Stovetop Smoking for Memorial Day

What do you call the day after two days of rain in Syracuse? Monday (rimshot).

The TV weatherfolk are calling for rain on Saturday and sunshine on Sunday and Monday. Naturally, this means we’ll have gray clouds from Friday afternoon until about 5 p.m. Monday, when a little bit of sun will peak through and taunt people like The Wife. She wants to be outside with The Baby doing cute stuff or finishing the fall cleanup that we never started. I’m sure I’ll be outside with the neighbor’s pressure washer at some point in my feeble attempt to return our siding to their original colors (white and yellow) without blasting a window or hurting myself.

Memorial Day marks the beginning of summer for many. One of the joys of the season is grilling and cooking outdoors. I’ve never understood why. “Hey! It’s 200 degrees with stifling humidity. Let’s go outside, stand in front of a 400-degree fire and cook meat like it’s the fucking middle ages.” (Side note: Those who know me well recognize that I have a love affair with air conditioning. My disdain for heat is best summed up by Deadspin’s Drew Magary.) In the perfect world, my kitchen would have grill grate and a commercial-grade range hood to vent out the smoke. Then again if the world were perfect a lot of things would change. There would be a Starbucks across from my office, for instance.