Starship Asterisk*

Nova Scotia has been having a hot and dry summer, following an extra warm spring. July's rainfall was 50% of normal. I noticed one odd result of this during my last two bike rides here in the sity: a freshly cut lawn does not smell sweet and grassy as it usually would; it smells more like new-mown hay. That's not surprising considering the amount of brown in most of the lawns around here. They're not quite as crispy as Chris' crunchy greenery, but I've never seen them so parched. For a peninsula jutting out into the North Atlantic, this is very unusual weather.

Rob

rstevenson wrote:Nova Scotia has been having a hot and dry summer, following an extra warm spring. July's rainfall was 50% of normal. I noticed one odd result of this during my last two bike rides here in the sity: a freshly cut lawn does not smell sweet and grassy as it usually would; it smells more like new-mown hay. That's not surprising considering the amount of brown in most of the lawns around here. They're not quite as crispy as Chris' crunchy greenery, but I've never seen them so parched.

We call it "brownery".

For a peninsula jutting out into the North Atlantic, this is very unusual weather.

Get used to it. It looks to be on the road to becoming the new norm. Cool and wet is what's going to be unusual.

Ahh! we're having a break in the weather; cool 80's for a week!

I saw lightning on my way home last night, to the north; there was no rain nor did I hear thunder. Most of our storms come from the south or west. Later in the evening, great booming thunderstorms rolled through; early this morning, we had torrential rain, though no thunder/lightning. The weekend is supposed to be cooler than this week has been.

Hi Owlice,

Thunder storms can be soothing (at least for me) when they are in the distance. I suppose it’s something about the sound and the fact that danger is remote.

I spent yesterday in a town some 80 kilometers north-east of where I live. The weather was slightly chilly - probably 17-18C - and there was a light but continuous drizzle which kept on for hours. I spent some time in a friend's home, walking barefoot in her home, since it is incredibly rude to enter somebody's home with your shoes on in my country. Her floor was cold, and I began to get uncomfortable. Later I took the train home, and it was cold on the train. When I cycled home through the streets of my hometown, the temperature was barely 15C, and my hands and feet were like ice. Luckily my indoor temperature was 25C, as usual!

This morning the radiators in my apartment were slightly warm. The night temperature dropped to below 10C, and the central heating got going for the first time this summer.

Today has been sunny and about 22C. The town which I visited yesterday was one degree warmer, 23C, and today it was the warmest spot in Sweden.

Ann

I didnt know that you take off your shoes when visiting someone! In Turkey it is the same, but there are wool carpets and warming slippers are provided for guests.
When you go to the bathroom, there are also extra shoes to use, they are made traditionally of wood and look like sandals, I know that Japanese use the same
wood shoes. Some are made more simple and some very luxury.

It is a hot night in Germany my window is permanently open and in my room it's 27 °C ! The next days will be hotter, Spanish high will come over Germany!

Moonlady wrote:

I didnt know that you take off your shoes when visiting someone!

It's because it's considered extremely bad form to make other people's floors dirty.

When I know I'm going home to somebody, I practically always bring an extra pair of shoes that I use only indoors. But on the occasion that I was talking about, I didn't know we were going to the other woman's home.

If it's a perfectly dry summer day, and you are wearing light sandals with perfectly flat soles, you might be excused for walking into another person's house without removing your footwear. But on this day it had been raining, and I was wearing much heavier shoes with "grooved" soles. If I had asked permission to keep my shoes on, the other woman would have done a double take.

Ann

We got a sprinkle this morning and it's supposed to be cool! It supposed to rain Saturday; so I am hopeful!

Yesterday the temperature hit 27.9C here in Malmö. That's the hottest we've had all summer.

Ann

We got over an inch of rain today, and for the first day since May, the temperature was below normal.

Clear blue sky, very hot, above 30°C, but it feels for me hotter.
Will go to the river and take a feet bath

And I will eat a lot of icecream! This time not self made, I bought it.
Don't ask me how they make chocolate icecream...maybe Asterisk* A. Snowman knows

For some reason, I'm having second thoughts about buying ice cream today (particularly chocolate ice cream...)

Ann

Hmm... are those mint chocolate chips that i see in the mixing bowl

Mint chocolate chips... I don't know???

I'll try to talk about the weather again. Yesterday was in all probability the hottest day we are going to have this year. We didn't hit 30.0C - not in my hometown - but we may have reached 29.5C.

Now, however, temperatures are predicted to keep going downhill.

Ann

We are enjoying cooler weather now; but it is still awful dry! There is a forecast for rain for this Thursday; I am hopeful!

We did hit 30C today! 30.2C, and possibly just a little bit more, when we get the "official statistics".
I'm sure it was 30.2C when I was standing in line to buy "American spin (or twisted) ice cream". The yearly city party, the Malmö Festival, is going on this week, and the spin ice cream is one of the hits of the festival - everyone wants it. Be prepared to stand in line and sweat - you'll be so ready for the ice cream when you finally get it!

Ann

Ann wrote:We did hit 30C today! 30.2C, and possibly just a little bit more, when we get the "official statistics".
I'm sure it was 30.2C when I was standing in line to buy "American spin (or twisted) ice cream". The yearly city party, the Malmö Festival, is going on this week, and the spin ice cream is one of the hits of the festival - everyone wants it. Be prepared to stand in line and sweat - you'll be so ready for the ice cream when you finally get it!

Ann

WOW That's a big one, Ann. A couple of those and you'd turn into a snow-girl.

Beyond wrote:WOW That's a big one, Ann. A couple of those and you'd turn into a snow-girl.

Well - I hope the ice cream wasn't made the way Moonlady suggested....

The official highest temperature we had yesterday was 30.6C. It was hot!

Ann

We’re in our late summer pattern where there’s usually a 10-30% chance of scattered showers. Temps in the mid 80's (around 30C like Ann's). The rain chance keeps me from washing my truck very often. I wish I could have sent our rain westward to help the farmers. We are doing a good job of raising mosquitoes!

emc wrote: We are doing a good job of raising mosquitoes!

That is the one thing we lacked this year;- - - mosquitoes! We didn't have too many of any insect! But what comes around goes around; so I'm sure in the future we will get our share.

Sounds like a possible return to the weather/climate of the early 30's

orin stepanek wrote:

emc wrote: We are doing a good job of raising mosquitoes!

That is the one thing we lacked this year;- - - mosquitoes! We didn't have too many of any insect! But what comes around goes around; so I'm sure in the future we will get our share.

There are never many mosquitoes in Malmö, where I live, and this year I definitely haven't seen any. There has been a general shortage of insects around here, because of the weather. By and large it has been dry, and for long stretches it has been rather chilly. Every year my apartment has been full of irritating fruit flies in late July and August, but so far I haven't had any this summer. I read in a Stockholm newspaper that we had a "wasp explosion" in Malmö in early August, but that's news to me: so far, I haven't seen any wasps, certainly not where I don't want them.

Yesterday the temperature dropped to a high of 21C, and the heat isn't likely to make a comeback.

Ann

Yea There's no rain in the forcast for a week But then, they lie a lot too.