Last summer was unusually comfortable, with only a short, mild bout of hot weather. Not so this year. This week alone will have more 90-degree days than all of last summer, and the forecast for today calls for a high of 99 degrees. I guess they just couldn't bring themselves to forecast the magic 100.

Combine the hot weather with a month of almost no rain, plus gusty winds, and you have a recipe for wildfire. Wildfire isn't as much of a problem in Minnesota as it is in, say, Wyoming or California, but it does happen. The northern two-thirds of the state is listed as "very high" fire danger for today, and a "red flag" warning is posted for the northwest part of the state. A "red flag" warning means that critical wildfire conditions are expected. Frankly, I wouldn't be too surprised to see some of the (non-sprinkled) lawns in our neighborhood go up in smoke this week. Lawns are just that dry.

Meanwhile, the issue in our household is how to stay cool without breaking the bank, and without being too environmentally unfriendly. During the workweek it's easy: we just turn the air conditioning off during the day when nobody's home.

A few years ago we installed insulated glass windows in our house, which have made a big difference in the cooling costs, since we have a lot of big South-facing windows. Even on the hottest days, the house takes a long time to heat up unless we do something dumb (like bake cookies). So I've been following the strategy of turning the thermostat down to 72 degrees overnight (cooling the house when it's easier because there's no sunlight and the outside air is cooler), and then turning the air conditioning up to 78 or 80 during the daytime (today I might let it get even warmer, since even at 85 degrees it will still feel cool inside). If we're not home, we turn the air conditioning off completely.

With this plan, the air conditioning usually doesn't click on at all until very late in the afternoon, after 5 PM, and after the peak of the air conditioning day has passed. So we aren't contributing to overloading the electric grid by trying to cool the house at the same time everyone else is doing the same, and the air conditioner isn't trying to work uphill against the hottest of the afternoon heat.

Sadly, nobody has invented a wood-fired air conditioner yet.