When it comes to heat, I do not enjoy it. A lot of people like to complain when fall comes around and the air temperature starts getting cooler. Not me. I look forward to this time of year with a strange kind of glee. In general, I even like winter, although this past one was particularly brutal and even got to me.

You see, I am a big fat guy. Big fat guys and heat do not get along. I have run into someone who used to get positively orgasmic describing summer months and how “your skin gets so moist.” What she called “moist” I generally referred to as “sweaty.” I turn from a big fat guy into a big fat SWEATY guy when it gets too hot.

I have one friend who used to play full-pad goalie in roller-hockey at an outdoor rink during the summer months while in St. Louis. I once opened the front door of my apartment on a day when it was so hot that it felt like walking into a wet blanket when you stepped outside to find him in full black sweat pants and sweat shirt. He was practicing his goalie moves and he told me he found this kind of head “invigorating.” I have puzzled over that statement the way some scientists puzzle over fossils ever since.

When it comes to being cold, you can always add layers. I love wearing sweaters and t-shirts and long pants and jackets. With my body, generally speaking, the more covered it is the better. I never, ever, ever, ever, EVER wear shorts. On the hottest of hot days, I am the guy in jeans and I consider that an important public service. More fat people need to cover themselves more before stepping out of the house.

When it comes to being hot, you can only take so many layers off before you venture into illegal territory. I mean, maybe there are some beaches and maybe if you live in Brazil, you can stroll around full nude, but most places frown upon it, particularly in places like restaurants, schools and churches.
So, it was not a very good match when I recently had to go to Orlando Florida for a trade show. As soon as I got off the plane, while you are in that vinyl tube that leads from the plane to the terminal, it was like stepping into a steam bath. Then, once you got into the terminal, with the air conditioning blowing, it was still as humid as your average sauna.

I have no idea how people actually live in that part of the world. I mean, seriously. I know people who anxiously and excitedly await going to places like Florida. This is a place where lizards and snakes and probably spiders the size of dinner plates and scorpions enjoy hanging out. At the very least, you should be warned away from the are because alligators call the place home.

I found myself sweating profusely. Even in the trade hall any movement at all would lead to me sweating profusely. Do you have any idea how hard it is to look good and professional when you have a constant sheen of sweat over your face and forehead?

Florida is a strange place. This is only my third time there. Both times before that I was there as a child and my family and I never liked the place. We always found it too hot and humid and never even liked Disney World all that much. I always liked Sea World better.

You rarely run into anyone who is actually from Florida when you are there. It is the world’s largest transplanted resident state in the world. Well, I just made that up, but it has to be very close to the truth.

For me, the only thing the entire south has ever contributed to society, and I rediscovered while in Florida, is Sweet Tea. Sweet Tea is fantastic for a guy like myself with a sweet tooth. Many people find it too sweet, but not me. It is iced tea with so much sugar in it that it could put you in a diabetic coma and is likely to make your teeth hurt. This is the greatest thing ever invented and I wish it would catch on more in the north.

Florida is a state that is hot, humid, full of old retired people or young college students getting drunk and passing out. It is hurricane bait and I don’t care how “inland” you say your city is, if you live on a peninsula, you aren’t that far away from the ocean and you are not very far inland. As Homer Simpson said in one episode of “The Simpsons,” “Oooohh, Florida! But that’s America’s wang!”

I was in Orlando. I cannot fathom living in a city where the entire economy is based entirely upon tourism. There is no Orlando export. There is only tourist traps. There is Disney World and there is Sea World and there is Universal Studios Florida and there are other amusement and water parks and that is about it. I couldn’t even locate a downtown area, although I am sure there is one.

The water there also takes like the most horrid thing you can imagine putting in your mouth. I am guessing that is because three sides of the state are surrounded by salt water and everyone else has to do with wells. I just know I’d take good ol’ polluted Lake Michigan water over a glass of Florida water any day of the week.

You are hearty bunch, Floridians. I do not, however, envy you. I am glad to be back in Chicago where it is sunny, devoid of humidity and maybe 70 degrees out there. I am gleefully wearing my Chicago Bears sweatshirt as I walk down the street. You can complain all you want about Chicago’s winters, but I’d take them over Florida humidity any time.

Bryan Alaspa is a featured writer for Xomba.com. Read the rest of his work here .