dog day
As Leah mentioned, yesterday was Rascal's birthday, or at least the arbitrary date we assigned for the celebration of his birth. Since we got him from the shelter his exact b-day is kind of shrouded in mystery, but until he tells us different we're going to fete him on August 1st. Of course, we shower him with so much love and affection every other day of the year I doubt he'll be able to tell the difference.
His birthday comes at an appropriate time for the celebration of dogs; as the pun in the title indicates, we are in what are colloquially referred to as the 'dog days of summer'. That means it's been wicked hot, but I don't know what the name comes from since Rascal likes the heat even less than I do. Today was supposed to be the hottest day ever--the upper end of the forecast was 103, with a heat index (whatever that is) of 114--so we obtained an air conditioner for the dog to sit in front of all day, which he did. While it was pretty hot, I don't think it managed to live up to the press coverage; it seems that in celebration of global warming the local news stations have decided to adapt the sort of breathless up-to-the-minute coverage they traditionally employ during blizzards and hurricanes to unpleasantly warm weather as well. A front came in around 7:00 and cooled things down wonderfully though, so presumably tomorrow Weather Center Five will get off the air and allow Leah to watch her Oprah in peace.