Good morning! Happy Tuesday. Clouds, occasional rain showers and 72 degrees at the Bethlehem Public Library. ☔ There is a west breeze at 8 mph. 🍃. The dew point is 66 degrees. Still kind of muggy. The skies will clear around 11 am.

This morning started out with the most pleasant of rains, 🌦  a good soaker but not so hard that it was likely to cause flooding. It’s been a hot few days and we need the rain. I heard the woods was burning up again in the Altona Flatlands up in the North Country, and certainly stream levels are quite low — as seen by the picture of the Potholers that I posted the other day.🏞️

Today will have a slight chance of showers before noon, then a slight chance of showers and thunderstorms between noon and 2pm. Some of the storms could produce gusty winds and heavy rain. Mostly cloudy, then gradually becoming sunny 🌦, with a high of 81 degrees at 2pm. One degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical day around August 10th. Maximum dew point of 66 at 10am. West wind 8 to 13 mph. Chance of precipitation is 20%. A year ago, we had mostly sunny skies in the morning, which became mostly sunny by afternoon. It was sticky. The high last year was 90 degrees. The record high of 99 was set in 1929.

I started out my morning get my teeth cleaned. 🦷 I have to admit I haven’t been brushing as much as I should regularly, but I didn’t get balled out too much by the dental hygentist. I should do better but I ran out of toothpaste while camping, 🤓 and forgot to pick some of what would have probably been $10 tube of toothpaste at Charlie Johns. I almost missed this appointment, had my dental hygentist not called me on Friday afternoon. So now you know the real reason for me coming back home.

Solar noon 🌞 is at 1:03 pm with sun having an altitude of 66.2° from the due south horizon (-4.6° vs. 6/21). A six foot person will cast a 2.6 foot shadow today compared to 2.2 feet on the first day of summer. The golden hour 🏅 starts at 7:40 pm with the sun in the west-northwest (290°). 📸 The sunset is in the west-northwest (297°) with the sun dropping below the horizon at 8:21 pm after setting for 3 minutes and 15 seconds with dusk around 8:52 pm, which is one minute and 3 seconds earlier than yesterday. 🌇 At dusk you’ll see the Waxing Gibbous 🌔 Moon in the south-southwest (193°) at an altitude of 30° from the horizon, 228,302 miles away. 🚀 The best time to look at the stars is after 9:34 pm. At sunset, look for mostly clear skies 🌄 and temperatures around 70 degrees. The dew point will be 56 degrees. There will be a west breeze at 8 mph. Today will have 14 hours and 35 minutes of daytime, a decrease of 2 minutes and 3 seconds over yesterday.

I got my teeth cleaned. 🦷🦷🦷🦷🤓 It was relatively painless, and I didn’t get called out that badly for being as bad at flossing and brushing as I have been this past summer. I’ve been a bad boy, but when you work remotely, nobody knows if you have dirty teeth or don’t use deodorant — and unless you have a zoom meeting they don’t know if you don’t shave, wash, or comb your hair.

Tonight will be mostly clear 🌃, with a low of 57 degrees at 3am. Five degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical night around August 31st. Maximum dew point of 57 at 6pm. West wind 5 to 8 mph. In 2019, we had mostly clear skies. It was very sticky. It got down to 67 degrees. The record low of 47 occurred back in 1987.

A picture perfect weekend on tap. 😎 Saturday, mostly sunny, with a high near 78. Maximum dew point of 60 at 8am. Sunday, a chance of showers and thunderstorms. Partly sunny, with a high near 78. Chance of precipitation is 30%. Maximum dew point of 61 at 7pm. Typical average high for the weekend is 82 degrees.

This weekend I’ll probably stay in town. 🦉 I have some things that I need to do in town, and I might take the following week off for work, for some kind of real summer vacation. No idea where I will go, although I’m leaning towards the Finger Lakes. Yeah, I’m hardly excited about visiting state parks with all the social distancing, but it would be nice to set up camp for the week, and just be able to hang out at the National Forest all week, doing some hiking, fishing, and paddling on some of the lakes.🚤🚶⛺ I was thinking originally about going to the Western Adirondacks and Saint Lawrence County, but I’m getting tired of the Adirondacks after my “workacation” up there to beat the heat for so much of the summer.

Looking ahead, there are 14 weeks until Election Day 2020 🗳️ when the sun will be setting at 4:45 pm with dusk at 5:14 pm (Standard Time). On that day in 2019, we had partly sunny skies, rain showers and temperatures between 53 and 30 degrees. Typically, the high temperature is 53 degrees. We hit a record high of 75 back in 1990.