Good question, sandy. No, this is not the norm for us. In fact, I just heard that we haven't had a heat wave this severe in 20 years. Often our summer heat spells last a few days at a time and 'only' get up to 40C/104F, so yes, this is extreme.

They're still saying that by Friday thunderstorms boom in, ushering in the needed precipitation and less humidity.

The northeast part of the US is suffering an incredible heatwave, with temperatures in Washington DC already reaching 100F/38C by 11 am local time. Many of the big cities in that area will be in triple digits for the next few days. Whew!

It's not nearly that hot here, but it's really humid. I was visiting friends yesterday and the kids wanted to play outside. I melted.

Do you reach those temperatures (40F/104F) each summer, jo? 100F (air temperature) is rare here - in the 40 years or so that I've been following our weather I think we've had more nights of -30F/-34C air temps than 100F (maybe 20 times). Even a heat index of 100F is rather unusual, though it probably happens most summers.

*spritzes water over the melting stargazer*

Wups, many pardons, I hasten to clarify: 40C/104F would be the heat index, but I tend to go by this because that's (unfortunately) how it feels. We do reach this pretty much every summer at a few points, which most years amounts to a handful of days, but sometimes we receive stretches of 7-10 days in a row (such as at present with the 109 index) and it's quite nasssty.

*longs for -30° right about now*

I'll be glad to send you some mosquitoes, TheGeneral.

Though they really haven't been bad here in town, after some of my late-night stargazing sessions I'm still ready for a blood transfusion.

Lol, well this past weekend I went up north to my uncles cabin and found out THAT's where they've been hiding lol. But in Michigan there is this area that is the worst place I've ever been to for mosquitos... I counted at least 60 bites on myself

Got a big storm today, love it

We had torrential rains today too, fortunately with no hail and minimal flooding.

It may be hard to believe given the heat in some parts of North America, but the earth was farthest from the sun (aphelion) yesterday. The difference is only 3% from its closest, so the effect is pretty minimal.

Bright Venus passes just 1 degree from Regulus (Leo's brightest star) Friday evening, so check out the scene after sunset this week to see the changing patterns in the sky.

That's where those ol' mosquitoes have been hiding, eh, TheGeneral? Well, can you just trap 'em all in there for the rest of the summer, please? Except that wouldn't be particularly nice for your uncle, nor his visitors.

We had one good day of reprieve from the oppressive heat and humidity on Friday with its lovely, long ground-drenching rain. Now, it's all descending upon us again for at least the next week, similar to my post above: temperatures in the mid-30sC/95F; with the heat index it will feel more like 40.5 - 44C/105 - 111F!!! Help! No end in sight at this point. Well, probably Autumn sometime. And hopefully long before that.

There is one difference this coming week: rain/pop-up thunderstorms are expected at some point nearly every day, whereas during the last spell it was sunny and extremely dry the entire time. The warning of severe weather is in every weather broadcast covering the next five or six days. So, at least it won't be boring *loves storms* 'though 'twill be beyond disgustingly hot. (That's me burning up.)

it's been SO hot recently here in New Hampshire! it got to 102 degrees last week and it's been in the 90's all the rest of the time!
I love hot weather.....

It has been raining, but it's been dry the last day or so. I wish it would rain some more! I loooove rain!!

Heat, heat, go away...come back another day (only if you must... )

Today's high was 91F/33C, but it was extremely humid. It felt like walking into a wall of water. The dewpoint was 78F/26C, giving a heat index of 106F/41C.

(Incidentally, today marks the date of the warmest air temperature on record here, 108F/42C, back in the 1930s Dust Bowl days).

A cold front moved through earlier this evening, reducing the humidity a bit but touching off high winds, hail, and tornadoes here and in western Wisconsin.

It rained here all day the other time and guess what, the next day, we had no electricity for one whole day!!!! *faints* I was so suffocated by too much heat.

Glad you got your power back, Sandy!

A friend near Milwaukee told me they received 5 inches of rain in one storm the other night, with over 12,000 lightning strikes recorded.

Our heat and humidity return for the weekend, after a brief respite. We're entering the hottest 2 weeks of the year for our location now, on average.

And we're entering the dog days of summer - those hot and sultry days that the ancient Romans blamed on the "Dog Star" Sirius (brightest star in the night sky) since it is now in the same direction of the sun and thus adding its own heat to that of the sun.

Sirius is too far away for such an effect, though. In fact, those of us in northern climes might appreciate a little extra heat from Sirius during those cold January weeks when it dominates our night skies.

In an astronomical vein, keep an eye on your western skies after dusk, as Venus, Mars, and Saturn all meet each other in the next couple weeks.

Third straight day of 100F/37.8C + temperatures. Cooled down from 106.7F/41.5C to 102.2F/39C today. Low humidity is helping at between 17-25%.

Yesterday was strange: I went out in the evening and it was still 95F and there was smoke everywhere from a fire to the south in the mountains. It also started to rain. When I came back less than 20 minutes later, the smoke was gone.
It is hard to keep cool when the low temperature is 78F-79F. I am thankful for the air conditioning we have.

thanks Stargazer!! . I really was crazy about the blackout. We had a test the next day but good thing the teacher postponed it.

Now in my country, the weather is just fine... Good thing the typhoon "Basyang" (I think) left already.

Good to hear the typhoon has passed. I have trouble imagining one of those; tornadoes are scary enough.

Speaking of which, we had our own weather excitement yesterday. Torrential rains driven sideways by winds exceeding 60 miles/hour, baseball-sized hail in some areas nearby, and lots of tornado spottings (yet to be confirmed). I spent yesterday evening in the basement of a friend's house waiting for the storm to pass. We didn't lose power here, but some 56,000 people did.

When I finally drove home last night it looked a little like a war zone, with numerous tree branches littering the yards and streets.

Thanks for the heads up about the 3 planets, stargazer, it kind of reminds me of this website I found called "bethlehemstar.net" that talks about the Star of Bethlehem and what it could have been. Amazing. You should check it out and if you have Starry Night or some other astronomy software, you can go back to the dates and look the things up yourself.

I can't wait till Saturn's rings come back out! I haven't seen it with its rings out yet. I started a couple years ago, but they were already going. Oh well, I'll wait a couple more years! There's plenty more to see for now!