An introduction, an invocation

I'm already tired of traveling, and I fly out tomorrow.

I've spent the last week on the road. Two nights in New Orleans, two nights in Austin, TX, one night in Gainesville, one night in St. Augustine, and now tonight in Sarasota.

Your humble narrator got his picture with a Texas icon.

This was by design.

For my first out-of-state vacation in three years, I opted to roadtrip to Austin via NOLA to visit some of my girlfriend's family, while also seeing what Bourbon Street was all about. It was fantastic, but also involved 2,000 miles of driving, much of it through rain. What would be the odds that two meteorologists drive through a line of severe thunderstorms that produced a (likely) tornado through their home city just an hour after leaving?

Taken May 20, 2016. A nasty squall line near Lake City, FL. This squall line likely produced an EF0 tornado about 30 miles to the south around the time this picture was taken. (NWS has not yet confirmed)

Now I'm waking at 4am (7 hours from now, no big deal) to fly out to Oklahoma City to begin an epic adventure - 8 days chasing severe thunderstorms in the Great Plains.

I'll be shepherded by Mississippi's state climatologist and my research advisor, Dr. Mike Brown, and accompanying me will be another Ph.D student plus a number of other Master's students like myself. I point out the number of ostensibly knowledgeable people that will come along in attempt to head off the one of the three questions nearly everyone asks when I mention my trip:

"Isn't that like really dangerous?"

"Don't people die a lot doing that?"

"Do you have a will?"

(The answers, by the way, are 'it depends', 'no', and 'yes'.)

I'm flying out of Tampa to Houston, then connecting to OKC. My TPA-Houston flight is first class. I'm flying first class first of all because it was only $100 extra and there's no checked bag fee, and second of all because I'm worth it and I enjoy sneering at poor people why the hell not! It's my first time in a plane in three years so I anticipate more anxiety than is usual for someone of my age/gender during takeoffs and landings.

Once I get to OKC, I will be a nomad. The weather will dictate where we spend the 8 days following my arrival, with anywhere in the US between the Appalachians and the Rockies fair game. We will likely be in a different town every night.

If and when cool things start to happen, I will live stream from my Periscope account, @DanHenryWeather. You can also follow me for live-tweeted updates at the same place and if you really really dig me then you can also like my Facebook page. Thanks for reading, and here's to a stormy next week!