It's September. Hooray!

I hate summer. I hate the heat, fighting with the lawn, watching out for poison ivy, the bugs, air conditioning, and watching reruns of 60 Minutes. I love winter. The colder and darker it gets, the happier I am. A few winters ago, when we were buried in snow in New York, I was ecstatic except for the day I launched a search party for my cat Jiggs after he failed to return from the cat bar. (He showed up several hours later looking like he was carved out of a snow pack.) As long as I can shovel a trail to my backyard barbecue and the wood pile, it can snow through June. My fantasy is to spend six months at the weather station in Antarctica. Yes, I am a very disturbed person.

Seasonal preferences aside, September should be a welcome month to any small businessperson. It's the month that we get to catch up with those people who eluded us all summer: "I'm sorry, but Mr. So-and-So is away this month. Would you like his voice mail?"

Oh, sure. Message No. 674 should stand out real well.

People are more with it in the fall and winter. They're sharper. I bet the weather has a lot to do with how you deal with daily business issues. In the summer's heat, I'm always two steps behind, fighting to form words, let alone whole sentences. Jeanie, whom I've been climatically at odds with since we got married, calls me a crab, and she's right. I'm short with people and have real trouble focusing in the heat. And sales calls are always a treat when it's 98 degrees. The humidity is 100%, and you're driving around looking for a foreign address. For a long time I drove a small car with no air conditioning. By the time I got to my destination, I looked like I'd walked through the Sahara with my laptop tied to my lower lip: "Nice to meet you, yes. Do you have a shower I could use?"

Even some of those annoying luncheons are a bit easy to take when the weather is more comfortable. One of the things I had to learn when I launched my business was how to mingle. Being in a corporate environment for so long, I was real good at talking to myself, but my mingle skills were poor. When I feel comfortable, I'm a great mingler, going from cluster to cluster, imparting my wit and wisdom. But even the slightest discomfort, like a combined temperature and humidity that exceeds my bowling score, makes me a bull in a china shop. I drop hors d'oeuvres, miss people's grasp during the handshake, and my eyes have this bad habit of rolling up into my head, especially if I sit at a table with seven life insurance agents. And forget about using the right fork or choosing the bun that's mine.

So, welcome September, and thank you for lifting my spirits and hopefully replenishing that revenue stream.

George Giokas is the president and CEO of StaffWriters Plus, a specialty agency that places writers in temporary and permanent positions with corporate and other employers. It also provides editorial consulting work. His database includes 2,500 writers and editors specializing in more than 60 categories. His Web site is located at www.staffwriters.com, and you can E-mail him at george@staffwriters.com.

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