I sweat.

An 80s girl, I was an avid Rick Springfield fan. (Holy crap! He’ll turn 7-0 in August.) As an avid fan, I saw “Hard to Hold.” The movie was pretty terrible, a fact Springfield himself acknowledged in his autobiography, which Laurie gave me for Christmas a couple years ago. Good read. Hard to believe some diehards really liked the movie, but, and I should probably be ashamed of this, I eventually bought the DVD. Blame the $4 bins at Target.

Anyway, the soundtrack isn’t bad. Springfield’s songs highlight it, of course, but there are other artists. Nona Hendrix, for example. Now, I don’t know Nona Hendrix from Adam’s housecat, but she has a song on there (“Heart of a Woman,”) and somehow – since this was pre-Google – I tried to figure out who she was and discovered she had a song called, “I Sweat,” which was featured in the John Travolta movie “Perfect,” which I never saw. As far as I know, I’ve never actually heard the song before; I just saw the title somewhere.

This weekend, boy howdy, have I thought about that song title this weekend, because I feel like “sweat” is all I’ve done.

Yep. It’s a dry heat, but holy hell, it’s hot. I really feel like sweating has been the highlight of my weekend. It’s all I’ve done. I mean, yeah, I’ve watched a couple of movies and read a couple of books (Recommended: “One Good Dog.” Not recommended: “The President is Missing.) but the underlying activity has been sweating.

We have an event going on next week and I had to go into the office to do some prep work, and even after turning on the AC and the ceiling fan, I broke out in sweats from the half-block walk from my TDY quarters to the office.

I suppose the upside is that it’s slightly cooler here than Baghdad, but when you’re discussing temperatures of over 100, can you really tell a difference between 119 and 109? I don’t set foot outside without sunglasses, my ridiculous-looking floppy hat (designed in Korea, made in China, purchased in Kazakhstan) and sunscreen, but I try not to set foot outside between 1 -5 p.m. or so anyway. Let it get down to 105 or so, you know?

Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego had it worse, I know, but it’s like living in an oven. Sometimes the wind blows, though. Want to know what it’s like then? Turn a hair dryer on your face.

This is not meant to be a complaint. I totally love this gig. It just amazes me that so many people live and adjust to extreme weather like this. Three of my closest colleagues work in the office downstairs from me, and my guess is I amuse them when I sit down under their AC unit and announce it’s hot. It is hot, but they’re used to it.

The whole no-humidity thing is wonderful; the shade is cooler, but it’s not a matter of it being tolerable. It’s not that you don’t broil; it’s just that it’s the Crock-pot version.

Baghdad is hotter, but because we built the compound there, we built a water treatment plant and you can drink water out of the faucets. Seriously, except for in the showers, there’s a little red sign over every faucet that says, “Tap water is safe to drink.” There have to be hundreds. No such luck here. Instead, we pound little half-liters to stay hydrated. Even with also drinking tea (I use tap for that since I boil it) and juice, I think I’ve had 4-5 today, and it’s only 6 p.m. (and 105).

One day, I’m going to finally get to Minsk and I’m going to be bitterly cold for months and it will stun me that people can adjust to that extreme as well, but right now I’m just going to sit back, sweat, and be amazed that people can deal with this on a regular basis.