Now That's a Cold Front!

Back to weather for a bit...

We've had a few pretty strong cold fronts move through Texas this winter so far, and another one is on the way now (probably moving through before people read this)! I went for a walk earlier and it was almost 80 degrees, and humid to go with it... kinda yucky for late January. Hard to believe not far away it is over 30 degrees colder. It will be quite a change later this evening into tonight, with a temperature drop of around 40 degrees or more from now to tomorrow morning. This map says it all. Check out how close 70s (and even an 80 in Conroe) are to temperatures in the 40s and even 30s!

Tax Time!

It's that time of year again, when hopefully we all can look forward to getting a refund from good ol' Uncle Sam. I've only recently been preparing my own taxes (yeah I admit I was just too lazy to do it before), and this year get to use the purchase of my first home to hopefully get a little extra cash back. As I've quickly learned, make sure to check carefully and claim every deduction possible to maximize your refund! Programs like Turbo Tax definitely make this much easier and keep you from making mistakes, that's for sure. But then again, we're going to put a guy in charge of the government's treasury department that can't even figure out how to do it right, so maybe mistakes do not matter, huh.

Happy deducting!

Living in the Past

Obviously even the election of Barack Obama cannot allow some people to let go of the past. While a lot of focus was on Obama's decision to invite Pastor Rick Warren to be a part of his inauguration, we managed to get an old timer named Joseph Lowery chosen to deliver the benediction at the end, and proceeded to get a bit of nonsense tossed in at the end of his prayer:

"Lord, in the memory of all the saints who from their labors rest, and in the joy of a new beginning, we ask you to help us work for that day when black will not be asked to get in back, when brown can stick around . . . when yellow will be mellow . . . when the red man can get ahead, man . . . and when white will embrace what is right. Let all those who do justice and love mercy say Amen."

Excuse me? Now, it has been brought to my attention that this came from an old song or saying from back in the days of segregation. So that makes it perfectly appropriate to say... 30, 40, 50 years ago, but NOT now. It is sad that such a comment would be made on the day an African-American becomes the President of the United States of America. I guess white people helping a black man achieve such a goal is not considered embracing what is "right". Give me a break. This stuff certainly is not beneficial when it comes to further improving race relations.

Oh wait. According to Lowery, I guess relations haven't actually improved over the last 40 years after all. Silly me.

Oh By the Way... Banks Still in Crisis

A little lost in all the inauguration coverage is what occurred in the financial markets today. While the focus is on the celebration of a new president, and a new hope for the nation, we have quite a crisis on hand here to deal with. To many, this isn't really new news, but I don't think a lot of folks grasp how serious this is. Bank stocks were just destroyed today, with big banks like Citigroup and Bank of America reaching levels not seen in over 15 years. I'm no expert economist by any means, but I do know investors are not stupid. These giants are still in huge trouble. The bailout (your tax dollars and mine) is a failure, and I don't think the banks or even some of the politicians are being up front about how big the problem is. It seems that nothing short of nationalizing these banks (gasp) will prevent them from failing... a big undertaking.

Moral of the story, the worst of the economy likely is not here yet, so the government had better try to come up with solutions fast, at least as best they can. Economies to a large degree are cyclical, and are going to have ups and downs regardless of anything the government does. In the meantime, let's all just hope we still have a job in a few months. I know I for one don't feel all that safe.

A Day of Change

Stepping back from weather today...

The title of this post was the headline in today's paper here locally. Obviously anyone not living under a rock knows why, though the definition of "change" has been very generic if not totally unclear as far as where the nation is headed. But that part aside, one element of change is very evident today, and should be celebrated. We just inuagurated the first black man as the President of the United States (okay so he isn't 100% black but you get the idea). As I said to folks the day after the election, that is a very remarkable thing, which was thought of as impossible not too long ago. This is a very important moment symbolically for the nation, and hopefully will go a long way in helping to further ease racial tensions, though I realize only an extreme idealist would ever expect those issues to totally go away.

I'm a conservative, and did not support Obama, but on this day, regardless of where your beliefs lie, we should all be willing to put aside differences for a day and applaud our nation for coming this far. There will be time for criticism, if warranted, as Obama's four years unfold, but at least for today, partisanship should be put on hold.

What will the future hold? Who knows. But count me in with conservatives who, while not agreeing with Obama's point of view on many issues, still wish to see him and our nation succeed. As bad as things are now, we simply cannot afford more failures in the next four years, and wishing for this solely to have a reason to throw him out of office in 2012 doesn't make a lot of sense to me. And this goes for those who genuinely wanted to see Bush fail (there were plenty in this group). It is definitely the start of a new era... a new chapter for the United States. How will this new chapter be written? Stay tuned the next four years and we'll all find out!

Wild Weather Stats from Yesterday

I mentioned yesterday how cold some areas of the U.S. were. For folks living in the Midwest who wanted to escape the warmth, you could have went up to the middle of Alaska. Say what? Yep, that's right. Amazingly, Fairbanks, Alaska saw a high temperature about 50 degrees warmer than the high temperatures in places like Chicago, Illinois and Columbus, Ohio. Normally, high temperatures this time of the year in Fairbanks are a degree below zero, but it was 52 there yesterday, but only 3 in Chicago! Pretty Amazing. Nature likes to balance things out, so when it is very cold somewhere, there will be anomalous warmth somewhere else to compensate.

Global Warming???

As someone who forecasts weather for a living, I get asked a lot what my opinion is about global warming. Of course, today is a funny day to talk about the topic, as you won't hear much about this on a day when places like Chicago are seeing their coldest temperatures in almost 13 years (17 below zero!), and some places in Iowa set all time record lows (as much as 34 below zero!). That is cold!

Anyway, it has always been my view that a warming trend is pretty clear if you look at the data over the last 100+ years, as shown by this chart:

























Focus more on the top chart, which averages the ocean and land, thus giving a true measure of the global temperature. It's pretty clear that the trendline is up from 1900 onward, so to me it seems silly to assert that we are not in a warmer world than what we were 100 years ago. The causes of this are what the real issue is. Obviously the media leads you to believe that mankind is responsible for "runaway warming" and thus we need to take actions to stop it before the world as we know it ends. Well, truth be known, all the junk we spew into the atmosphere probably isn't helping, and probably is responsible for some of the warming, but it is tough to say how much of it. Is it 90%? 50%? Only 10%? I personally believe that natural cycles are responsible for a good deal of the temperature trends, and may actually be pointing toward a cooling trend globally. Now there is something that may shock Al Gore and the mainstream folks! Anyway, I will make my case here, keeping things as simple as I can so as to not get too technical. The following graph is a chart of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation. Don't worry about what this technically is, as the important thing to know is that when it is negative, the Pacific Ocean is cooler overall, and when it is positive, the Pacific is warmer, and each phase tends to run 20-30 years (thus the term "decadal). This is a natural phenomenon driven in part by things like el nino and la nina, solar cycles, oceanic circulations, and probably other things we are not even aware of yet.













Notice how from the 1940s to the 1970s, this oscillation was negative. Then go back and look at the temperature graph above, and what do you know? The global temperatures actually trended down during that 30 year period as well, and once the Pacific warmed again after the 70s, the warming trend came back. But notice at the end of this graph, around 2000, changes began again, and the last few years have seen cooler trends in the Pacific once again, which is very natural and we were due for this. Now here is something else you don't see reported, which are the global temperatures since 1998, according to the Hadley Centre in the U.K.























Click on the image to see it clearer. You will see that the last few years have actually been trending cooler globally despite some of the global warming hysteria. Now, anyone who knows a lick about statistics will correctly point out that in any long term trend there are fluctuations, so we cannot use this to say for sure we are entering a period of global cooling, but assuming the cooler oceanic phases for the next couple of decades, coupled with a weaker sun (which I haven't even mentioned so far), it stands to reason that the warming should at least slow down, if not reverse some in the coming years. So yes, I do believe the doom and gloom predictions are mostly just a means to create panic and play on our fears. Oh the irony here. I should find the video clip where Al Gore rants about President Bush playing on our fears, when he is doing the very same thing with the whole climate issue, but who am I to argue with such an expert on the subject (sarcasm intended!).

So I am not a skeptic of global warming, as it has been occurring, but I am a very skeptical of those who claim they have the causes all figured out, as I have yet to read anything that invalidates some of the natural cycles I have mentioned here as possible drivers of climate change. Maybe it will turn out that they are right. I definitely don't have all the answers myself, but know enough to see that the debate doesn't appear to be settled. The next several years will be interesting to watch.

Having said all of this, I am 100% in favor of looking for cleaner / alternative energy sources because, well, spewing crap in the air isn't healthy for anyone regardless of any warming it causes or doesn't cause, and of course we cannot rely on fossil fuels forever, so in that sense I'm all for going green!

Memorable Headlines from 2008

With the financial markets getting destroyed today, causing the resumption of chants of more economic doom and gloom on the way, it's time to look at something from the lighter side. Since we are still early on in the new year, it's not too late to go back and look at some of the more memorable headlines from the year 2008. Maybe you have seen some of these already, but either way, some funny stuff!

My First Trek into the Blog-o-sphere

Well it has taken awhile, but I finally decided to create my own little space on the web where I can ramble on about whatever I feel like rambling on about. For anyone who doesn't know, my name is Brian, and I grew up in Virginia, but now work as a meteorologist down in Houston, TX in order to support my wife and my little boy (soon to be two children!). Trying to forecast the weather is certainly a fun but very challenging, and sometimes humbling job, since of course you have to accept that you are simply going to be wrong sometimes. Fortunately, the science continues to improve though, but the goal is to work hard to maintain an edge on the competition. Perhaps you do not think of weather forecasting as a competitive business? Take it from me, it can be extremely competitive, especially down here in the energy capital of the nation, where loads of cash can be riding on your forecast, meaning an accurate forecast is in very high demand. Anyhow, enough of that for now. While I will throw in weather related posts here, this blog will not be limited to meteorology by any means, but rather will serve as my place to discuss a variety of topics, from weather to money, politics, current events, or whatever crosses my mind. Everyone definitely has their own perspective on things, and mine will be presented here, when I'm not occupied with my job or entertaining the family (of course that comes first!). Enjoy!