The forecast for the next couple of days is fairly straightforward. A nearly stationary front will continue to sit in place from the Texas Hill Country into East Texas. Conditions north of the front will be drier with slightly cooler temperatures. Folks south of the front will remain in a humid, muggy, and seasonably warm air mass with high temperatures in the 70s and 80s. Scattered showers will remain possible through Thursday along and south of this front. Rainfall amounts over the next 3 days could approach half an inch in a few places, but many others wont’ see any rain at all. The highest rain totals will likely be in East Texas, and towards Arkansas and Louisiana. Severe thunderstorms are not expected, nor is any winter weather or flooding. A storm system out in the Southwest United States will bring increasing rain chances to the Borderland and far West Texas by Friday.

Temperatures this afternoon will be a bit cooler compared to Monday, although temperatures will remain above-average for the most part. We’ll generally see upper 50s to lower 80s. The 80s will be confined to the Rio Grande Valley with the upper 50s in the eastern Panhandle and Texoma as weak northerly flow helps keep temperatures a tad cooler.

The temperature roller coaster begins its climb back up on Wednesday with upper 60s to upper 80s across Texas. The Permian Basin, South Texas, and the Rio Grande Valley will all maek it into the lower to upper 80s. McAllen will probably flirt with 90 degrees.

Another cool front will arrive Wednesday Night into Thursday. That front will knock temperatures back down to late-December averages with highs in the 40s, 50s and 60s. No major arctic outbreaks are expected through the remainder of 2016. It looks like we may see a decent batch of cold air arrive in the second week of January, but that’s just peaking ahead at the long-range trends. The extended range also looks dry, which is a problem considering this December has been dry as well. Our winter fire weather season will probably ramp up as we head into the first week of January.