If the seasons were in a competition for best time of year (which, let's face it, they are), fall would always win. Fall has the superior weather (warm but not hot, cool but not cold), the superior color palette for foliage (green, gold, red, orange, and not much pollen to trigger allergies), the superior clothing accessories (boots, scarves, cardigans), as well as the superior holidays (Halloween and Thanksgiving). But in order to get to the crisp, golden, refreshing days of fall, we have to squeeze through the sweaty, sun-bleached, sticky days of summer. Here are a few products and suggestions to help you get through the long season of picnics, rooftop barbecues, perspiration, general use of sleeveless shirts, and bombastic action movies that stretches before you:
Plastic Spray Bottle With Fan Necklace (orientaltrading.com, $19.95 per dozen)
In the hierarchy of embarrassing things you could wear around your neck, a spray bottle with a personal fan attached falls somewhere between a replica of Flava Flav's clock and a flashlight pen. Still, having one of these fans swinging around your neck during summertime is at least understandable. When you're in public, and you mist your face with a personal fan like a grocery clerk spraying vegetables in the produce section, yes, people will judge you. But they'll probably also be jealous both of the cool air hitting your dewy face and of the brimming self-confidence you obviously have to wear such a ridiculous contraption in public.
Frozen Vodka Watermelon (prices vary for the components at grocery stores and liquor stores everywhere)
Watermelon, that oblong thing at least one person brings to every summer picnic, is kind of disgusting. It's sickly sweet and extremely sticky, plus it requires spitting for proper consumption. (Seedless watermelons are science experiments, not watermelons.) But the addition of one simple ingredient fixes at least one of those problems. By cutting a hole in the top of your watermelon, sticking a bottle of vodka upside down in it, letting the alcohol slowly seep into the fruit, and then shoving the whole thing into the freezer, you can cut the sickly sweetness of watermelon by at least half. It will still be sticky, and it'll still require spitting, but you'll be so drunk, you'll hardly be able to tell.
Merimekko for H&M (hm.com, prices vary)
Clothing in summertime should be disposable (gauzy sundresses, T-shirts you can sweat through, plastic flip-flops bought on a whim) and really, really loud: disposable because it's too hot to wear clothes, so why spend money on them, and really, really loud because the sun has pretty much burned out everyone's retinas, and they won't even be able to see drab clothes. In these respects, Finnish textile company Merimekko has produced the perfect line of summer clothes for H&M. The dresses are cheap enough that you can throw them away in September, and the patterns are so bright and ridiculous, they practically generate their own strobe light. When else is it going to be acceptable for you to walk around wearing what looks like a tablecloth with the 1960s exploded all over it? Take advantage now.
Mindless entertainment (hulu.com, free with your employer's Internet connection)
People get stupider in the summer. That's just a fact. Our brains overheat in the humidity, sweat leaks into our synapses, and it becomes impossible to think about anything but going outside, lounging in the shade somewhere, and spacing out. This is why summer office hours exist. But if your employer doesn't let you leave early on Fridays, you can still take mental summer hours with the help of Hulu.com. Around 2 p.m. on Friday, simply go to Hulu and start watching the stupidest thing you can find—Temptation Island, Solitary, Son Of The Beach—until you're allowed to leave for the day. Your employers have your body in summer, but if your office has an Internet connection and you have headphones, they don't have to have your mind.
Scratch-off lottery games (convenience stores everywhere, $1-$5)
Every summer needs a project, some kind of simple goal to while away the hot, hot hours: planting a garden, reading a certain book you've been meaning to read, hanging some of those paper lanterns in the backyard, finding a suitable summer fling, etc., etc. This year, why not make your summer project winning a million dollars? Buy a few scratch-off lottery games every week, go sit on a bench in the park, and start scratching. It's practically exercise.
American Teen (in theaters July 25, $10.50 or less)
Summer belongs to kids. It's when they run around, enjoy their freedom from school, and are filmed for MTV shows about life at fat camp. But instead of interacting with summer-happy teens, why not coolly observe them in documentary form? Nanette Burstein's American Teen follows a group of high-schoolers in Indiana through their senior year, so going to see it this summer will satisfy your high-school nostalgia quotient, fulfill your "Kids these days…" worry quota, and help you meet your refreshing movie-theater air-conditioning requirement.
Reasonably sized sunglasses (Rite Aid, $9)
Sunglasses get bigger and more exophthalmic each year, occasionally covering the entire face and turning wearers into human mosquitoes. Why this happens is unclear, especially considering that the sun remains pretty much the same size from summer to summer. This year, resist the gigantism that pervades sunglasses-dom. Scale back and purchase sunglasses that cover the eyes and keep out the sun, but that don't weigh 15 pounds and stretch from your upper lip to your hairline.
Savage Lovecast (iTunes.com, free)
Is there a better soundtrack to a lazy walk around the park on a warm summer afternoon, with the sunlight filtering through the trees and dappling shadows on the green grass, than hearing someone ask a question like "Is piss-play safe?" on a frank sex-advice podcast? Probably. But listening to the Savage Lovecast while walking around shapes your surroundings like nothing else. Why? Everyone who calls in to the podcast is anonymous, so everyone you see while listening to it becomes a potential caller, and the whole world becomes a fun game of "Guess The Kink." Is that guy with the acoustic guitar the weird wet-dream guy? Is the girl walking the Boston terrier the grammar fetishist? Is the old lady in the floppy hat the sister of the public masturbator? For all you know, they probably are.
Barbara Walters and a dunk tank (Barbara Walters, $50,001 and up, allamericanspeakers.com; dunk tank, $1,500 and up, rentalhq.com)
If there's any time of year to rent a celebrity and a dunk tank, it's summer. Why? There are so many outdoor gatherings in summer that are in dire need of fresh entertainment. People can only eat and drink so much before they start to fight or leave. As a good host, you must plan other activities. Karaoke? Played out. Setting up a movie screen, a projector, and Rock Band? One step above played out. A Slip 'N Slide? Those things chafe. Just think about how great your rooftop barbecue would be if you rented Barbara Walters and a dunk tank to amuse your guests between helpings of grilled hot dogs and corn on the cob. In fact, in a perfect world, you'd be able to rent both from the same website. In her new book, Audition: A Memoir, Barbara Walters claims to have never perspired. Find out if that's true when she's sitting on the bench of a dunk tank in 90-degree heat at your backyard barbecue.
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