Cricket song

Field crickets are singing loudly tonight, clearly in great numbers based on the volume. I can't say it's melodious, since it's basically one call over and over. But it's remarkably loud, and it fills the night, so we're surrounded with warm humid air and the shu-shu two note calls, over and over. It's the sound of southern summer nights in the Eastern U.S.

Cicadas and evening light

Growing up in Central Texas, we saw lots of billowing cumulus clouds, often tinted with darker, stormy edges. The sunsets were often spectacular, as the clouds viewed across a long horizon turned orange, gold, and purple.
But here in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains, part of the Appalachian range, our views to the east are muted by the escarpment. But in the summer, the high humidity creates a luminous quality in late evening and early morning which I love. And, if there's a possibility of thunderstorms, the cloud towers become tinted with the sunset.

The sounds of cicadas, crickets, and katydids are a summer constant, a bit muted this summer because of drought. But evenings in the Midwestern U.S. and the West are silent in comparison; the nocturnal symphony is something that's ours to appreciate.