Today's Weather: A Beautiful Day — For January

If you had to pick one of the best days of the next week, it might be today. There will be plenty of sunshine and temperatures are going to reach the mid and perhaps even upper 40s. The lack of snow cover continues to help temperatures to overachieve their potential. When you don't have snow cover on the ground, the sun is able to heat the Earth more and that can boost air temperatures.

It's not impossible to get Arctic air without snow cover, but the coldest temperatures usually do occur with a deeper snow.

To illustrate the lack of cold air even further, a nor'easter will move up the coastline on Saturday. In most years this would mean some snow for the region — perhaps even significant — but this year, without the cold air, we're just going to see some rain.

On Sunday, skies clear and temperatures will once again be back into the lower and mid-40s. It's chilly on Monday and that will set the stage for the next storm on Tuesday. It's likely that northern New England will see some snow out of this but just rain is mostly likely for southern New England.

The next couple of weeks will continue to feature average or above-average temperatures and generally a lack of snow. There are early indications the pattern may start to flip at the end of the month. We'll have to wait another week or so before there's any confidence in that forecast.

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Friday: Sunshine and a few clouds south. Highs 42-48.

Friday Night: Clouding up. Some freezing rain toward New Hampshire by morning, otherwise just rain by dawn. Lows 29-34.

Saturday: A cold rain. Highs in the upper 30s to lower 40s.

Sunday: Mostly sunny and seasonably cold. Highs 40-45.

Monday: Sunshine then clouds. Seasonable. Highs in the low 30s.

Tuesday: Some rain and snow. Highs 35-45.