1000 demons

As I close in on my final week here in Madrid, I begin, very cautiously, to breathe a slow sigh of relief. One of the worries about scheduling a three-month stay, to span the months of May, June, and July was - well - July in Madrid. Whenever I would mention to a Spaniard that I was planning to be in Madrid during July, there would be an inevitable furrowing of the brow, followed by deployment of the phrase "un calor de mil demonios" (the heat of a thousand demons).

But, I am relieved to report, so far things have been entirely soportable. While daytime temperatures have occasionally climbed to the mid-90's, there is a general cooling off at night, and the humidity has been reasonable.

I have my own theory as to why this has been the case. It is my belief that many of the hard-working heat demons have been seconded by Pope Rat-zinger to the newly reopened infierno, to deploy their little toasting forks in poking at Jerry Falwell and his ilk. This leaves central Spain suffering a seasonal shortage of demons, accounting for the relatively tolerable summer temperatures. Exact figures are hard to come by, but if one thinks that each circle of hell would need 100 demons as a skeleton crew, this leaves a maximum of 100 for Madrid.

I am working on an exact equation to convert the number of demons to degrees Fahrenheit, but my formula is not quite ready for prime time. Here, however, is how to convert temperatures from Fahrenheit to Celsius, and vice versa:

F = 32 + (9/5) x C

C = (5/9) x (F - 32)