Monday, August 15, 2011

Is it getting close to autumn?

I don't know why, exactly, but I'm feeling more and more like summer is about to be over.

That's kind of ridiculous, considering the highs in the middle of this week in DFW will be in the 105° range. It obviously doesn't have much to do with the weather, though — for the record — let me just state that I'll take 105° over 110° any day. A high today of only 101° makes for kind of a refreshing break, to tell you the truth.

I realize there are places in the world where August really is the end of summer. July is the hottest month in a number of locales, and things start to cool down in August. However, I've never lived in those places, and the idea that August is cooler than anything at all is a completely foreign notion for me.

Maybe it feels like cool weather is coming because I went to San Antonio this past weekend, and we talked about the upcoming Fall Birthday Bash. It's our annual group birthday party, five family-and-close-friends birthdays between 8/31 and 9/18, get together every year, blahdy blah. And since it takes place in the fall (duh), it's around the time that school's starting, days are getting shorter, the weather is beginning to get a little cooler (or at least less blazing hot). So maybe that's why. Making plans for the Birthday Bash in just a few weeks is getting me in the frame of mind for fall.

Or it might be that, for once, I'm actually thinking ahead and on track to be ready for winter. I've got plans for shelters for the feral cats, instead of bumbling around in the freezing cold trying to kludge together something shortly after they needed to start using it. I'm getting estimates from plumbers for switching out our regular outdoor faucets for freeze-proof ones. (Yes, children, it's true. In cold climates they don't have to put Styrofoam covers over their garden faucets in the winter. True Minnesotans, for example, don't even know that some of us tromp around the house a few nights each year after watching the late news, jamming plastic bags and cereal boxes over our faucets. They'd probably be surprised.)

Maybe it's because it's hurricane season, and the Texas Gulf coast is usually a pretty primo target.

In any case, I have faith that the Earth is still moving through space, and the weather will eventually get cooler.

Really.