I don’t remember if I commented on this a year ago. Probably did.

It certainly is strange to get up one day and realize … a bunch of people have left Abu Dhabi and the UAE. Just … gone.

We are observing what is an annual rite of summer, though it doesn’t really take hold until July is fully upon us.

It’s all about weather. Nothing to do with economics, though we did have a certain amount of economic refugees fleeing the country in 2008-09, back when the economy stalled out. No. Most of the annual migration is all weather-related. You just don’t want to be here in summer.

X number of people, including the Emiratis, just pick up and leaving for cooler climes. I’m going to pluck a number out of thin air and guestimate that 15 percent of the population of Abu Dhabi is not actually in Abu Dhabi in July and August.

As soon as school is done, about the first day of summer, people start to leave.  By the middle of July, it tends to hit a peak.

You know from your workplace that this, that and the other co-worker is taking vacation. Makes sense. If you can get out of the UAE in July, August, September, you do it. The weather is brutal. You can’t really spend any time outside during the day.

But where you really notice the disappearance of your neighbors is on the highways. The drive downtown that you might have budgeted 30 minutes for in May … you can do in 15 minutes in July.

There’s that, anyway. Not as much time stuck in cars with the AC blowing at max.

At The National, every department loads up with “summer series” because so little news is breaking. Government employees and officials, all educators … they’re gone. Everything slows down. In a way, it’s almost like the UAE operates on a 10-month schedule. No major decisions are likely to be made in the height of summer.

The flip side of this? In early September, we will be making a drive somewhere here in town, and suddenly will be back to waiting two or three cycles to get through a traffic light. Everyone will be back.

Not that September is any treat — arguably, it’s the worst weather month of all — but schools are back in session, and everybody comes back from Europe or Canada or Australia. Or even from their homes in India and Pakistan and Sri Lanka and Indonesia, where the weather will have been hardly any better, but at least they went home.