It's heating up. The city turns itself inside-out, with houses, restaurants and bars disgorging their inhabitants - sending people out onto the streets. And the cicadas have started to sing in summer. Cicadas spend most of their lives underground (up to seven years), shedding their skeletons intermittently and preparing for their debut above ground. That's when they crawl from their holes, climb a tree and burst into song. It's the males that produce all that racket, by vibrating membranes at the base of the abdomen, called tymbals. They're among the loudest insects in the world; the louder they get, the more likely they are to attract Mrs Cicada.
No wonder there's tension in the air when cicadas are at full volume.