photo #9383577

Open the fridge, take out a can of anything, set it on the counter, and count. Fogged and beading before thirty means the air around you is carrying a load of water. That is the muggy kind of afternoon that turns into a thunderstorm if anything gives it a push. Still dry and clear at sixty means the air is thin and light, and a thin sky does not have the makings of a storm. Somewhere in between is an ordinary day. The number you are really reading is the dew point, and it is the one number the old-timers felt in their knees and the weather people put at the top of the page in September.