Bumpy loud storms tonight; sticky weekend then relief

A weak cool front stalls near the Twin Cities overnight. Scattered showers and thunderstorms are moving along the frontal zone.

Many of the cells will be garden variety thundershowers with locally heavy downpours and lightning. But a few may reach severe limits packing high winds and hail.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Storm Prediction Center paints a slight risk zone for severe weather across southern Minnesota.

Storms in and around the Twin Cities favor the hours between 5 p.m. and 10 p.m. Thursday.

Remember for breaking up-to-the minute severe weather news and updates, follow the MPR News severe weather live blog.

Sticky factor

Wednesday makes four out of the past five days with highs at or above 90 degrees in the Twin Cities. That makes 13 days so far this summer, which is average for an entire year. And we're not even to the halfway point of meteorological summer yet.

It may be a few degrees cooler Friday through Sunday, but dew points will hover just below or near the 70-degree mark.

Friday's dew point map shows the contrast in air masses from north to south across Minnesota. It will be comfy up north, but still sticky in central and down south.

Relief next week

When we were kids, there was no air conditioning in the early Weather Lab. We would all sleep in the hallway next to the seemingly giant roaring window fan in hot summer nights like this. It was either that or a folding chair on the porch.

The debate was always, fan blowing in or out? My dad was right, fan blowing out removed more hot air from the house and let the cooler night air in the other windows. Even though the fan blowing created a bit of wind chill for us kids below the fan. Alas, I digress.

The long-advertised fresh Canadian air mass is still on schedule for next week. Highs in the upper 70s to near 80 and dew points in the 50s will feel mighty good next week.

Good sleeping weather, indeed.