Buggy day

Life goes on here, quietly. It's too hot to move*; even the bugs are in hiding. The sowbugs that frequent my collection of plants on the kitchen windowsill have moved elsewhere. Spiders lurk only in the darkest, coolest corners. The slugs have even abandoned the damp, broken flowerpot I set out for them, with murderous intent.

And then, in one 24 hour period, I had a stream of visitors. Maybe it's cooler inside.

The first. 2 AM, just over my bed. Tiny, but pretty.

Orange underwing moth on a dusty window. Most of the dust is outside. 10AM

From another angle, with her double reflections. The sun was bright this morning; the pink and green are refracted sunlight.

A small male crane fly with the greenest eyes ever. 5PM 

Midnight, resting under a lamp. An extremely small green fly. To my eyes, it was just an elongated speck.

Besides these, that day there was an interesting pale orange moth in an awkward place, that I could not reach to get in focus. A couple of mosquitoes; not interesting. A racing house spider, trying to escape the kittens. And a humongous crane fly that the cats beat me to. The smallest kitten ate it. And the June bug.

And today, we're back to lying low. The whole area is under an alert for hot weather, and there's a smoke haze wafted over from the burning mainland. Will these fires never cease?

Special air quality statement in effect for:
Campbell River
Comox Valley
Duncan
Nanaimo/Parksville
...
The Ministry of Environment and Climate Change Strategy, in collaboration with Island Health, has issued a Smoky Skies Bulletin for communities in the East Vancouver Island, the Southern Gulf Islands, and Greater Victoria regions due to wildfire smoke in the area. The current weather pattern over the BC coast is causing outflow winds to carry smoke from wildfires burning in the BC Interior towards the coast. Smoke concentrations will vary widely as winds, fire behaviour and temperatures change....
This Bulletin will remain in effect until further notice. (from gov. alert)

Higher pollution levels are expected to persist into Friday.

* I know, a temperature of 34 Celsius is not hot at all, if you're living where 40 is normal. But around here, we wilt at 30. To make up for it, we go out for long walks in pouring rain or deep snow.