The Four H's

As I might have mentioned a few times, Mother Nature has been a bitch as of late, deciding that summer (which in my book is June 1 through September 1, not that whole June 20th or whatever) weather here in the Black Hills should be more April like than June like, meaning cool and WAY TOO MUCH fucking rain.  I have permanent prune hands I think.

We scheduled our normal Tuesday night Rambler ride at Bulldog which was postponed because of...wait for it...RAIN (imagine that).  So, we rescheduled for Wednesday evening after seeing the forecast for that day with no rain predicted.

We met at Bulldog at 6 pm after a day when the highs were in the low 80's.  Perfect you'd think, huh?  Hold on there Tonto...under normal circumstances, 80 would be an ideal riding temperature, but here in the Black Hills, the average afternoon relative humidity for June floats around in the mid 40% range.  Wednesday's afternoon relative humidity?  Almost 70%, and I would argue that on the trail with all the vegetation and the supremely damp trail, it was much higher than that.

I can already hear the grumblings of those that live east of the Missouri River, where humidity is usually the same as the temperature outside in the summer but understand, we live in a semi-arid area and we are not used to humidity which is where the four H's come in.

Heat, humidity, hairiness and heaviness.  Hot, H2O, hirsuteness and huge.  Whatever your words, pick 3 and leave the humidity out.  They do NOT mix, trust me.  I was sweating like a fat hooker in church.  My clothes felt like I went swimming in them.  Not cool.

In addition, thanks to all the rain, the area around the trail looked like it was some sort of poison ivy farm.  Nice.  Hairy, huge, sweaty and itching oozing blisters.  What isn't to love about that?  Thankfully, I've managed to steer clear of the ivy so far this year, knock on wood, but I know my luck is running out.

I suppose I could do something about the hairiness...I guess I need a good clipping over the whole body.  Now that we are dog free in the house I guess the clippers are free for human use.  I just hope I can balance on the grooming table while my wife trims me up.