ftlaudbob -- it's really drifting right now, moreso than any definitive movement. A northward path is likely early on in its life, give or take a little either side of north. Once it gets into the Gulf & the ridge builds in (assuming it does), it should move more to the west. Depending on how close it gets to Florida & how strong it is, it could either enhance rainfall or create a very warm, dry day over land (due to subsidence outside the storm's envelope).

Another asked a question about variable SSTs: the lower SSTs reduces the amount of heat content for a storm and generally tends to limit the maximum end of the intensity, but it's moreso the depth of the warm water that is important as opposed to just warm SSTs. The SSTs are warm in the east Gulf, for instance, but the depth of that warmth is very shallow; the storm will churn the waters there and, coupled with rainfall cooling the atmosphere/waters as well, result in a very small amount of heat content available to even maintain intensity. In the central Gulf, however, SSTs are warmer, as are the sub-surface SSTs. A storm wouldn't have too much trouble there. The important depth is about 60m...a normal storm won't churn up a lot below there.

Satellite representation of the storm continues to get better with time; Dvorak numbers from SSD are 1.0, probably trending higher now, and recon will be there shortly to (hopefully) provide more data. Next QuikSCAT should be in the next 6hrs; not sure about the microwave satellite imagers. If current trends continue, we should have a depression sometime today or early tomorrow. Only time will tell from there.