Windy and Warmer.

Hang on to your hat, bad hair day, skirt alert….whatever you want to call it, it will be windy both today and again on Sunday. Those strong southerly winds will also continue to moderate our temperatures as we will only be in the 50s tonight after topping out in the upper 60s to near 70 both today and again on Sunday.

Also, moisture will be gradually returning with only some high level cirrus clouds expected for today but mostly cloudy skies are expected for much of the day Sunday. The lower stratus and cumulus clouds more will also be more prominent on Sunday. Mostly cloudy skies should stay with us for the next several days along with those gusty southerly winds.

However, things start getting a little tricky as the week wears on. A cool front will be approaching our part of the state during the day Tuesday, but is expected to stall out. At this time range, the positioning is difficult to determine with any accuracy as the longer range guidance is all over the place. Some products suggest it will move on through bringing cooler conditions for later Tue and through the day Wednesday. Other products stall it out, move it back north as a warm front, and then bring everything through as a much stronger cold front later Wednesday. At present, I am leaning toward the latter solution which would keep most of us except for the more northern counties in the warm sector for much of the day Wednesday. However, this is very uncertain and subject to change so check back for updates.

About the only thing that the longer range guidance does agree on for next week is that it will be much colder for Thanksgiving Day. Although the timing of the cold front is very uncertain on Tue/Wed, there is a consensus that it will be well on past us for Thanksgiving Day itself. In fact, this will easily be the coldest we have been so far this season. Gusty northerly winds and temperatures in the 20s that morning will only make it into the 30s to near 40 that afternoon. Fortunately, we will be dry with lots of sunshine for Thursday and Friday. Also, a warming trend will set up for the coming weekend so the blast of cold air will be relatively short lived.

As always, stay tuned and check back for updates.

Dick Faurot