A tad chilly

The Pluto closeup shots keep getting better. Swirls near the rough terrain are from frozen nitrogen flowing around obstacles and into depressions.

Cool.

The Soo hit 90 F yesterday (July 26), the first 90 degree day in more than 2 years (July 16th and 17th in 2013 reached 92 F and 91 F, respectively). The record high for yesterday's date is 92 F (1955). The "normal" value is 77 F .

Same here.  Haven't seen 90 in two years.  Now I've seen it two consecutive days.  Ugh.  And it's as dry as I've seen it in years.

Two days ago there was 1.41 inches of rain here, almost all of it within a 30-minute period. It's humid enough that none of that has dried off yet-- no need to water flowers since last week. June and July rain totals have been about normal, but it was large rains with big gaps in between to get to those totals.

The Soo peaked at 95 F on Tuesday (a record for the date), the 3rd straight day at or above 90. Yesterday was just a wee cooler at 85 F, though I spent more than 4 hours sitting at and standing near a couple card tables in direct open sun on a relatively new (and thus shiny black, not yet graying) asphalt parking lot. Yow. I wouldn't have survived the day before.

I wonder where Grobe went.

We hit the 109" mark early last winter-- January 8th. The "normal" date for us to reach 109" is March 18, but last winter on March 18th the cumulative snowfall total was at 154.4".

Ontario (and a bit of Michigan) has a weird rain system right now.

That is weird. It keeps going back and forth.

Here are measured surface temperatures in the Great Lakes at the end of July. Lake Superior is definitely a bird of a different feather compared to the other 4 lakes.

...and here we are in August...

normally the highest temperatures of the year in the Northern hemisphere. It's kinda funny how the lakes influence the climate.

CP, you're in an "interesting" place. Almost anything can happen on any day, i.e., forecast could be for a lot of snow-you may not even see flurries.

Forecast could be flurries, and you wake up to a foot of snow!

We're back into a potential snow month now. July is the only month that's never had snowfall observed in the Soo.

The Soo is now a week or so past it's "normal" temperature peak date of July 26. Some time back, either here in ATC or elsewhere, I mentioned that I was surprised to learn that within the contiguous 48 there is a range of a few weeks for the date of highest average temperature for the season, and the variation doesn't rely in an obvious way on factors like elevation, position relative to mountain ranges or Great Lakes, latitude, etc.

Tucson peaks very early on June 26, Albuquerque is fairly early on July 5, and Waco is later than most places with a peak on August 2. Houston? They have 32 straight days when their average high is 94, but the middle of that stretch falls on July 28. Most cities I checked peak around July 20-25, and one article said July 24 was the date of the highest average temp integrated across the continental U.S.

That is interesting. For so many years, we went throught the so-called "dog days" of August in Chicago.

The information makes sense, though, because the dates you provide are  closer to the solstice.

I'm also suprised the variances don't rely on factors you mentioned, and some others (the coldest winter I ever had was a summer in San Francisco, hehe!).

The information you gathered was probably temps only. Since (I'm sure you know), land heats and cools faster than bodies of water, I wonder if the "dog days" I mentioned are due to that. The wind off of Lake Michigan will get warmer over a longer period of time of sustained high temps, and will bring moisture with it. The combination of heat (though not at it's highest) and humidity is probably greatest in August there.

A similar occurrence happens in October and November. As the lake is cooling at a slower rate than actual surface temps, it's not uncommon to have 20 degree differences from the lakefront to inland.

Like you, I also have a personal perception of August typically being a more miserable month than July, and I don't know if it's just because by that time I'm really getting sick of hot days (not in the U.P., but other places I've lived), or if it's more humid then, or what. Certainly there can be some horrible days in August, and the number of such days is probably pretty similar to July. I should see if there's a reasonably quick way to determine total number of days with highs within 5 degree bins for both July and August over a hundred-year or so period. I'd guess there's not much difference between the two months in frequency of days reaching into the 80s and 90s here. In my current location I don't think humidity variation between July and August is a factor, but that may not have been the case elsewhere that I've lived.

I used to argue about that with people. They said August was hottest, I said July was hottest. But they're both hotter than hell here, anyway.

I just re-noted that comment, and it got me wondering how close in length the temperature lags from the summer and winter solstices are here. As I mentioned above, the Soo average high T peaks on July 26, ~36 days past the average solstice date. In the winter the Soo average T bottoms out on about January 19, only 29 days past the average solstice date.

A one week difference in lag between summer peak T and winter peak T at the Soo.

Of course, that lag comparison will vary widely, since both summer peak and winter nadir temperature dates vary among different locations

   Now that Pluto has come and gone, the only thing to look forward to is CP's first day of snow.  Let's hope it's a doozy!    :)