A long overdue update is here...

Life has gotten busy, so hopefully this post will help catch you up!

I started work at the NWS here in Huntsville and while it's rough
working and going to school/trying to get my thesis done, I'm really
enjoying it! The folks at the office here are pretty fun and they're a
good mix of young people and experienced forecasters. Sometimes I have
to work with the to kU alums in the office, which is rough, but we tend
to enjoy our mutual mocking. It's also kind of fun because there are
two other females in the office besides our secretary - one intern and
one forecaster. We're trying to convince the scheduler to get
us all on a shift together sometime. For some reason it seems to make
all the men in the office nervous...they're afraid of what we'll do if
we all gang up together, I have no idea why ;)

Work as an intern isn't too complicated - a lot of keeping tabs on
the radio transmitters and other equipment, making sure the website
updates correctly, organizing climate data, and taking obs.

Classes this semester are going really well. I'm taking seminar
(kinda boring) and the dual-pol radar class. Radar is probably my
favorite class so far at UAH. Everything is applicable to real life!!!
I also seem to be understanding well because I went out with our techs
from the office a couple of weeks ago to work on the radar and
understood what I was looking at in all the equipment and what it was
used for. It probably also helps that Walk & Larry (who are tag-team
teaching the class) remind me a lot of the profs back at Mizzou - very
energetic, excited about what they do, explain well, care that students
are actually learning, etc...so I'll be sad when the semester is over.

Thesis work is going ok - I'm looking at the Rita tornados from 2005.
I've done my synoptic analysis, looked at soundings and severe weather parameter trends over space and time around the tornado reports, gotten verification tatistics put together, and am currently in the long process of
unfolding radar data. I got the 88-D at Hytop done and am now on to
ARMOR...unfolding C-Band radar data in a tropical case is not so much
fun. We're hoping to do a dual-doppler analysis of two storms: one that
produced a tornado and one that was warned on but didn't. It'll be nice
cause this can then double as my final project for Radar class!

I'm still hoping to then be able to defend in late February and then
walk in May. After that, my MIC has hinted that he'd like to keep me on
here...but we'll see as we get closer what openings are available...

What else...I'm the new club webmaster for our AMS chapter. I've
been working on a new design for the page and am loving it. In a week
or so it'll get moved over from my trail workspace
(http://vortex.nsstc.uah.edu/~crowe/UAHAMS/) to the official slot...but
I want to make sure I've got the bugs worked out of it first. I'm also
playing coed flag-football with the department team and we look to
defend our title once again in a couple of weeks...it's amazing that a
bunch of grad students that sit at desks all day are able to take on the
Greek teams!

October is going to be a crazy month - I come in to MO for my
brother's wedding this weekend, then the weekend of the 4th of October
is our friends' John & Jen's wedding in New Orleans. Then we have NWA
(I'm going this year and soooo excited - 2 posters at the student conf)
and a week or so after that - SLS in Savannah (a presentation).

I know, I'm still just as insane and busy as I ever was!