the.com/scorcher
a day so hot the sidewalk auditions to become a frying pan
means A scorcher is a day of brutal, oppressive heat — or, more loosely, anything blisteringly intense, fast, or impressive.
from From the verb 'scorch,' which arrived in Middle English (as 'scorchen' or 'scorcnen') meaning to burn the surface of something. Its deeper roots are murky and debated — possibly tied to Old Norse 'skorpna,' to shrivel up, or to Old French 'escorcher,' to flay, though the two have likely tangled together over time. The '-er' ending turns the act into a thing that does it intensely, and English speakers cheerfully borrowed that heat for everything from sweltering days to a 'scorching' fastball or a 'scorching' review.
- first use
- British slang for blazing days since the 1800s
- asphalt heat
- pavement can hit 60C under sun
- egg myth
- sidewalks rarely get hot enough to cook one
- double duty
- also means a brutal insult or fast pitch
death valley 1913 — furnace creek recorded 56.7°c (134°f), the highest reliably measured temperature on earth