I explained to a friend as we were driving around in the early evening hours there that it was 111 degrees in Barstow when I got out of there.

“Oh,” he responded. “It got up to 118 degrees here today.”

Oh, indeed. When I left to return home the next afternoon, I burned one of my fingers on the reflector sunblock on my windshield when I was removing it. And so another fun summer begins. Though I’ve been here long enough to be prepared. My first summer in Barstow, I left a tape cassette on the passenger’s seat of my car and it melted.