The good news is that the fierce heat and humidity we're facing this week already has an end - sort of - in sight. The bad news is that we're looking at five or six days of ferocious weather before we finally break out of it.

The forecast speaks for itself. Daytime highs will climb to near 100 degrees, and there will be some measure of relief overnight, with lows near 75 degrees. Even if you can escape the heat by huddling in your air-conditioned house, or car, or workplace, BGE will own your wallet this week as we spin our fans and churn our air conditioners to stay ahead of this blast furnace outside.

Excessive heat warnings were posted for Tuesday through Thursday across Central Maryland. That means heat index readings could top 110 degrees.

We could easily break daily heat records Tuesday and Wednesday. Here are the records for August as they stand now.

You can blame the same high-pressure system that stalled over the west coast last week, sending thermometers to record highs all up and down the Pacific states. The Great Plains caught it over the weekend, and now it's headed our way. 

Relief could be as near as the weekend. The forecasters in Sterling are posting expected highs near 85 degrees for Saturday and Sunday, which is actually a shade below normal for this time of year. But they seem to have some doubt about whether the cold front they're counting on to deliver the cooler weather will actually make it this far south. Here's a snippet from their forecast discussion, in their somewhat archaic telegraph English:

"FEEL JURY/S STILL OUT WHETHER CDFNT WL
MAKE IT THRU. END OF FCST TRENDS TWD NRML TEMPS...OR EVEN A PINCH
BLO...AND THATS SUFFICIENT FOR NOW."