Please allow me to interject my feelings about Mother Nature

Been awfully quiet in the Atlantic. Just the one fish storm way out past Newfoundland that is subtropical.

Too quiet.

 

As warm as the water is down in the gulf, if a storm pushes its way into that area it's liable to be one helluva strong hurricane.

 

The Atlantic is beyond hot, too, and that scares me about August and September.
There is a system folks are watching coming off Africa right now that could form next week and turn into something.
October 1 is usually safe harbor day for the Atlantic coast. We'll see.

 

That was always my breathe easier date. Until Wilma's eye winked at me in 2005. Oct. 24, 2005.

 

That was the year everything changed, I think.

 

It was so bad IRS let people deduct casualty losses dollar for dollar (instead of having to reach some high threshold having to do with your income). I didn't know about it until after I had filed, so I quickly filed a form 1040X with $4,400 in losses and got about $1,000 back for my trouble.

 

Never forget:

 

Wilma came across from the Gulf side, though.

 

Yeah, it was. And that's usually no big deal for South Florida, but this thing was motoring at 25 mph and barely had a blink to weaken before it was upon us. Strong front just gave it a mighty push east, instead of the usual NNE path these things take.

 

And adding to the fun: we're forecast to top 110 every day for at least another week. We're going to obliterate this record.

 

We got to 108º in DFW today and Denton got to 110º. The record for July 18 (and the month of July all-time) for DFW is 110º, set in 1980.

But the humidity was down and there was a decent breeze about 15-20 mph out of the southwest. Call me a heretic, but I prefer this over 98º with 60% humidity.