Stormz on the wayz

I'm seeing a big storm moving across the prairies and into Northern Ontario over the next few days.... Sub 980mb the whole way across? Is they for realz? 

Forecast for today - LOTS of rain in our area... BIG monster low's in BC (981 and 972)

Sunday - 974mb thing moving across the Prairies... 

Monday - 986mb thinger in Ontario...

I'm not terribly excited about it - because it's mid-January.. But you never know with those crazy birds! These storms over the next 1-5 days will also be giving us some warmer air over that time frame... Enjoy it while they last! Why? 

Because in the 5-8 day range, we will probably have this mega storm shown above (day 5 here)... Huge low over northern Ontario... It might give us some snow.. It might give us some more cold.. But I don't think anyone is really sure at this point. Is it too far north? ... No matter how you spin it, it looks pretty sweet to me! (Because I like the cold! And snow too!) 

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Yesterday morning the lake off my condo was 100% frozen!!! IF you remember, about a week ago, I said I was excited to see what would happen with Great Lakes ice cover during this last cold snap... Turns out I wasn't the only one - as Dr. Master's did a post specifically on that subject:

http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/comment.html?entrynum=2607

Highest cover in 20 years! 

He even wrote that before I woke up yesterday and saw the lake was frozen at my place! I waited and waited to see the ice analysis update, and then I was disappointed to see they were still showing a lack of ice in the Hamilton Area:

I guess the thin ice-layer off my place pales in comparison to the "solid" ice elsewhere around the Great Lakes and didn't make the cut. You'll notice that Lake Erie pretty much froze solid (almost) during the last spell.. It may break up a bit in the short term, but hopefully it gets cold again soon and we can watch the ice grow!

Just for fun, you can see that the Western Great Lakes are doing a good job of "icing up" as well... Will be interesting to see how much it can build in 2014. 

Not a recent picture, but I'm kinda hoping these silly birds that have been pushing their winter-ranges northwards over the past 10 years will get a good wakeup call from this. I wan't Gyr's! Eiders! And Ivories! Not winter warblers...