Please don't let this be global warming

I've tried to avoid talking about the oppressive heat that we've been experiencing for the last week because isn't that all everyone is talking about? At the store, the cashier asks you "Are you staying cool?" to which you answer "Trying to!" At gymnastics, the parents say "It's too hot to go outside! We're going stir crazy!" to which you give a sympathetic nod and smile. At the library, the librarian asks "Are you beating the heat with books?" to which you roll your eyes and mumble something about beating the librarian with books.

Wait, I actually just made that last part up, but it's what I really wanted to say instead of giving a short laugh and steering my girls to the kid's section. I think maybe the heat is making me cranky.

I know for a fact that it's making my kids cranky. And bored. And sick of all their toys, which by the way, decreased by about two hundred Polly Pockets after this week's latest lead-paint toy recall.

So, yes, it's hot. Too hot to go outside. Too hot to go to the pool, even. By Tuesday of this week, we'd already gone to the Library, the play area at the Mall (holding my breath waiting for Arden to break out in some random virus), Target (yes, we went to Target for no other reason than to get out of the house) and Chick-fil-A.

Since I figured it would be weird to hang out at Target too much, we have spent a lot of time at home this week as well. Being the creative and engaged mom that I am, I have spent countless hours playing Candyland, Don't Break the Ice, and Lucky Ducks (if you don't have this game, for the love of all things, DON'T get it), making toilet paper roll binoculars and searching for animals in danger, dressing up as a princess and allowing my three-year-old to "fix" my hair, and allowing that same three-year-old to watch way more than the American Pediatric Association's recommended two hours of television per day (surely that recommendation is only applicable in fair weather and doesn't apply to a Hannah Montana marathon on Disney Channel?!).

Let's all pray that the heat breaks soon, because, seriously, I don't know how many more times I can build that ice burg only to have Arden break it two seconds later. Or listen to the incessant quacking of those lucky ducks. Or watch Billy Ray Cyrus on Hannah Montana.

The only upside to this heat wave is the significant decrease in the number of green plastic men loitering in the middle of my street.