New Ways to Die

New Ways To Die!  Is that not exciting or what?  I am watching the news, and we have been told about 6 billion times in the past few days that a massive heat wave is coming our way.  It could even get close to 90 degrees!  GASP! 

But, no worries, we will not die of the heat.  We will die from the COLD in the heat.  That's the Pacific Northwest for ya.  See, people here like to jump in the rivers and lakes when it's hot out.  The only problem is that the water is FREEZING all summer long.  But people who grow up here are tough, they can take the ice water even though they barely know how to swim.  So, summer is a big swift water rescue time.  And unswift water rescue, for those who jump in lakes and really do not know how to swim that well, especially among the icebergs.  We take the boat out on Lake Washington in summer, and I am forced to swim in it's freezing waters.  I stay on the top 1 foot of the water, floating, feeling like I am sliding on a sheet of ice.  Those who went to college with me know that I despise cold water.  A LOT. 

On the brighter side, people like to tube down the rivers here.  But the snow melt this heat wave will raise the rivers quite high and make them more dangerous.  I learned today about two new ways to drown, the "Strainer" and the "Undercut Rock".  While you are joyfully tubing your frozen butt down the river, you can float into vegetation and dreaded shrubbery that is newly covered by snow melt river water.  You get stuck.  You turn into a Strainer (we call it a Collander on the East Coast).  And you drown.  Yay!  The undercut rock is a big rock, which there are tons of out here, under the water that has a ledge you can float into and under.  And you drown.  In the cold water, because it is never above 50 degrees. 

They say a really good way to stay safe is to throw a stick in the river, and if it is faster than you can walk, the current is dangerous and too strong for human activity.  Although I like to play Pooh Sticks with my kids (throw sticks in the river, run to the other side of the bridge to see who's floats out first, they win.  Winnie the Pooh.  It's awesome), I have no intentions of actually TOUCHING the freezing water.  It's all glacier melt here, and icey water is just not my thing. 

Frankly, Ihave the best way to stay safe out here.  Do not go in the water!  AT ALL.  And if you cannot swim well, you should stay out of the hot tubs too, because you never know when a Tsunami will hit.