Cowboy Who?

Good morning. High pressure is starting to build back over the Houston region today, and that will lead to four days when temperatures will likely reach 100 degrees, or higher, for most of the region. Friday looks especially hot, with highs near 105 degrees possible for inland areas. But by this weekend high pressure starts to weaken. Accordingly, next week, our temperatures are going down into the mid-90s, at least, and we’ll start to see some better rain chances.

Wednesday

Today will be sunny and hot. Before the high pressure system fully asserts control, we’re going to have a puncher’s chance of rainfall today. I’d say there will be about a 20 percent chance of a brief shower. Otherwise, high temperatures will reach about 100 degrees with mostly sunny skies. Winds will be light, coming from the southeast later today.

Thursday and Friday

Both of these days are likely to bring highs in the low 100s for much of the metro area, with sunny skies. Winds will be light, out of the west to southwest. If I squint, I can see some scenarios in which there are a few isolated showers on Thursday, but it’s not something I’m holding my breath for.

Saturday and Sunday

As mentioned above, Saturday is likely to be the final day, of four, that could see highs of 100 degrees. Conditions will be mostly sunny and hot. However, by then the high pressure system will be easing westward, opening the door to some chances for scattered showers. Sunday should be a bit cooler, with highs in the mid- to upper 90s, and more scattered showers. Call it a 30 percent chance for each day, subject to modification.

Next week

High temperatures next week should be in the range of the low- to mid-90s. We may also see cooler nights, in the 70s. There’s even the chance of a weak front and some slightly drier air. We should also see daily rain chances in the vicinity of 20 to 40 percent. So all in all, quite a bit of moderation from the summer of hell conditions we experienced for most of June, July, and August.

Tropics

As we discussed at length on Tuesday, the Gulf of Mexico remains largely closed off to tropical activity for now, and likely the next two weeks. However there is a potentially very strong hurricane developing the central Atlantic Ocean, Lee, which is likely to eventually threaten Bermuda and possibly interests along the U.S. East Coast. Matt has all of the details on The Eyewall if you want to read more.

One-sentence summary

While Tropical Storm Lee’s ultimate future is unknown, it is likely to become a hurricane today, and it is still forecast to miss to the north of the islands with some modest fringe impacts there.

Tropical Storm Lee: 65 mph, moving WNW 14 mph

What’s changed since yesterday?

Invest 95L became Tropical Depression 13 briefly, and then it became Tropical Storm Lee yesterday afternoon. It is organizing and tracking west-northwest. Confidence that it will miss a direct impact on the islands is increasing. Confidence on anything beyond there is low.

Lee’s intensity

Lee is in a tremendously ideal environment for intensification. It has deep warm water, low shear, and plenty of moist air in the neighborhood for the next 5 or 6 days. Models have suggested since last week that this would go to the moon intensity-wise, and there’s no reason to doubt that today. The NHC forecast for Lee was one of its most aggressive on record, taking it to a category 4 storm by Sunday or Monday, something they will not commit to without confidence.

Once Lee manages category 4 or 5 intensity by Friday or Saturday, it will likely fluctuate in intensity up and down for a few days, probably remaining a major, if not Cat 4-5 storm much of the time. Heading into next week, the question will become where Lee tracks relative to the cold wake in the Atlantic from upwelled water left behind by Hurricanes Franklin and Idalia.

So, for now, expect a pretty impressive hurricane into early next week, followed up by some potential significant fluctuations in intensity as it comes northwest.

So where is Lee headed?

We have about 5 hurdles with respect to Lee’s track over the next 10 days or so. First, Puerto Rico and the Leeward Islands. Second, the Turks and Caicos and southeast Bahamas. Third, Bermuda. Fourth, the US coast, and lastly the Canadian Maritimes.

First, with respect to Puerto Rico and the islands, Lee is expected to pass to the north, comfortably enough to avoid significant impacts but definitely close enough to keep watch and expect fringe impacts (a few outer bands with gusty winds, rough surf, rip currents, etc.). So if you’re in Puerto Rico or the Virgin Islands, stay tuned and keep watch, but you are almost at the point of being able to exhale.

Beyond that, it remains to be seen what happens. Lee will be steered around the periphery of high pressure over the Atlantic. This should ensure it gets to a point northeast of the Bahamas early next week. From there, the players on the field become more difficult to assess. How strong is the high? Does it collapse, weakening steering currents? If it doesn’t collapse, where is it centered? Will the trough over the Great Lakes be strong enough to try to “capture” Lee and draw it more toward the East Coast? If Lee splits the gap between Bermuda and the Carolinas, will New England or the Maritimes be in the way on its way out? Will Lee be strong enough to just barge north toward Bermuda anyway? How much of a role will the cooler water out there play in Lee’s intensity? The map below shows the situation on Sunday evening.

There will be some people out there speaking with conviction about the future of Lee, and if so, you can tune them right out. Every question I just rhetorically asked has no answer yet. None. I personally think Lee will split the gap between Bermuda and the Carolinas and then hook out to sea, but I see a path where the trough digging in from the Lakes could try to draw it back west, especially if it’s weakened some by the cooler water west of Bermuda. I see how it could hit Bermuda directly or pass very close. I see a path where it misses Bermuda and the US but runs into Atlantic Canada. What I don’t have is confidence in any of those outcomes right now. There are too many “known unknowns” for confidence. I realize this answer won’t generate a lot of excitement, but this is exactly why we’re here…to provide sober, steady analysis of significant storms. Welcome to The Eyewall!

Anyway, let’s keep tabs on this over the next few days, and we’ll monitor the progress of the features that will steer Lee in the future. One thing I can say with confidence? Expect more rough surf and rip currents on the East Coast next week.

Beyond Lee

We recycled into Invest 96L yesterday, which is a very robust tropical wave just off the coast of Africa. That has a decent chance to become either Tropical Depression 14 or Tropical Storm Margot in the coming days. It is unlikely to threaten land other than some initial heavy rainfall in the Cabo Verde Islands.

After we get past 96L, there is a minimal chance of additional development in the Atlantic next week. The Gulf looks closed off, as does the western Caribbean, loaded with shear. The overall background state of the basin should be hostile to tropical development into next week. We may flip back to a more lively pattern again in the final 10 days of the month. We’ll see!

This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager.

It’s five answers to five questions. Here we go…

1. I’m being blamed for a coworker dropping the ball while I was out

I was recently out for three weeks due to scheduled surgery. An important task needed to be completed as quickly as possible during my absence. Since I could not do it before my surgery because I was still missing some key information, I asked my colleague whether she could do it. She said yes and I provided her with all necessary info.

During my recovery, I called her once or twice because of unrelated matters and asked how the task was coming along. Both times, she said she hadn’t gotten around to it yet but she’d do it. I told her to please keep me posted on this, even while I was sick.

The day I came back, she still had not done anything. The client had written an angry email to my boss and cc’d me and complained that I did not get anything done since quite a bit of money was at stake.

This task is usually not my coworker’s responsibility, and she is not obliged to do it for me. It was supposed to be a favor. If she didn’t have the time or simply didn’t want to, that’s fine. But why didn’t she tell me that? Or she could have called me after a week and told me, “Sorry, I realized I don’t have time for this!” Am I in the wrong to expect this?

I told my boss that I had delegated the task to another team member who had not gotten around to it, but I didn’t say who. My coworker has been with the company for 20 years and my boss works very closely with her. I have only been here for one year. I also didn’t want to say anything without talking to her first. Unfortunately, she is now on vacation until the end of September, so I have to wait until she comes back. How should I approach this? Am I in the wrong for expecting she’d at least inform me that she cannot do it?

No, you’re not in the wrong. Your coworker told you she would do the task, and then continued to assure you she was on it when you asked. If she realized she couldn’t do it, she needed to proactively tell you or your boss that.

I don’t think you can adequately defend yourself without telling your boss exactly what happened, which means naming the coworker (and it would look shady not to). It doesn’t need to be accusatory, though; you can allow for the possibility she did the task and emailed it before she left and the message went astray, or who knows what else. But explain to your boss that your colleague agreed to do it and you followed up with her several times and she assured you she was on it, and that you don’t know what happened but will find out once she’s back.

In the future, it makes sense to fill in your boss ahead of time on who will be covering things for you in your absence — not just to ward off situations like this, but also in case questions about it come up while you’re gone. You can tell her that you’ll do that from now on, and also ask if there’s a different way she would have liked you to handle this one.

2. My birthday is being hijacked

I have a question that feels ridiculous to even ask, but it’s bothering me more than I expected. A friend and colleague (we’ve known each other for years before starting at our current company; we were always more “acquaintances” than friends but we’ve never been at odds with each other, and we got closer while working together), “Jane,” and I almost share a birthday. Jane’s birthday is one day after mine. This is something that that Jane definitely knows. This year, Jane invited me to a birthday party for herself, to be held on my actual birthday because of weekends. The invite was online so I could see the guest list, and it is 100% mutual friends and work colleagues and includes all the people I would have invited to a celebration of my birthday.

If this were on any other day, I’d be happy to go and bring Jane a gift, but now I feel like if I go and other people brought Jane a card/gift, it will be awkward when they find out that it’s my actual birthday and they don’t have anything for me. I know this is small potatoes, but I feel really slighted here. The invite was also sent out a few weeks in advance, before I had invited people to celebrate my birthday, and now I feel like I can’t invite my friends to something for me unless I change the day. Even as I write this, I know it’s silly, but do you have advice for what to do? Am I just being ridiculous? I just wish Jane had asked me to do something together.

Why not just say to Jane, “I’d been planning to organize something for my own birthday, which is that day, and would have invited a lot of these same people. Want to make it a joint party for both our birthdays?”

I wouldn’t normally advocate trying to hijack part of someone else’s event for yourself, but when it’s your actual birthday and it’s the same group of friends (that last part is key), it makes a lot of sense.

3. How to get my co-interviewer to share her real opinions about candidates?

I work in a healthcare setting, manage the support staff, and am conducting interviews next week. For our interviews, the head of department always assigns a medical professional to interview with me. Usually this goes well and I have no problems. However, the colleague assigned this time — who I get along with well — has never conducted interviews before and is a real people pleaser. She is good at her job, but she never shares her thoughts in meetings/conversations and just agrees with the majority consensus. My concern is that I need the opposite in an interview process. If she simply agrees with me, even though she may think differently, then it is no different than me interviewing on my own. It is supposed to be a panel for a reason.

My plan was to not state my thoughts and instead push for her to speak first so she cannot simply repeat my opinion. However, I am skeptical this will work as I have tried this in the past with her and she just would not answer and kept deflecting back to my thoughts. Is there anything else I can do? How would you handle this?

Even when you’re not concerned about your co-interviewers being overly influenced by you (or each other), it’s still smart to create an interview rubric form that you each use to assess candidates, listing the key must-have’s and the nice-to-have’s that you’re looking for in candidates, and then each fill the form out on your own before you meet to discuss a candidate post-interview. That kind of assessment tool will ensure that you’re measuring each candidate against the same bar and can help mitigate bias (because you’ll be assessing candidates on clear requirements, not just a gut feeling or personal like/dislike — and has the side benefit of forcing your coworker to put her impressions down on paper before she has the chance to be influenced by you.

4. Taking a maternity leave without destroying my freelance business

I’m a self-employed nonprofit fundraising consultant, currently pregnant and due in spring 2024. I support a handful of organizations and I operate as a team of one (no subcontractors or employees). My business is a dream come true: I work remotely, doing projects I’m passionate about and highly skilled in, and I have tremendous flexibility.

I’d like to take a three-month maternity leave when the baby comes. As I see it, my options are: (1) Give my clients as much notice as possible about my upcoming leave and let them know I’ll be unavailable during that time. In the meantime, I would work with them to get ahead on as many projects as possible. The goal would be to make things relatively turn-key and avoid leaving my clients in the lurch. (2) Hire a subcontractor to work with clients on my behalf while I’m on leave.

I’m less inclined to do #2 because I don’t have anyone in mind to hire as a subcontractor, I don’t want to manage payroll or other issues that might come up while I’m on leave, and I don’t want to be worrying whether they’re delivering the quality of work my clients need. That feels like too much potential stress on top of all the craziness of caring for a newborn and my older child.

However, I’m concerned that a three-month gap may cause some of my clients to walk away. I’ve built up a strong client base over the last couple years and I don’t want to lose the great thing I have. I know my clients trust me and value my work, but I also know they have significant fundraising needs and may struggle to get the work done on their own. My leave also happens to coincide with one of the busiest times of year for nonprofit fundraising!

Option #1 seems far preferable to me for all the reasons you name. If you already had someone in mind who you knew you could rely on, that would change things. It’s not impossible that you could try to find someone before then, but you’d need to work closely enough with them between now and your leave to be comfortable letting them stand in for you while you’re unavailable (presumably with a contract prohibiting them from making a play for the client’s business for themselves), and it’s far from guaranteed that you’d find the right person … and meanwhile you’d be paying for their work with you during that pre-leave period, plus managing them (which is a substantial time investment), at exactly the same time as you want to be doing extra work to get ahead on projects in case the person doesn’t end up being the right one. It’s a lot of additional work without a guaranteed payoff.

If you have strong relationships with your clients, you’re not likely to lose them over a three-month leave with lots of preparation. Good fundraising consultants are hard to find, and if they like your work and you’re very transparent about how you’re arranging things for your absence, you’re likely to be fine. (However, you could always test this with a client or two — have the conversation now and feel out their reaction before you proceed with the others.)

5. Can I refuse to do this extra work?

I have a regular academic job and am getting close to retirement. I also get a very modest annual honorarium for editing a journal for a publisher (think four figures). The amount of work I put into it well exceeds the compensation, and the job has been a lot of effort. The journal was moribund when I took it on, and it is now one of the leaders in the field and turning a profit.

I’m entering the last year of my several years tenure as editor, and the publisher is now asking me to do another large marketing task in addition to editing which involves a lot of coordination and time. A little while ago, I received a very small raise to account for inflation, but it really is a cut as it is nowhere near inflation, and it is clear no more money is forthcoming. Several of the previous perks such as conference travel have also been cut in favour of these cheaper-to-run but much more labor-intensive marketing efforts, and I’m expected to do it all at home with my own IT equipment. It isn’t because the organization has no money; it does rather well.

I’ve done some of the marketing tasks that were asked, but found that unless I run the whole show, it doesn’t come off very well. I’ve said, “Well, I’ve done X amount and if you want more, here is a plan to delegate it to others as I’ll be leaving next year.” The journal is running very well, so the next editor is inheriting a much easier situation than I did. Did I do right here or should I just cheerfully accept more work for the good of the journal? It is a service job and there is no formal employment contract per se, though I pay taxes on the honorarium so I suppose it is sort of a consultancy.

Nope, that’s perfect. In this kind of role, you’re not obligated to take on additional work that you didn’t sign up for and aren’t being paid for just because they asked. Your obligation is to be clear about what you will and won’t do so they  can make other plans. You’ve done that. If they’d like to sweeten the pot to entice you, they’re welcome to try that — but you don’t need to do work you never signed up for simply because they want you to.

That’s of course a much blurrier line to maintain in a traditional employment situation (and often an utterly impractical one if you want to keep the job), but when you’re a consultant or someone being paid via honorarium, you have a ton of leverage and authority to simply explain that won’t work for you/you don’t have the time/it’s not your area of interest/etc. and decline, as you did.

This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager.

A reader writes:

I work in a competitive, technical field where I need to be able to research, think critically, propose solutions, and write persuasively. I’ve always gotten good feedback on these skills, except in my current role from my boss, Jane. Jane’s style of feedback entails questioning every single detail, where it came from, what evidence I have to support it, and how it plays into a bigger picture. These are all things I should know, and I know she’s trying to coach me. The problem is that her questions are delivered as accusations and even when I say the “right” thing, I still feel like I’m fighting with her. She also doesn’t really give positive feedback — I think her philosophy is that good work is expected and doesn’t need to be commented on. She once said that 95% of my work is good … but I’d say that 95% of her feedback to me is critical, frustrated, or accusatory. I feel like a constant disappointment and burden to her.

Colleagues have said things to me like “there’s not enough money in the world for me to work with Jane” and “talking to her makes me want to pull my hair out.” I’ve seen her make multiple coworkers cry after she interrogates them (including me).

She’s VERY good at the business side of what we do — a very niche speciality that I have over a decade of experience in. I think under a more supportive manager, I would be able to excel at the difficult work that we’re doing. I’m used to being a high performer, and I desperately want to succeed at this job. It feels like a point of pride to get her approval. But it’s been several years, my motivation and self-esteem are non-existent, and my anxiety spikes every time she messages me. I’ve lost the ability to be creative or think out of the box; all I can focus on is the inevitable barrage of questions and Jane not being happy with whatever work I do. It’s at the point where I’m not sure I could speak to her about this without getting emotional.

How do I get my mojo back? How do I learn to use her coaching and feedback as a way to grow? I don’t want to crumble under pressure, but that’s exactly what I’m doing. I’m in therapy and looking for a new job, but I’m in a bit of a golden handcuffs situation and am the primary earner in my family so a new role would need to check a lot of boxes.

Take a minute to imagine a friend coming to you and saying, “I have an abusive person in my life who tears me apart, makes me cry, and is destroying my mental health. How can I use their criticism as a way to grow?” I’m guessing you’d be horrified and would strongly push them away from buying into that person’s assessment of them in any way.

It’s really not that different here. Yes, Jane is your boss and thus the person charged with assessing your work, and probably has some basis of expertise from which to do so. But you know from watching her for years now that she’s accusatory, hostile, incapable of responding to the totality of someone’s work, and, frankly, a jerk. You’ve fallen into the trap of “she’s so exacting that if I can get her approval, it must mean I really succeeded” … but that’s keeping you from seeing that her judgment is off in really fundamental ways. Think about the prize you’re going after here: the approval of someone who’s doing a crucial and highly relevant piece of her own job terribly (management).

Trying to see Jane’s feedback as a way to grow carries a strong risk of deepening your unhappiness — and harming you psychologically — because you would have to buy into the idea that what she’s doing is okay. Bluntly, you’re proposing trying to make yourself buy into the worldview of a person’s whose entire M.O. is to tear you down, assume the worst of you, and make you prove anew each day that you’re good enough for the work you’ve been doing successfully for over a decade. That’s not a worldview you should be trying to buy into — it’s a worldview that’s rooted in some really psychologically damaging (and psychologically damaged) stuff.

I want to be clear: It’s not that a jerk can never be correct about their criticism. Sometimes they are! But the value of feedback plummets when the person offering it isn’t able to recognize what you’re getting right (particularly when that person’s job is to evaluate your work as a whole, as Jane’s is) or when their judgment leads them to treat minor issues as major failings. And more importantly in this case, when things are at the point where you’re describing your motivation and self-esteem as non-existent and you’ve lost your creativity because you’re living in fear, it doesn’t matter if Jane sometimes has useful things to offer. You’ll be much better off focusing on maintaining strong boundaries with her and clearly seeing how truly messed up she is, for as long as you have to stay there.

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Good morning. After parts of the Houston region received a decent soaking on Labor Day, the region has one more passable chance of rainfall today before the high heat returns through the weekend. And after that? Well, after that I think we’re done with 100-degree temperatures for awhile, and perhaps even for the entirety of 2023, although I’m not ready to stipulate that yet.

Tuesday

The overall setup today, in terms of rainfall, is similar to Monday. There is plenty of moisture and a decent amount of lift to promote showers and thunderstorms. However, a capping inversion should be a little more pronounced today, and that may limit coverage. The bottom line, I think, is that areas along and east of Interstate 45 probably have about a 50 percent chance of rainfall, and areas to the west about 30 percent.

For the most part these will be quickly passing storms, so don’t expect significant accumulations. Temperatures will depend on the extent of rainfall coverage, but generally we can expect highs to reach the upper 90s with partly to mostly sunny skies. Winds will be light, out of the south. Lows tonight will drop to around 80 degrees.

Wednesday

Skies will be sunny, and most of the area will see temperatures of around 100 degrees. Rain chances aren’t going away entirely, but we’re looking at chances probably on the order of 10 to 20 percent. Winds will be light, out of the southeast.

Thursday and Friday

Who is ready for the return of the ridge? The answer, I realize, is almost no one. But high pressure will indeed build back over the are during the end of the week. This will produce highs of around 100 to the low 100s. This won’t quit be the stultifying heat we saw earlier this summer, but it’s still going to be really, really hot.

Saturday and Sunday

The heat continues, with highs of around 100 degrees each day. However as the high pressure system eases westward it will introduce some slight rain chances, perhaps 20 percent, each day. Skies, for the most part, should be sunny however.

Next week

Hey Eric, didn’t you mention the “end of the worst summer ever” in the post’s title? Well, yes I did. And it wasn’t clickbait, I promise. The reality is that after the surge of heat to end this week, our pattern should shift to a slightly more moderate one that will feel a bit more like late summer. That is to say, for most of next week, we probably will see highs top out in the mid-90s—or even lower if we see the development of some afternoon showers. Which will be possible. The bottom line is that we’re probably looking at a little bit less sunshine, a little bit less heat, and possibly a little bit more rainfall. It’s not fall, but after this week, I think we can close the door on extreme heat for the summer of 2023. Small victories, right?

Hurricane season

Check back on the site around 10 am for a post on what to expect for the remainder of the Atlantic hurricane season, with a focus on Texas.

This is a fairly long post that we’ve broken into two parts. First up in a look at what to expect for Texas, for the rest of September, when it comes to hurricane season. The TL;DR there is that things look pretty good, but we’ve still got a few weeks to go. The second part of this post was written by Matt Lanza over at our Atlantic hurricanes site, The Eyewall. It offers a broader look at activity so far in the Atlantic basin, and what that may mean for the rest of the season.

Part I: This is absolutely the heart of hurricane season in Texas

Historically, the majority of significant hurricane strikes on Texas have come in September. Most notoriously, there was the 1900 Galveston hurricane, which made landfall on September 8. More recently there was Hurricane Ike, which made landfall on September 13, 2008. This is the time of year when we see tropical waves forming off the coast of Africa, tracking across the Atlantic Ocean, and moving into the Gulf of Mexico. I never schedule vacations in late August and September for the very reason that this is “go” time for big storms.

But as quickly as hurricane season peaks, for Texas it ramps down pretty fast. As I have famously—or infamously, in some quarters—written, the odds of a hurricane strike on the state of Texas really drop precipitously after around September 24. It is too early to say whether that will be the case for this year, but the reality is that we probably have about three or four more weeks of prime time hurricane season in Texas. After that, we should be able to breathe a bit easier.

So what’s on the menu for September 2023?

As per usual, we are seeing large and powerful storms developing in the Atlantic Ocean this year. The good news is that, with the exception of Hurricane Idalia, they have steered away from the Gulf of Mexico. We’ve been heavy on fish storms this year, which is just fine. That’s also likely to be the case with the forthcoming Tropical Storm Lee, which should become a powerful hurricane this week. Read below for more details, but the bottom line is that we expect this one to recurve before nearing the Gulf of Mexico.

Looking out to mid-September, we don’t see any significant threats to the Gulf, or Texas. Not only are there few indications of storms forming or moving into the Gulf, but wind shear levels look high for the next 10 days or even two weeks. This should preclude any significant activity. However, that leaves open a window of opportunity for the last 10 days of September, during which it will be possible for storm activity. The bottom line is that we’re pretty close to the end of the 2023 Texas hurricane season, but we’re not there yet. Given the very warm seas out there, if wind shear drops down, the end of September could be rocking in the Gulf of Mexico.

So we’ll continue watching things for you, and probably post again later next week when we have a bit more insight into the end of the month.

Part II: Taking stock of the 2023 Atlantic season so far

Back in June when we launched The Eyewall, one of the things we did was dive into the components of the seasonal forecast. We explained that the 2023 hurricane season would be trickier than normal, as the developing El Niño, which typically reduces storm activity would be battling an outrageously warm Atlantic Ocean, a feature that would be good for busy storm activity. So far, that battle seems to be exactly what’s playing out. The “consensus” forecast was 16 named storms, 7 hurricanes, and 3 majors. As of Monday, we sat at 12 named storms, 3 hurricanes, and 2 majors.

Our accumulated cyclone energy for the season, or ACE, sits around 125 percent of normal for the first week of September.

If the season ended right now, we would be sitting in the upper tier of “below normal” seasons. In other words, we already have one heck of a base and seem to be on our way to an average season. Idalia, Don, and Franklin, the season’s three hurricanes, account for nearly 75 percent of the seasonal ACE to date. So three legitimate storms make up the majority of the total.

Back in June we said that we believed the Caribbean would struggle (it mostly has), the eastern Atlantic would be busy (it’s been more the central Atlantic, so that point is a little fuzzier), and that the most concerning items this season would be systems forming close to home (Idalia counts for that). So thus far, this is going mostly as expected, if not a little bit busier. Kudos to the seasonal forecasters for not just going all-in on El Niño.

Where are we going?

Well, this week we are likely to see another big jump in seasonal ACE when Lee forms.

From our morning post, you can read how we expect that to become a major hurricane, likely at least a category 4 storm. This will be a big ACE adder, and I suspect we’ll see things shoot up at least into the 70s once Lee is done, pushing us into the “average” tier of seasons if it ended right there. Behind Lee, we may get another storm in the eastern Atlantic, so there’s an opportunity for a few more ACE units.

But here’s something. If you look at the European ensemble model forecast for wind shear in days 11 to 15, which pushes us out to near September 20th now, you can see that the Gulf and western Atlantic are ripping with shear.

If that happens as forecast, anything in the Gulf will struggle, as would anything coming out of the Caribbean. However, the lower wind shear in the eastern Atlantic and central Atlantic suggests these would be the areas where storms could continue to form, continuing the legacy of the 2023 season to date. We may see less hostile conditions return to the Gulf and western Atlantic in the final days of September, but that’s obviously a long way off.

What does El Niño tell us?

Quite frankly, if we assume that El Niño is up and humming now and the influence is strengthening, then we should expect to see a lot of what we’ve already seen for the remainder of hurricane season. Here is a map of all hurricanes in Septembers and Octobers since 1950 when the Oceanic Niño Index (ONI) was 1.0 or greater for June-July-August (this year’s value is 1.1).

With a couple notable exceptions, this map shows a lot of fish storms and middling systems in the western Atlantic. The two most notable exceptions were Joaquin in 2015 which killed 34 people (33 of whom were aboard the El Faro). And also Betsy in 1965, which killed 81 and inundated New Orleans. Emily in 1987 hit Hispaniola and Bermuda. And I think that sums up the season so far: A lot of middling storms and mostly fish storms with one potent hit in Idalia.

All in all, given what we see on the maps right now and given how this season has gone, there are two primary areas that probably should watch for land impacts: Bermuda and the Greater Antilles. If we can relax shear enough late in the season and get a disturbance in the Caribbean that comes straight north, you never know what you can get out of that, and those often threaten Cuba, Jamaica, Hispaniola or the Bahamas. Bermuda remains in the target line I think for at least one or two more storms. Lastly, the eastern Gulf or off the Southeast coast may be secondary areas to watch, given the warm waters and potential for just the right things coming together at the wrong time, sort of like what we saw with Idalia and to a far less impactful extent, Harold in Texas earlier this season.

Will it be enough to drive ACE above normal for the season in the end? I’m not certain, but it will be close.

CUPERTINO, CA—Still sporting the fishnet tights, spiked metal collar, and brightly colored pasties he had worn to the festival, late-returning Burning Man attendee Greg Schaffer was forced Tuesday to drive his fantastical wooden ship straight to work. “So sorry I’m late, my fellow burners and I got stuck on the…

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This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager.

Remember the letter-writer whose new hire was monitoring the whole team’s calendars and commenting on them? The first update was here, and here’s the conclusion.

As predicted, Seniority Susan didn’t make it.

I delivered a PIP with explicit expectations for behavior modification outlined. At the time, Susan did not give me much hope that change would occur.

I was wrong … for about five months. She abided by the PIP goals and, I thought, had turned over a new leaf when things started going downhill again.

She just couldn’t stay in her lane and do her work. She rebuilt spreadsheets I created to fulfill very specific needs, complicated every decision and conversation by insisting that she was an expert in X, Y, and Z (she isn’t), spent weeks laying claim to as many prospects as she could (but doing absolutely nothing with them) and did everything but her core job. She was busy … but not effective … and she was EXHAUSTING to deal with!

So I started to address all that in our weekly 1:1 meetings. Defensiveness was her reaction, asserting that she is the authority on all things — in other words, Seniority Susan was back!

As I held firm and put expectations on paper, she began to claim illness and infirmity. Now, I realize that this sounds monstrous, but I truly believe she was mimicking the experience of a colleague who contends with an autoimmune disorder to take advantage of us. She had the exact same symptoms but always worked it so we couldn’t get a doctor’s confirmation she needed accommodations. She would be out two days in a row, never three (policy is a doctor’s note at three days), come in late, leave early, I’ll be working from home (but not having any work product to show for it), the whole thing.

After two months of this, HR sat her down and discussed FMLA. How can we accommodate your needs and get our work done? What can we do here to get you where we need you to be? Let’s get a plan on paper and figure this out.

So we went in to accommodation mode, even though she never completed the FMLA paperwork.

Still. No work being done. No progress made. Nada!

So, as in every sales job on earth, you don’t make progress towards goal, folks start to ask questions. And the answers were not good.

Her position was eliminated. Leadership felt that we didn’t really need that position anyway — the goals weren’t met and the budget couldn’t support it.

Once she was gone, my team started sharing stories of the manipulation she was doing behind the scenes: lies she told, complaints she made about me to them, things she told them to do — saying that I asked her to tell them, even arranging for a colleague to be out of the room when she was to be introduced at an event! Really crazy stuff.

I have never been so happy to have missed a sales goal in my career! Now that Susan is gone, our team’s productivity has increased and we are actually on track to meet goal by the end of the year — making up for the deficit she was in before she left AND meeting our own!

Oh, and we can even share our calendars with the whole team and hear zero comments on what we have on them.

Sayonara, Susan!

CHICAGO—Telling the 43-year-old that his condition had simply made him impossible to be around, friends and family reportedly abandoned local man Jonathan Clarke one by one Tuesday after they discovered he was balding. “It’s just too embarrassing to go anywhere with Jonathan when his scalp is out there in the open for…

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OLYMPIA, WA—In an effort to bring more awareness to an often overlooked issue, a safety campaign was launched Tuesday to teach new parents that babies can die in just one or two inches of lava. “Take it from me, leaving your infant unsupervised in a shallow pool of hot, molten rock is deadlier than you may think,”…

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SAN FRANCISCO—In one of the biggest funding rounds so far this year, Harvard Business School graduate Josh Paulsen reportedly raised over $300 million from angel investors Tuesday with a drawing of a flying dog. “He came into my office, slapped his drawing on my desk, and said, ‘I’m going to make this happen,’”…

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OAKVILLE, ON – Following a rise in self-checkout theft driven by increased prices, a consortium of Canadian retailers announced a new experimental pilot program replacing self-checkouts with actual live human cashiers. “With prices of groceries, toiletries, and other necessities of living rapidly rising, we’ve experienced a rise in flesh consumers abusing our perfect automated self-checkouts,” […]

The post To combat self-checkout theft, stores experimenting with new human cashier pilot program appeared first on The Beaverton.

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PSST NYC

“There’s a guy with measuring tape in my stable. Do we need to talk?”

One-sentence summary

Invest 95L is expected to become a depression or tropical storm soon as it comes west across the Atlantic, likely passing just north of the Caribbean islands, though it merits some continued watching.

Invest 95L

On satellite, Invest 95L is beginning to slowly get itself together. It has thunderstorms that have persisted, indicated by the brighter colors on the satellite loop shown here. It’s got a little swirl to it, but probably not quite enough to indicate a surface low is present.

But it’s getting there, and that’s the takeaway today. The National Hurricane Center has boosted odds of development to 90 percent over the next several days. And this seems to be in line with almost all model guidance that shows this developing.

Invest 95L’s track

The track and intensity forecasts are somewhat intertwined. As is often the case, a stronger storm will be more apt to get steered poleward, or toward a recurve north. A weaker storm won’t get as much latitude. So the speed at which 95L organizes is somewhat important. Given that it is already starting to establish some structure, my thoughts today lean toward the stronger outcome and a faster recurve. That said, this remains a very close call in the islands.

Models have actually been in very good agreement through about day 4, which gets 95L some decent latitude. By day 5 (shown on the Euro ensemble mean below), 95L should already be near the same latitude as Puerto Rico. As long as that occurs, it should miss the islands to the north.

So we believe that 95L will stay north of the islands, but it will be close. Of the many model ensemble members from the GFS, Euro, and Canadian models, about 90 to 95 percent or so stay north of the islands.

So the odds are generally good for minimal land impacts as 95L comes west. This is good, as the majority of model guidance shows this becoming a major hurricane in about 4 days. But still, you don’t rest entirely with 5 to 10 percent bringing it much closer. We’ll keep watching.

Beyond the islands

Once 95L (or likely Lee by that time) gets north of the islands, where it goes is a bit of an open question. Will it truly recurve north and threaten Bermuda or turn out to sea? Will it turn north but then turn back more west-northwest and threaten the Bahamas or the U.S. coast? How will the cooler water recently upwelled from Franklin and Idalia impact it if it comes north? It’s too early to say anything with confidence here, so we’ll leave it at that for now. Stuff for us to watch this week.

Elsewhere

We may see another system attempt to develop and basically follow in Katia’s footsteps way out at sea in the open eastern Atlantic. But aside from that and 95L, truthfully things look quiet, a potentially decent outcome for mid-September in the Atlantic.

NEW YORK—In an effort to educate low-income residents on the most affordable treatment options available to them, NYU Langone Health rolled out a new program Monday aimed at teaching community members to ignore their symptoms. “We want low-income and other marginalized people living in our community to have the skills…

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NEW YORK—Saying the choice was entirely in your hands, a report released Monday found that you could quit your job right now and just play PlayStation 5 until you run out of money. “At this very moment, you could walk out the front door of your office and go home to spend month after month playing God Of War: Ragnarok …

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Several attendees said they are making the best of the muddy situation. The conditions are testing a community of "burners," which touts self-reliance and communal effort among its core principles.

(Image credit: Julie Jammot/AFP via Getty Images)