What's happening in Philadelphia this week?

Philadelphia's week is built around its markets. Reading Terminal Market at 12th and Arch opens at 8am, and the gap between a weekday morning and a Saturday afternoon is enormous. Tuesday through Thursday before 10am, you'll find maybe 200 people inside, the smell of DiNic's roast pork warming the hall, Amish vendors from Lancaster County stacking soft pretzels still hot from the oven. Saturday by 11am the count reaches 2,000 and the aisles slow to a shuffle. Down on 9th Street, the Italian Market runs daily but peaks Tuesday through Friday mornings, when the produce crates go up early and the fishmongers call prices over beds of crushed ice.

The Rittenhouse Square Farmers Market sets up every Saturday from 10am to 2pm on the south side of the park, roughly 30 vendors in season. It's smaller and less varied than Reading Terminal. The prepared food stalls, maybe 8 or 10 of them, are the real draw, and the crowd tends to be 80% neighborhood regulars. Sunday mornings Philadelphia goes quiet. Shops along Walnut Street and Chestnut Street open at noon. The Philadelphia Museum of Art, founded in 1876, opens at 10am on Sundays, and the first 2 hours tend to be the emptiest of the week. By 11am brunch takes over. In Fishtown, Suraya fills for weekend Lebanese brunch by late morning. In the Italian Market area, Sabrina's Cafe at 10th and Christian has had a weekend brunch line down the block since 1990.

Monday is the weakest day for visitors. The Barnes Foundation on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway and the Penn Museum at 33rd and Spruce both close Mondays, and many neighborhood restaurants in Fishtown and Northern Liberties go dark. Tuesday through Thursday is the sweet spot. The Franklin Institute, founded in 1824, is least crowded on Wednesday mornings. Mid-June weather in Philadelphia currently sits at 22.5°C with 68% humidity and clear skies. Expect temperatures to reach 28-32°C by afternoon, with humidity climbing through Thursday and Friday. The asphalt along Broad Street radiates heat by 2pm, and the shade on the east side of Rittenhouse Square becomes the most popular spot in Center City. If a thunderstorm builds, it tends to hit between 3pm and 5pm and pass within 40 minutes.

Philadelphia's happy hour runs 4pm to 6pm, Tuesday through Friday, and the city takes it seriously. Along Sansom Street between 15th and 18th, bars like Monk's Cafe and Good Dog Bar fill with the Center City office crowd by 4:30. Draft beers drop to $5-6. Friday night shifts to East Passyunk Avenue in South Philadelphia and Frankford Avenue in Fishtown, where the sidewalk tables stay full until 11pm in June's 24°C twilight. Saturday night the loudest stretch is 2nd Street in Old City, though to be fair it skews younger and louder than the rest of the city. Mind you, Philadelphia's bar-closing time is 2am, not 4am like New York.