this old town, he played four, he played .. wait. Town? I mean man!

When you step outside, you can feel the sun sucking the moisture from your flesh. Even your hair feels hot enough to boil water, stinging your hands as you run them through it. The wind roars past your body, its furnace-temperatures searing your skin and flinging dust into eyes dried up like sandpaper.

Tarred roads melt under the onslaught of a Central West Summer sun where the mere thought of having to step outside to buy groceries results in thousands of simultaneous phone calls to the local take away shops - and an hour long wait for a hamburger.

Sometimes, it’s even too hot for the locusts and crickets who do small, lazy jumps, barely avoiding a quick death beneath your shoes.

Dirt clings to the sweat that coats the webbing between your big toe and the one beside it, drying to form an unsightly, black crumble which only becomes apparent once you kick your thongs off your feet. Underarm sweat mixes with deodorant to form a sticky paste that stains shirts but does little to combat the smell being generated by heat and movement. T-Shirts cling to backs and under-boobs and shorts get stuck in bums, riding up to reveal patterns that seating has left in the backs of exposed thighs.

In my office, small goose bumps cover my arms, the result of the arctic winds emanating from the air-conditioner. It is the reason I keep a cardigan over the back of my chair. It’s a harsh adjustment from 40 degrees outside to the chilly 22 swirling around my desk.

The view out my window is distorted by almost-invisible waves of heat, rising off the iron roof below. A discarded can of spray paint sends a sharp glint of sunlight against the wall of the next building and I worry each day that it will explode in a shower of dried up paint chips and flame. I walked onto the roof and got the last one, falling for the story my co-workers fed me about their own successful roof-treks.
It wasn’t until I was halfway out, the thin iron that was my only support softly bending beneath my feet, that I looked up and saw them laughing hysterically at my gullibility. Apparently nobody else is as stupid as me, to walk onto the two-storey roof of a 100 (and something) year old building with nothing to save them but their reflexes - Reflexes of a cat (that is blind, deaf, and unable to eat solid food anymore)!

On days like this, I spend my work hours dreaming about the blue sparkle of my parents’ pool and that delicious instant where the cool water touches your sun-scorched skin and pulls the breath from your lungs. I dream about the way the seams of the inflatable pool pony scratches against your sunburn, and its smell as you press your nose into the soft, warm plastic to blow it up a little more.

Every outdoor excursion is put off until the sun begins to set behind gum trees standing still as stone when the furnace winds have abated and left us with an oppressive heat-blanket, thick and exhausting. The outdoor jobs that can’t be put off wring childish tears from adult eyes at the unfairness of having to leave air-conditioned comfort and whole families flinch as the tempers of even the most patient parents suddenly get much, much shorter.

Eventually the sun starts saying goodbye, apologising for its rude intensity with spectacular sunsets; splashes of mauve and pink and peach and red setting fire to the stray wisps of cloud dotting the sky. Temperatures begin to drop as salads are tossed and sausages are left to sizzle on barbecues that feel cooler than the steering wheel did at 4pm. As the food hits the outdoor setting, the mozzies begin their attack; a couple of scouts to begin with, followed by the larger army.

With full bellies and sunburn sting, chairs are pushed back from tables and dishwashers stacked; the sharp “ting, ting, ting” of cutlery scraping bread crusts and sauce-piles into garbage bins breaks through the cicada-songs and satisfied sighs are released, along with those full bellies from their trousers.

Cold showers give late-night respite before switching on the fan and pulling up the blankets. One foot stays in, the other sticks out to evenly distribute your body’s temperature. Tomorrow we wake, and do it all again, until Summer’s stinging sun gives way to Autumn’s cardigan call and its promises of flannelette pyjamas and steaming bowls of soup.

Intense weather - that's just how this town rolls.