Wednesday, July 7, 2010

What's all that scratching?

7 July 2010


Man, it’s hot, and I don’t even live in the hotter, considerably flatter part of Azerbaijan. Here in the rayon of Oğuz, we’re right by the mountains and rivers, a little ways uphill from the steamy cities of Mingechevir and Ujar, to name a couple. But still, I can’t deny the fact that I’m sweating my ass off at every corner, except for my bedroom here in the house, with the fan on high, blowing against the back of my Tennessee Titans shirt (You didn’t know I was a fan. Did you?). I was just in class with one ten year old girl who I’d suspect was thinking, the whole, you know, ten minutes we could stand to be in the classroom, “When the heck are we leaving?” We jammed out way early because her cousin was left alone at her house. Azerbaijani’s like to stay close to their guests. None of us wept at the change of plans.

But it’s a small price to pay for summer vacation. I mean, I’m from central Texas, where July days surpass a hundred degrees Fahrenheit. I’d still run and sweat in the midday sun along the hills of Sierra West and not give it a thought. To be honest, I kinna liked it, and I still don’t mind it too much around here. Let’s consider the alternative, or opposite, if you will:

Would you rather…

-Walk around on a July day, your wet t-shirt sticking to your back, dying to get in the air conditioning?

or…

-Freeze your butt off in the January coldness, carrying the dishes out to the yard faucet, your hands getting numb from the icy water?

Now, don’t cheat. Human nature dictates you’ll always choose what you’re not in now. At first glance, plenty of you would choose the latter. However, if you were in a bustling crowd of polka dancers in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania on Groundhog Day, you’d choose the former (“Better put on your booties, ‘cause it’s cold out there today.”). The truth is we naturally want what we don’t have. That’s why you get a crush on that girl who used to like you. Okay, this entry needs more direction.

As if the sweltering heat weren’t enough, these peaceful days are disrupted, from time to time, by mysterious scratching noises coming from, literally, inside the desk in my room. I don’t know what they are, and I can’t see a trace of evidence. All I know is that if I pound on the top of the table like this: BOOM! (Sorry, you couldn’t actually see or hear that.), the scratching stops for a minute and starts back up again. It’s like an invisible man is clipping and scraping out his toenails within the thin, wooden piece of plywood that supports my computer and nearly empty can of Nescafe. It’s annoying and concerning. What the hell is it? Any ideas? Termites? Ants? Evil spirits? Flesh eating bacteria? The rotting wood? Though this isn’t a horribly dire concern, knowing would be nice, and I’d appreciate your help.

Then again, I could just ask my landlord.

1 comment:

Paula Bean said...

Is it sad that I can empathize with you on both the awful bipolar weather and the annoying and enigmatic clicking noises? Hmm. Our sites are closer than they appear in mirror.