outdoors for The Albany Herald. Contact him at [email protected].