[WIND CHILL ADVISORIES HAVE BEEN HOISTED FOR THE ENTIRE WMASS REGION INCLUDING N.CT, S.VT., E.NY, AND CMASS… CHESHIRE COUNTY NH NOT INCLUDED BUT ACT AS IF IT IS… ADVISORIES LAST MIDNIGHT TO NOON TOMORROW FOR 20-BELOW-ZERO WIND CHILLS… NW WINDS PICK UP THIS AFTERNOON AND TONIGHT AND TEMPS PLUMMET ALL AFTERNOON AND NIGHT… COLD BUT FAIR WEEKEND FOLLOWED BY THE POTENTIAL FOR A MAJOR SNOWY NOR’EASTER IN THE WMASS REGION MONDAY-TUESDAY TIMEFRAME… STAY TUNED FOR DETAILS AS WE GET CLOSER…7:05AM THURS]

Good morning everybody, rise and cloud! Get it? It’s mostly overcast, so instead of rise and SHINE, it’s rise and CLOUD. #IllBeHereAllWeek #TryTheChickenParm #IfYoureVeganHaveTheCheeselessEggplant

The Cheeseless Eggplant… shouldn’t that be a blog title of some sort?

Anyway, I’ve wasted enough of your time, and as my good friend and former bandmate, F. Alex Johnson, once said before the start of a gig at Smith College, “Let’s get down to business, kids!”

SUMMARY
–Cold and cloudy this morning, with some snow showers possible in the eastern half of Worcester County and northeast CT today due to ocean effect snow showers in EMass with onshore flow
–We can’t rule out an isolated snow shower in the Berkshires either
–Temps now in the 20s and some upper teens will pretty much be our highs today, maybe a few degrees up from where we are, then we crash this afternoon and evening
–As the afternoon wears on under partly sunny skies, temps will drop into the teens and possibly reach the upper singles in the high terrain by evening
–As Arctic air advects into the region, northwest winds will pick up and gust 25-35mph at times, maybe even 40mph overnight in the Berkshires
–You can see in the attached North American temperature map valid 4:30am that there is TONS of Arctic air poised to our north in Canada, and we’re getting a chunk of it over the next 48 hours or so
–By morning, lows will range from just below zero in the high terrain to maybe the mid-single digits in the Pioneer Valley
–With continued gusty winds, this will result in wind chill readings as much as 20 below zero, which is why Wind Chill Advisories are up for the region through noon tomorrow
–For Friday, after our frigid start, we’ll have…. a frigid middle and a frigid finish, with highs in the upper single digits in the high terrain to mid teens in the valley, southern CMass and northern CT, hooray!
–Winds will continue to gust 30-40mph out of the NW, and wind chills will be in the single digits below zero tomorrow. Brutal. Cold.
–Lows tomorrow night will again be in the low singles below zero to mid singles above zero, so you know, be sure to strip down to your undies and take a midnight run around the block #NotSoundAdvice #DoNotAttemptThisAtAll
–Wind chills will still be 10-15 below zero with wind gusts to 30mph, slackening into Saturday
–The weekend looks gorgeous with high pressure tracking into New England, centered to our northwest. It will be plenty cold under mostly sunny skies
–Highs on Saturday reach the mid teens to low 20s with lows in the single digits, and highs on Sunday reach the mid to upper 20s with lows in the teens
–Monday into Tuesday continues to look stormy and snowy with highs in the mid 20s to low 30s
–A storm system will be entering the west coast and tracking east through Arkansas, picking up plenty of Gulf of Mexico moisture, and reaching the Carolina coast before turning northeast towards New England by Monday morning
–If this storm comes together, it could be a major snowstorm, perhaps a 6-12″+ type system, but it’s too early to feel any measure of confidence in impacts
–For now, we monitor, but please stay tuned because it could produce big impacts around here
–After that, we should warm up a bit mid to late next week with an ice-to-rainy inside runner that tracks west of us by next Friday/Saturday, with colder air returning thereafter

As you can see, we have lots going on in our active winter pattern as we head into February, which is the heart of winter, so stay tuned folks, and have a great day!