THE BEAT / PERSONA
which she uses for motivation when she wants to “eat crazy”). But she’s also quick to laugh, played clarinet in college, has a sweet tooth and a strong love for people. On a sunny day at the start of hurricane season, Murphy and I met up for coffee.
Q: How do you like being in New
Orleans? When I was looking for the next job, my prayer was, “Lord, let me go to a place where the lights are always on.” I came from Greenville, North Carolina, which was a college town … there’s East Carolina University and a hospital. Going from there, coming from Pittsburgh, I knew I needed more. That was the prayer, and that’s what happened.
Q: The power goes out a lot here, so
Kweilyn Murphy WDSU Meteorologist BY LAUREN LABORDE
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n TV, Kweilyn Murphy strikes the authoritative tone needed to deliver a weather forecast in a region prone to severe weather, but in real life she’s pure sunshine. The strong-but-sweet persona makes sense:
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that’s not literally true. (laughs) I mean there’s a lot of action. There’s options: In Greenville, if I was leaving work at 9 or 11 o’clock I was going home. Here we have options no matter what day it is, what time it is. If you wanna stay home, you can do that. If you wanna have a small gathering, you can do that. If you wanna paint the town, you can do that.
Q: Were you always more of a night she was raised in a family of Pittsburgh steel workers, and meteorology brought her down south. She’s a fitness lover who has competed in a muscle competition (she showed me a photo on her phone from the competition,
owl or a morning person? I love to stay up, but I’m not one of those people who has a hard time at a certain part of the day. Once I’m up, I’m good, I’m grateful. It’s the little things. I’m pretty simple; I think people think there has to be some
greg miles PHOTOGRAPH