One hundred degrees in the shade
Some days are different
Some days are just plain different. One hundred degrees in the shade surely ranks as one of those days.
We all experience a handful of days over the course of our lives that are totally unlike all of the rest. Watershed days. Days that make us and days that threaten to break us. Some days appear ordinary at the start but by the end become extraordinary.
Tuesday, March 8, 2005 was such a day. It was a most unusual day, to say the least. It began as a normal partly cloudy late winter spring-is-just-around-the-corner kind of Tuesday.
But it turned out to be a weather person’s delight. The Weather Channel actually got the forecast right for a change because just about every weather system known to man hit northeastern North Carolina. In the course of about an hour, from 12:15 to 1:15, we experienced what can only be described as a weather phenomenon.
An unforgettable hour
At 12:15 the temperature was in the mid 50s, skies were partly cloudy, and northeast winds were light and variable. By 12:20 the winds had picked up to around 20 knots. The sky turned ominously dark as a peel of thunder could be heard over the horizon. The temperature plunged ten degrees in a matter of minutes.
At 12:23 it began to hail. About the size of a dime, the small chunks of ice pummeled the ground (and my Corvette which happened to be in the driveway). The nice breeze turned into a gale force of 65 knots sending the ice horizontal.
By 12:32 the hail turned to sleet and began to accumulate. All the while thunder rolled and lightning flashed. At 12:45 the sleet turned to snow. The temperature was now in the low 40s.
By 1:06 the snow turned to rain and by 1:15 the rain stopped and the sun began to shine through the clouds. In the course of an hour we experienced clouds, thunder, lightning, a fifteen-degree temperature plunge, hail, sleet, snow, rain, gale force winds, and sunshine.
One hundred degrees in the shade
Fast forward to the Crystal Coast this past weekend, Sunday, July 24, 2:00 pm, to be exact. My friend, Debbie, was visiting for the weekend. In search of a new head shot for her online profiles, we headed out to Fort Macon for an impromptu photo session.
The sun was high in the sky and not a cloud in sight. The temperature was 90 degrees but the heat index was 104. The breeze off the ocean felt like a hair dryer set on incinerate. And walking on the sand was analogous to walking on hot coals.
What better time to attempt a photo shoot?! We managed to find some partial shade under a canopy of live oak trees where the heat index was only 103. But we got some great shots and we now know what hell feels like (because of the weather, not the photo shoot).
At Beaufort Photography Co., some days are just plain different. One hundred degrees in the shade.
