Compared to yesterday, today was awful. It was 78 degrees at 6:00 a.m. this morning - not good. I hate these warm nights.

I've been hearing that we are entering a La Nina phase now or soon. Can you 'splain that to me, Lucy?

I'm kinda takin' a day off. Already finished the watering, mulching the tomatoes, checking the plants over well for insect damage, disease, etc. Found little army worms on the tomatos and removed them.....permanently.

Susan

Ugh. The heat is making my sinusitis seem 100 times worse. I've had a sinus infection for two months or so now and I'm ready for winter. Stupid heat. Stupid pollen.

The older I get, the more I look forward to winter each year.

Diane

Susan,

Let me do some research on La Nina and see what the latest data shows. I haven't looked at the models and data for about a month now so feel like I need to see what's been happening the last month while I've been preoccupied by garden work. After I do my research, I'll do a La Nina thread because I have found La Nina seems to kick our behinds here in Oklahoma....or at least where I live in southern OK. I'm not positive if it has the same effect on all the state since Oklahoma is often a transition area...where northern/northeastern/eastern areas have very different weather (especially rainfall) from southern/western/southwestern OK and with central OK being caught in the middle.

Diane,

That is just horrible that you have battled sinusitis for so long. I have had worse allergies all spring and summer than usual (and they're usually pretty bad as it is) but they haven't been as bad the last 3 weeks or so.

Dorothy has something natural she uses for allergies and I can't remember the name of it but I keep meaning to look for it when I'm in a health food/supplement type store. Hopefully she'll see this and tell you the name of the product she uses. It sounds like it really works well for her.

The older I get, the more I look forward to fall and spring...lol....I can't quite get excited about cold weather, but I love the milder weather of fall and spring. I AM beginning to understand why people retire to milder climates, but we moved here intending to retire here, and so we shall. I'll just have to 'hibernate' inside during the hottest months.

Dawn

I hear you Dawn! It is miserably hot. I grew up in FL where the humidity was always 100% in the summer, but it is almost worse having a change of seasons --- just when I get used to having winter and spring, summer hits with a vengeance. At least in FL the heat and humidity were consistent! Yesterday I worked in the garden for hours in the morning and there was a great breeze but sweat was pouring off of me like a bucket. Crazy weather!

I agree - hibernation is the key!

Traci

Here in Edmond it was a lot cooler today than yesterday..87, heat index of 89 with a 15 mph breeze. Yesterday was brutal..94, humid and very little wind. This coming week NOAA is predicting mid-ninties during the day and mid-seventies at night.

Diane, I also have to deal with sinus issues and the best thing I 've found is to use some type of nasal irrigation...ie, neti pot or something similar. It might sound gross, but it really works and it sure beats the heck out of a sinus infection. Also, if allergies are really bothering me and a neti pot doesn't work as well as I need, flonase seems to help. Good luck.....Phil

I'm just a little north of Phil, between Edmond and Guthrie, and I was surprised at how much nicer it was today than yesterday. It was lightly overcast for a while and there was a nice breeze that seemed to be from the east. In fact I worked outside from late morning until this evening, pulling grass and weeds from a flowerbed that had been overrun and laying down new mulch.

Diane, my daughter also uses a neti pot for her allergies and sinus problems and says it is a huge help.

Traci, my sister lived in Florida for two years in the mid-80s and she said once she became acclimated to the constant heat and humidity she didn't really have problems dealing with it. On the other hand, I thought it was miserable when I visited a couple of times :). I've also been in New Orleans in July and it was every bit as bad, if not worse. When we got home I opened our suitcase and all the clothes inside were damp from the humidity. It made me wonder why anyone would want to live there.

Suzie

Today ended up being slightly hotter than the forecast, but it felt better outside as the temperature rose because the humidity dropped.

We reached 97 degrees this afternoon with a heat index of 100....and this was supposed to be our cool 'break' in the middle of the heat wave. That doesn't leave us a lot to look forward to for the next couple of days, does it?

Our granddaughter is here for a visit, and other than an early morning trip to the playground in Gainesville, we'll be inside painting her room (the former guest room) purple for the next couple of days. Other than watering container-grown plants, I'm going to try to avoid spending much time outdoors on Mon. and Tues. as we're expecting a repeat of today...or worse.

I just am not ready for July weather in early June!

Dawn

I think this summer is going to be like last summer. Last summer began like this one, it got hot EARLY and stayed that way.

Aaacccck!

It is 'only' 92 here at the present time but it is very humid, so the heat index is 105. I'm pretty sure that's the highest heat index we've had since last August.

It is so hot here that when we open the door and walk out, the wasps try to fly in.

Last June we had temps ranging from 75 to 91 during the first week of June, and this June our early June temps have been between 91 and 97. It is shaping up to be a worse June here than in 2009 and no rain has fallen in three weeks, so I don't even know where all the high humidity is coming from.

Dawn, Watch out for those wasp. I have been stung before with very little problem, but this one that got me on Saturday has caused a reaction. I looked it up on the web and it looks just like the picture, red, swollen, and feverish. The article said if it keeps moving down you are OK but if it starts up, to get treatment. So far mine is going down my arm and itching so bad it wakes me. The article said take Bendryl until the swelling subsides, which will probably take five days. This may be one time that I will resort to pesticides and spray inside my tool cabinets. I don't know if that's where he came from, but that is my best guess since I had the door open and was digging in there. I had my left arm in the cabinet but the sting is on the back of my right arm. I don't want another one for sure.

Carol,

I had an abnormally bad scorpion sting similar to your wasp sting last year. It was the worst one I've ever had and I couldn't use that finger or hand for several days. It was just ridiculous.

Only one black wasp made it inside the house and Tim promptly killed it.

It was so hot I brought all the dogs inside and they're lying in the floor of our nicely air-conditioned home panting like they're dying---I bet I have trouble getting them to go back outside later. They're going to want to come inside all the time in order to stay cool. It is just hot, hot, hot. I keep promising Maddie we'll go out to the pool 'when it cools off' but I don't know when that will be. The heat index has been stuck at 102 for the last hour or two and it feels so awful. I think my body has forgotten how to handle heat since we had such a nice cold winter.

I'd spray that tool cabinet too. You really cannot tolerate wasp nests in places where humans work a lot. Last year, the dirt daubers kept wanting to build their mud nests on the patio furniture, inside the screened-in porch, inside empty flower pots, etc. and we just had to keep spraying the nests to make them 'move along'. They even built a dirt dauber's nest inside my watering can!

I haven't seen as many wasps this year...maybe they're at your house and not ours. I'll trade you my two biggest pests, copperheads and raccoons, for the wasps.

I hope your arm feels better soon. I've noticed our medics have had a lot of calls with wasp stings/bee stings and people going into anaphylactic shock. Maybe it is a bad wasp year here and I just don't know it.

Dawn

The forecasters totally blew today's weather. Rain was not predicted even last night. We woke up to thunder, lightning, and rain. We had camp outside all day so it turned out to be comfortable with the overcast skies, but muddy. Tomorrow will probably be extra humid.

Dawn,
"and no rain has fallen in three weeks, so I don't even know where all the high humidity is coming from." Remember in April when the ground was soaking wet, but the air was crunchy dry? Add it to the weird pile.

There was a naturalist guy named Bob Jenny who did segments on KWTV Channel 9 when I was growing up. He was a guest speaker at 4H camp one summer. He let me hold his Gila Monster. I thought I'd died and gone to heaven to be that close to such a big celebrity! I still have the photo.

He told me that scorpion stings are quickly neutralized by household ammonia. I've found it works for me.

Carol, sorry to hear about your wasp sting. We have more than usual this year, and I've attributed it to my (almost) no kill policy in prior years, but perhaps it is something else. I draw the line at setting up camp near doorways, and I see I'm going to have to make some of them homeless. I'm not looking foward to it. Perhaps I'll send hubs in his bee costume.

I just got back from Houston (again). I'm not saying it's not hot here, but relatively speaking, home feels cool and dry. Dawn, I went via I-35 this time, and I honked EXTRA loud so you would know for sure it was me.

Thanks okiedawn and seedmama.

One year I had a oriole feeder near my front door for a few days and the wasp loved it. One came in the house and sting my grandson on the neck. I took that thing down and have never put it back up. I was at a friends house a week or so ago and she had a feeder on the eve of her house, but not near a door and the orioles were all over it. I thought that I should find a place to put mine up again, but didn't do it. The wasp got me on Saturday, and today I walked into my garden to find an oriole. If I had gotten the feeder up then I would have thought the nectar drew that bee in. LOL I may have to find a place to hang the feeder where I can observe the birds, but not be threatened by the bees that also like that feeder.

Good to know about the ammonia vs. scorpions! We get several stings a year.

Neti pot = EW! I know, I know but I have a thing with mucus. In my nursing days, I could smile through puke & blood, diarrhea & pus. But mucus and saliva? Grody!!!

^^More than you ever wanted to know about me.

We got rain yesterday! Just 1/2" and I'm feeling greedy so not very satisfied with it but I'll still take it. The gardens sure did need something.

Diane

Seedmama,

I'll file away that info about the scorpion sting and ammonia for the next sting. This was my first scorpion sting in 6 or 7 years. We had lots of scorpions the first few years, including inside the house, which seems typical in new homes here, but not many recently.

I DID hear you honking as you went down I35 this time, and told Tim "There she goes again....." lol

I bet Houston was awful, weather-wise. When is their humidity not in the killer range? I know our dew point here was as high as 75 yesterday, and someone from Texas told me their dewpoints there were in the 80s. As far as I know, we've never hit the 80s in the dewpoint here in southcentral OK, although those of you in central thru northeastern OK might have since y'all have more humidity than us most of the time.

Thanks for reminding me that April was weird. hee hee Do we ever have a month when our weather is not odd? Maybe October of some years?

Diane, Any rain is good. I hope some falls here...they've put a 20-30% chance in every day in the seven day forecast after today. It is not much of a chance, but any chance is better than no chance.

In some areas, the cracks in the clay are almost 1" wide. I am getting a bad feeling about this summer, Maybe it is because last summer was cooler than average in June and most of July and wetter than average, but this June seems so much hotter and drier by comparison.

OK, off to Gainesville to the community playground with Maddie. We'd be there already, but her grandparents completely wore her out yesterday and she slept until 10 a.m. It is partially shaded but I still like to get there pretty early in the day to 'beat the heat' if such a thing is possible.

I've been up for hours and outside so long today I already feel hot and wilted and worn out and she's as fresh as a daisy and full of energy. Aaargggh! Youth vs. old age, I guess.

Dawn