Sleep cheap. Cool nights ahead
Woke up cold last night. We'd shut off the AC and opened the windows as the evening temps began to slide below our thermostat settings.
By 2 a.m. or so, there was a cold breeze drifting through the house, and it was enough to demand we pull up a blanket. You can thank that little front that rumbled through Baltimore Saturday night with a brief thunderstorm. Behind it came yesterday's more seasonable temperatures and better sleeping weather. You can see the storm's impact on temperatures in data from The Sun's weather station for Saturday.
Today there's another cold front due. Forecasters say we should expect showers and thunderstorms with it. Some may be severe. But behind THIS one is even cooler weather. Starting Tuesday we can look forward to days with highs only in the upper 70s to low 80s through the weekend. That's a couple of ticks below normal for this time of year in Baltimore.
Best of all, the nighttime lows will sink into the 60s again tonight, and then to the 50s through Thursday night. We should be able to leave those AC compressors idle at night all week long, and pocket the savings on our next electric bill. We need the break. We're running 88 percent above normal on cooling degree-days so far this month. That means the demand for energy to cool our homes is running 88 percent above the long-term average for June in Baltimore. Ouch.
The cooler weather will provide a nice comfort zone for a pair of Swedes we know who are arriving 
in Baltimore this week to attend a Fells Point wedding. A hot summer for them is 70 degrees and sunny. Venturing into a Chesapeake summer, for them, is like spending a month in the Amazon. And an extended dip in ocean water without brain freeze is a marvel.
But beware: these people change into (and out of) their swim suits on the beach. See if you can spot them. They're headed for the Delaware Shore this weekend, 380 years after Sweden's first (1638) landing in Delaware (right) in an abortive attempt to colonize the New World. This attempt will likely fail as well. We welcome them anyway.
