It is kind of funny to be so mesmerized by the plunging extent numbers, and yet they can be an indirect and sometimes counterintuitive representation of all that is going on. The compaction of the icecap by the high helped send the extent numbers plunging, but that compaction probably helped preserve the ice. So dropping extent can be, in a way, 'good'. It was the increased solar radiation reaching the surface caused by the high that has done so much damage to the ice, and actual extent has little to do with that.
Paradoxically, one of the worst things that could happen is for a big and persistent low or similar weather system to arrive and scatter the ice. Maybe that will occur, and let's hope it doesn't. But if it does, it will either temporarily slow, or even reverse, the decline in extent numbers. Thus an apparent hiatus in extent losses would be terrible news for the ice as it is sent out into the surrounding warm seas, and as warm, saline water is perhaps churned to the surface of the Arctic. (And all this might be happening just as insolation is fading fast and bottom melt becomes paramount.)
I guess what is ironic to me is that, in the short term, extent losses can indicate almost the opposite of what they seem to imply. In the longer term, of course, there is no argument, net loss of extent by September is an unequivocally bad thing.
Sorry if all this is very obvious to all you experienced ice watchers out there ... had to get it off my chest. Here's hoping the ice pack stays together...