New Year, but Same SW Upper Flow...

Egad, How much longer can we stay in this cloudy, dreary pattern with little, or no sunshine?  How about 2 more days before a strong upper disturbance plows through taking away the clouds & rain with it.  Friday will finally get back into sunshine with cooler and drier air. That should stay around for the whole weekend.  Before then, tomorrow will again be dreary with the low clouds & fog along with a few showers.  Temps stay mild approaching 70.  As the strong upper system arrives on Thursday, there is the potential for more locally heavy (2-4") rainfall that should be fairly widespread, unlike the isolated heavy totals caused by training of storms last week.   This system will be more progressive with the location of the heaviest rainfall dependent on the track of the surface low.   IF the low tracks to the north & west of Lake Pontchartrain, the heaviest totals will be across the North Shore.   IF the low tracks along the coast farther to the south, then the South Shore will get the heavier totals.   SPC is not indicating any severe weather threat, but we will need to pay attention on Thursday for a stormy day.  I still don't see any signs of brutal cold air moving down to us since that would require a deep upper east coast trough and for the next 7-10 days, that won't happen.   The 2nd half of January could turn very cold over the South and we still have a long way to go before real Spring arrives by mid March.  Stay tuned!