Hot & Heavy

The Austin Hot Sauce Festival 2012   Picture this. A dry, dry, arid & dry field. I said dry, right? Just wanna be sure my not so subtle drift is catching. Some grass. Patches of dust that kick up when the wind blows. It's a clear day and heat is radiating off the ground in waves that blurry the world like those cartoon mirages. It's 96 degrees and the sun is beating down--accent of beating. No passive sun here. This one is heavy and pissed. Somewhere out there is that dried up cow skull singing "you'll be sooorrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrry.."   Now sprinkle this field with booths and small pitch tents. Add a few thousand people, a booth or two dispensing alcohol and you have the 2012 Austin Hot Sauce Festival. Lines snake backward from booth after booth as fans of hot sauce stand in the hard sun. Sweat is dripping down everyones face. No one here is wearing a dry shirt and me, I can feel the sweat pooling at the base of my spine. The back of my dress is sticking to me no matter how I move.   How to choose which booth to try next? I look around for a few seconds reading the signs. Each one is colorful and has snappy names. "Hot Ass Hot Sauce" "Don't Panic Hispanic" "Glaming Lips" and "Three drops of Death"...Do any of these booths have shade? Ha! Yeah, right. This is Texas. I think back to New York Rule #1. Fuck You. I remember that well. I lived under that rule for 15 years. Need a cab in the rain? Fuck you. Can't pay your rent? Fuck you. Want to avoid that bum peeing in the corner on the subway? Fuck you.  Texas has different rules. Texas rule #1. Drink water. Texas rule #2, do not ignore rule number 1.   Back to the Festival. Ok, I've been through maybe 4 booths. I'm hungry but I'm dizzy. This is not good. I know if I start to see stars, I have maybe 2 minutes before the lights go out so I'm paying close attention to the constellations in my head. Shade. Need shade. We find some bleachers in a shady spot and sit down. This is an endurance fest but not the kind I like. The heat is making my confused and cranky. I don't even want to hang with me. A rest in the shade is not enough. I need submersion and fast.   Later back on the couch, I am still pummeled. The sun here is like nothing I've ever felt before. The sheer strength with which it pushes down. No passive shining here. This is an aggressive sun. It reach and wallops you upside the head. My knees are still wobbly, arms weigh 600 pounds each and the headache is worse. Even the next day I am still wiped. There was a plethora of delicious hot sauces but was it really worth this? WTH? Decisions are made to avoid all summer outdoor festivals until maybe 2015. By then they will have invented wearable ACs....until then, I'm good. Just pass me a margarita & point me to the shady spot in the pool.