Hot Start to a Long Weekend

1. The Labor Day weekend gets off to a sunny, hazy, hot start today with a high of about 94 and an overnight low around 68. We have a trio of alerts: a Code Orange smog alert; a hazardous weather alert, warning of the possibility of violent storms popping up; and a hydrologic alert, warning that Tropical Storm Lee is likely to bring a lot of rain to parched North Georgia on Monday and Tuesday. That could dampen a .

2. The final furlough day has arrived. offices, including libraries, are closed today for the fifth of the five furlough days enacted in the spring to balance the budget. Offices also are closed Monday for Labor Day, so you’ll have to wait until Tuesday to deal with your .

3. It’s high school football night, highlighted by the Backyard Brawl between (0-1) and (1-0) at Lassiter. (0-1) also has its home opener against (1-0). Northeast Cobb Patch will have a full preview of the football weekend this morning, and tonight we’ll have a continually updated scoreboard for games throughout the region. If you go to one of the games, we’d love to see your photos and videos; send them to michael.jacobs@patch.com.

4. Did you catch this week’s ? Meet two of your neighbors, Charlie Freed and Eleana Courson, and their dogs, Penny and Raiden, at the Sweat Mountain dog park.

5. doesn’t represent Northeast Cobb, but the proposed redistricting would give him the largest chuck of Cobb County. The Marietta Republican got a reality check on citizen frustration during a meeting in Kennesaw on Thursday, and Marietta Patch has video from the event.