Wednesday December 23, 2015

Greetings and welcome!

I was pretty crabby last night so I kept the update to a minimum. I have a rule about that.. I figure if you want to hang out with a cranky old man, they aren’t very hard to find. At that point I keep it brief or skip out if I am having a tough day.

Anyway…

This morning started out very foggy. I had about 100-150 foot visibility on the way to work, along with some rain. I will talk more about the fog later.

It rained a lot today, and some waves of rain pounded on the roof pretty good. All of the puddles were full when I went out for lunch at about 1. The one where I park my car covered a lot of the gravel area, and would provide a soaker if you didn’t walk carefully.

I didn’t like it much when I came out after work and found my puddle gone. That meant that the rain and mid-40s day had beaten the frost in the ground and the puddle had soaked in. Curses, foiled again.

Looking at the radar at 7pm I am seeing an area of heavy rain and thunderstorms heading this way, along with some snow for a finish.

To our northwest it is a different story. From Oneida and Vilas Co west there are winter weather advisories out. The 8 northwestern-most counties are under a winter storm warning.

Around here we are looking at rain, snow, falling temperatures, and strong wind gusts as the storm departs. South of Green Bay they are looking at 50mph wind gusts. I am not expecting it to be that strong here, but the NWS is saying that 40 is a possibility.

I am expecting some icy roads tomorrow morning between the rain, snow, and falling temperatures. Tomorrow looks cooler with a high around 30 and a lot of wind.

Christmas day looks like a nice day in the mid-30s.

Saturday and Sunday I am expecting some accumulating snow. The GFS has been pretty consistent in showing us getting precip, and being in the blessed area. It isn’t huge, But I’d expect a couple of inches.

The GFS is also showing a good snow next Monday and Tuesday. We might need to plow that one if it hits as advertised.

After that storm it is starting to look more like winter with cold air from the north, and small clipper type storms. Do I smell a pattern change? Finally?

I told you that I’d talk about fog. In short, I am not a fan. Not only is it a pain to drive in, it steals our snow and frost in the ground when the ground is bare.

Water is a very effective transmitter of heat, and fog is a fully saturated atmosphere. Usually when we get fog it is warm air overrunning the cold ground or snow pack, and a warm foggy day can transmit a lot of heat into our snow pack and steal a lot. At that point I am not a fan of foggy days.

That’s it for tonight. Have a merry Christmas and thank you for visiting!

RJB