Watch those smokes, folks. The National Weather Service has posted a "Red Flag Warning" from Arundel and Montgomery counties wouth into Virginia, as high winds and very low humidities turn grass, brush and leaf litter to tinder. It's the red zone in this map.

The forecast calls for winds gusting as high as 55 mph this afternoon. The really cold arctic air moves in late today, sending overnight lows into the teens tonight. This will be very dry air. Here's how the forecasters out at Sterling put it in their discussion yesterday:

"FOR SNOW LOVERS THIS WILL BE A WASTE OF COLD AIR. HIGH PRESSURE TO BUILD
INTO THE REGION SUNDAY NIGHT BRINGING VERY DRY (AND COLD) AIR. I CAN`T
RECALL THE LAST TIME I PUT SUBZERO DEWPOINTS IN THE ZONES. LOTS OF STATIC
ELECTRICITY WHEN YOU WALK AROUND AND TOUCH ANYTHING MON. MORNING."

Sub-zero dewpoints mean the air is so dry that temperatures would have to sink below zero before the air would become saturated, and the moisture condense and fall as snow. The dewpoints in Baltimore tonight will be minus-2 to minus-4 degrees.

I'll have to be careful with static charges. I've zapped my laptop once before with a spark from my finger to the screen. It went dark and I had to reboot.