Sure Is Hot
There is “July hot” and there is “sauté pan hot” but the hottest and most miserable of them all is “September hot”. It’s a “hottest” that can’t be quantified with a thermometer, but anyone who has survived a Florida summer knows exactly what I am talking about.
By eight o’clock in the morning it is too hot to work outside. By two in the afternoon, no one wants to leave the A/C and Gulf Drive could double as a landing strip.
They call them the “dog days” but the dogs don’t want them either. Tempers flare, divorce rates go up and patience becomes just a concept.
One of my favorite things to do in September is to get in line at the post office or the hardware store. Feel the quiet tension in the air, the accumulated oppression of all that mid-afternoon stifling white heat. Wait for the moment, and then say, “sure is hot.”
Drives folks crazy. Steam comes out of their ears. Sometimes you get that “AARGH” noise that Charlie Brown used to make when Luci pulled the football away.
The only good thing that comes from the “hot” of September is my favorite rite of Fall – that glorious first cold front. Eventually our prayers will pull a mass of cold Canadian air down past Tallahassee and across Tampa Bay. We will be washed with cool rain and the temperature will dip into the seventies.
That night –“cold front night”– is marked every year in Bistro sales charts with a leaping spike in the graph. The cold air arrives – people come out of their air-conditioned boxes in herds – maddened by the cool, fresh breezes.
They drink bottles of red wine, eat red meat and dance naked on the beach.
This year the Bistro has developed a “Sure is Hot” program to help us all through the dog days.
Drink More … a page from the Irish “How to Deal with Difficulty” manual
Sean is going to buy everyone a free drink. From now through the 15 of October, local patrons who come into the Bistro and say “Sure is Hot” will get a free cocktail or glass of wine with dinner in the bar or dining room. This is a locals-only program. If you have travelled to Florida for the “dog days” the free drink might affect your medication.
Fred has concocted two seductive libations for the “Sure is Hot” rest of summer – a beautiful Watermelon Cosmo and a Pineapple-Infused Martini. Chilling, delicious and nutritious – they might even be good for more than your attitude.
A Cool Drive … The Bistro Bus (air conditioned) will be available every night to provide free on island transportation to and from the Bistro and off-island transportation for six or more with dinner reservations.
Lighter Portions and Pricing … For that lighter summer appetite, the Bistro bar and dining room menus will continue to emphasize the world’s best quality products at a variety of portions, pricing and preparations that deliver exceptional value.
Cool Stuff … Bistro Chefs have designed some lighter, cooler preparations with the heat relief in mind – a wonderfully cool and refreshing Watermelon Salad, a chilled “Three Things” soup of honeydew, mint and lime and daily “spa” seafood preparations for the lighter, leaner palate.
The Cold Front “Watch” … The Bistro staff will post advisories on our web site tracking approaching cold fronts. When “That First Big One” gets here, we will host a “Cold Front Beach Party” – free wine, music and dancing on the beach – with clothes. The Bistro Bus (air conditioned) will get everyone home to their clothing-optional homes.
“Sure is hot”. September. Together we can do this.
Be cool, Sean