Fireworks season starts today. Be careful.

🥶 Chill Zone

The weather folks have made official what you’ve felt in your bones — at 291 days and counting, Las Vegas has broken its record for longest stretch without an official 100-degree temp. (My bones thank you, weather gods!) However, the Natty Weather Service says we'll crest 100 this week. Meanwhile, Gov. Lombardo has signed a bill paying for more cloud-seeding efforts. [KTNV, KVVU]

🪙 Minimum Wage Going Up

Saturday will see the state’s minimum wage jump from its current $10.50 an hour to $11.25 — a stopgap figure until next July 1, when it will hit its final amount, $12 an hour. Saturday’s new minimum wage maths out to $23,000 a year before taxes. [Nevada Current]

• Meanwhile: 💰 Las Vegas tourism boss Steve Hill is in line for a salary bump of more than $33,000 — almost 1.5 minimum wage jobs — and a bonus equal to almost eight minimum wage jobs: $179,000. [Review-Journal]

Abortion Patients Coming to NV

In the year since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, what many expected has come to pass: a steep increase in out-of-state patients seeking abortions in Nevada. More than 1,200 came to Las Vegas, according to Planned Parenthood. [Review-Journal]

💰 Smooth Talker!

It seems a man posing as the owner of Circa, the downtown resort, talked an employee in the casino’s cage into giving him more than $1 million for alleged “fire safety payments.” Not that old totally believable con! The culprit has been arrested, by the way. [KLAS]

• Maybe we should add “demand to see owner’s ID” to our list of 15 rules for living in Las Vegas. [City Cast Las Vegas 🎧]

🌽 Vendor Unbender

Now that a new law paves the way for street food vendors to get licensed, it’s a good time to revisit our dual podcast episodes looking at the issue from the perspective of vendors and from the enforcement angle. [City Cast Las Vegas 🎧]

⛰️ About a Mountain

Last week, it emerged that what we’ve long called Black Mountain — best known for its crown of broadcast towers (and, among the metaphysically inclined, as the possible location of a vortex) — is actually nameless. The real one’s several miles distant.

Naturally, I asked you what it should be named. Let’s see what came in!

⛰️ Many of you opted for a strictly utilitarian naming scheme:

Rknredhd: “Broadcast Mountain.”

Steve Barone: “I grew up in Las Vegas and always called it ‘Antenna Mountain.’”

Dave Turner: “Black Mountain #2.”

⛰️ Some of you got a little more poetic:

Mellissa M.: “Porcupine Hill.”

⛰️ A few of you underlined Black Mountain’s fake-name status:

John: “Imposter Mountain!”

⛰️ At least one of you was inspired by Prince and, possibly, an old Chili’s restaurant jingle?

Jecia: “I just refer to it as the Mountain-Formerly-Known-as-Black, but I also like Baby Black Mountain.”

⛰️ Some have qualms about development encroaching on with the mountain:

Cathy Razor: “Henderson's Next Housing Development.”

Brian and Sandy M.: “No Place for Houses Mountain?”

⛰️ And some of you are just Golden Knights fans eager to enshrine the championship:

A: “Adin Hill.”

Perfect.

🎤 ‘Reckless in Vegas: Unplugged’ | Thursday | 7 p.m.

Putting their own spin on classic Las Vegas numbers — think Rat Pack, Tom Jones — Reckless in Vegas presents an evening of storytelling, local history, and acoustic songs. [Notoriety, downtown; $25-$40]

📚 Reading by Beth Raymer | Friday | 7 p.m.

Her Vegas memoir “Lay the Favorite” is practically local canon; this time she reads from her new novel, “Fireworks Every Night.” [The Writer's Block, downtown; free]

🌪️ Staged Reading of ‘Alabaster’ | Friday | 7 p.m.

Audrey Cefaly’s play about a girl and her goat, lone survivors of a tornado, gets the staged reading treatment by A Public Fit Theatre Company, followed by a talk-back session. [Clark County Library; free]

The View From Up There

Who among us, deep in the hot slosh of another urban summer, hasn’t dreamed of living atop cool Mount Charleston? But what’s that actually like? In today’s episode, hear about the year-round, off-the-grid reality from the mouth of Jimmy Alderson, aka Mount Charleston Mountain Man, in conversation with co-host Dayvid Figler.