Sun Day in Houston

I thought things were looking poorly when I touched down here on April 4 and the temperature was 87 degrees with the humidity about the same.

But then the weather turned downright idyllic, with temps in the 70s and a near-perfect saturation of water molecules in the atmosphere.

But Texas hands kept telling me, "You just wait 'til Easter. Woo, boy. You just wait." Typically in Western nations, Easter is a happy day, regardless of whether you're celebrating the Resurrection or hiding some colored eggs around your backyard for your toddler to find. It is, at least, the harbinger of spring.

But not here.

Here, folks talked about Easter the way Southern-fried cop Patrick Swayze warned those Chicago gangsters who kilt his brother in "Next of Kin," an unfairly overlooked entry in the Swayze canon: "You ain't seen bad yet. But it's comin'."

And Houstonians were right. As if on cue, the temperature and humidity shot up over the Easter weekend. I believe the meteorological term to describe how hot it was on Monday was "plum." Yesterday it hit 90, and little relief is expected for at least a week.

This is the time of year when the lightly populated streets of downtown daytime Houston (This city really has 2 million people?) become nearly empty, as residents pop up from the tunnels that underlie downtown only to scurry back into their air-conditioned buildings. More on those tunnels later. (Seven miles' worth, making Crystal City's underground look like a small fallout shelter by comparison.)

By Frank Ahrens |  April 19, 2006; 11:39 AM ET  | Category:  Houstoniana
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