Good morning, D.C. There’s no doubt many of you are starting this Saturday morning early. Was it the prospect of scoring tickets to this year’s Virgin Mobile Festival? Or perhaps the beautiful view outside your window? Either way, that uplifting view belies the oppressive heat that waits beyond the threshold of the front door. The DCist weather center is already registering a temperature of 90 degrees, and many reports are near guaranteeing a record-setting day.

Yesterday, Virginia state officials confirmed this year’s sixth heat-related death while Maryland’s total reached 16. So be like Davy DCist and follow DC Fire/EMS recommendations: stay indoors, preferably where there is air conditioning. Otherwise, seek out one of several cooling centers around the city, Virginia and Maryland.

>> Street — and we literally mean ‘street’ — artist Steed Taylor will be painting a “road tattoo” along the 800 block of Vermont Avenue. All day Saturday and Sunday, the stretch of road in front of the White House will be blocked off while Taylor and volunteers grid and paint a 300 feet long Celtic knot, honoring the lives of local soldiers who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan. The design will be marked off, painted and inscribed with names before a dedication ceremony at 1 p.m. on Sunday.

>> According to NBC4, Maryland animal control officials gathered over twenty cats in and around a home on Bryans Road in Charles County Friday. Neighbors complained that the resident’s pets had started to take over the neighborhood. Forty-one cats were caught at the same residence two years ago, but the hoarding persisted.

>> 36-year old Nathaniel Phillips was arrested and charged with second-degree murder in the death of Theresa Hungerford, Friday. The stabbing occurred last Monday in the 1600 block of E Street NE, on the outskirts of the Capitol Hill neighborhood.