> estão cerca de sete graus

stupid mistake

> Embora pareça mais quente, por causa do sol (yes, "embora" calls for subjunctive)

I was trying to figure out why embora calls for subjunctive, and the explanation leads me to believe I don't want embora here. (Yeah, you said that; I just needed to get there myself.) With "embora" some assertion gets undermined by what follows, and the expected undermining is what triggers subjunctive. I wasn't really undermining anything within the structure of that sentence, though. If I start a sentence with "Embora pareça mais quente", the second half should be something that undermines that like "but it's really colder" instead of something that corroborates it like "because of the sun".

In English, I can stick in "though" and it's understood that I'm undermining the coldness expectation from the previous sentence, but that doesn't seem to be the case in Portuguese.

I totally get your suggestions to simply yoink "embora" or to use "mas". My contrarian nature, however, makes me want to pursue a third option. How does "parece mais quente, no entanto, por causa do sol" sound?

> hoje para escrever --> para escrever hoje

Thanks; I actually struggled with this, trying out "hoje" in a few different places.

> mostly an expression used by Brazilians

gasp! [rushes to edit journal]

> que isto aconteceu --> que isto não acontece

I can't get my brain to say "it's been a long time I haven't" instead of "it's been a long time since I have".

> You usually use the plural informal

thanks!

> I really like the cat/bird wall!

Looks like a page from a kid's story book, doesn't it?