Welcome to summer!

...and you're thinking, "what rock have you been under? It's been 95 for four days with no end in sight!" Well, I can technically say "welcome to summer" today because June 21 is the official first day of summer. The summer solstice occurred this morning at 12:45am CDT. The solstice is the point in time when the Earth's axis is most inclined toward the sun, yielding the longest day of the year for the Northern Hemisphere, thus the beginning of our summer. It is also the day when the apparent position of the sun is the highest in the sky for those in the Northern Hemisphere. The graphic above from the Wikipedia article on the summer solstice shows the illumination of the Earth at the summer solstice. Notice that the areas around the Arctic circle get light all day as the Earth rotates, while those areas near the south pole are in darkness all day. So, welcome to summer!

Also, Happy Father's Day, dads!! I'm proud to be one of you! Thank God for our children!

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