MARK SARDELLA
Published in the August 18, 2016 edition
Have you looked at a calendar lately? It’s Aug. 18 already! Wasn’t the July Fourth Parade just last weekend?
Summer’s slipping away, and we are rapidly approaching the point where even Daylight Saving Time will not be able to stave off the encroaching night. Even Saturday’s Festival Italia will conclude in darkness.
But if you’re like most people (and after all who isn’t?) you still haven’t done most of the activities on your summer to-do list.
As for me, I didn’t make a list of things to do this summer. That’s what the internet is for. So with two weeks to go until Labor Day weekend, I figured I’d better Google a list of summer activities and see where I stand.
How did I do? You be the judge.
Make lemonade from scratch. Who do I look like, Martha Stewart?
Get caught in a summer rainstorm. There haven’t been a lot of opportunities for that this summer, but I’ll take it under advisement.
Smell freshly-cut grass. All the grass is burnt. (See previous item.)
Bring a blanket and lie on the grass at an outdoor concert. Did that in my youth. I remember smelling a lot of burnt grass at that concert, too.
Go camping. I’ll pass. The novelty of sleeping on the ground wore off for me sometime in my 20s.
Go for a bike ride. No thanks. I can irritate enough people without mounting a Trek. Besides, I don’t look good in Spandex.
Buy fresh produce at the farmers market. Only if I can get my purchase it in a double plastic bag.
Go for a hike. Be serious.
Play Marco Polo. Sorry, far too confusing with my name.
Wash your car. I drive a 2003 Mazda. It gets washed when it rains.
Play a board game on a picnic table. Does Words with Friends on my phone count?
See a movie at the drive-in. What’s playing at the Starlite?
Catch fireflies — or as one website called them, “lightening” bugs. As opposed to darkening bugs? Either way, it sounds positively electrifying.
Stargaze while lying in the grass. One word: mosquitoes.
Watch the Olympics. Anyone know what channel they’re on?
Take a last-minute road trip. Not a bad idea with this summer’s cheap gas prices. (Thanks, fracking!)
Based on the online list and my performance, it would seem that I haven’t done much this summer.
But I would count it a successful season if I could just fulfill my one fantasy of attaching a balloon to the top of the crane at the Brightview site.
That would be the high point of my summer.
