Storm Chasing gear

So today I have been spending part of the day trying to figure out what kind of things I need to get for going storm chasing this year. Last year I managed to chase a few storms and take some photos and video. I basically went out chasing with my Droid phone using the mobile site of a local Tv station in Lincoln to pull radar into my phone to see where the storm/s were heading. This method seemed to work pretty well for me but at times it was a pain. I also had a scanner I bought from Radio Shack that lets me listen in on Ham radio and a few other channels. I think most of the law enforcement in Nebraska has switch to Digital so I am unable to get access to stuff like that when I am out and about. The scanner is a hand held scanner so it is limited by its small antenna to receive signals from far off distances. It didn't aid me to much the times I took it out but the few times I was able to listen to a few spotters it was nice to hear what they were seeing.

 I have been looking into some laptop radar software and think I have found what I want to get this year for some more accurate data on the storms I follow. I have yet to decide what to do about internet for my laptop. I really don't want to spend money on a data card as I won't be using it that much so I am thinking of trying out a tethering app for my droid called PDAnet that seems to do a good job of supplying my laptop with internet and I don't have to have an extra data plan on my phone for it or have my phone rooted to do tethering. I have been using this app and I think it was around 18.00 and it has worked pretty well for internet for my laptop when I am away from home with my laptop. I think I am going to go with the GRlevel3 (http://www.grlevelx.com/grlevel3/ software and then a Storm Chaser data package from Allison House for like $10.00 a month for the storm season. http://www.allisonhouse.com/storm_chaser.php . There are a lot of other options out there, this is just the one that I think is going to work best for me and my budget. 

Other things I am currently looking at is a dc to ac converter to power my laptop and  few other devices. This one is around $30.00 at Amazon and should do the job.

Some kind of mounting system to mount my laptop in the passenger seat to keep it from sliding all over the place is something else I need to think about. I don't want anything to extravagant so it will most likely be made out of wood if I come up with some ideas and simple designs. More thoughts on that later.