It’s So Hot That The Only Thing I Can Do Is Complain

Weather porn, day two:

But as the day dragged on in a hazy trance, the heat made even the seconds pass by in a sluggish torpor: it was a morning and night of a million little miseries, with just as many ways to get through them.

Many seats in New York City summer school sessions were vacant after the city’s announcement that students could stay home. Office workers seeking a cigarette break faced a one-two punch of heat and humidity if they dared venture from cooled lobbies. Observant Jews wrestled with how to deal with a day of fasting that began last night — and prohibits the drinking of water. At Rikers Island, running under generator power, guards, inmates and visitors all sweated.

. . .

Creeping down 58th Street in Woodside, Queens, in his white Ford van, Anthony Ramirez, 35, tilted his head back for a long gulp, downing the last of a bottle of Gatorade. “I’m going to need another one soon,” he said, looking ahead at the traffic, barely moving.

Sweat dripped down the sides of his face, stained the front of his T-shirt and made his arms look as if they had been dunked in a bucket of water. Hot water. “I feel like the devil’s in here,” he said, “It’s murder, I’m telling you.”

What it was, really, inside his van, was 111 degrees, according to a thermometer that toured some of the city’s hottest locations yesterday.