High Plains Drifter

That’s right.  Eastern New Mexico.  Why?  I had a good day yesterday, so this will be a more relaxed chase… with a target a bit closer to home then, say, Junction, Texas.  I have 3 options:  1)  Play the front with upper 60s dewpoints ahead of it in questionable chase territory in the Junction-Menard-Llano-Kerrville polygon… probably messy structure given all the moisture… the farther southeast one gets, the less photogenic storms tend to be.  I’m a High Plains storm photographer… so going clear down to almost San Antonio to chase storms isn’t exactly my cup of tea.  2).  Play storms coming in New Mexico at the nose of the 250mb jet in the narrow return flow region where some upper 40s dewpoints will sneak back up into eastern New Mexico yeilding perhaps up to 1000 J/kg CAPE… but, the high-res models have been showing convective signals approaching the TX-NM line northwest of LBB for several runs… and there will be a lot of upper forcing in this area.  3)  Go home.  I’m not ready for 3 yet, so I’m playing #2.  I’m going to target Ft. Sumner to Portales.  Totally unconventional chase play, and I’ll be the only fool out there, but if I keep my expectations low, then it won’t be that big of a bust.  We’ll see what happens.