Weather
Somewhere along the way, weather became WEATHER and became a national past time, akin to a major sporting event. We’ve got all kinds of ways to keep track of weather now. There’s the old school way, your local evening news. Well, truly the old school way would be opening the door and sticking your head out to see what the weather is like and figure out what to wear for the day.
But now, you’ve got an app on your phone, you’ve got weather alerts on your weather app on your phone, you’ve got the weather channel on tv, you’ve got an assortment of AI support in the form of Siri, Alexa or Cortana. So truly, knowing the current and future weather by the minute is now at your finger tips.
You can now precisely schedule that walk with your dog. Yes, there will be only a 5% chance of rain at 2:00 pm. Pencil that in. You can even find out what the weather is anywhere in the world. Planning a trip to Ireland in the spring? You can start checking the weather weeks out and pack accordingly.
And since weather became WEATHER, normal terms like rain, snow, wind, hail no longer suffice. Gotta gussy it up to do WEATHER justice. Now we talk about bomb cyclones or bombagenesis, polar vortexes, and clipper streams.
The best has to be how we will sit on the edge of our seats when the Weather Channel guy is covering a WEATHER event, say a hurricane. The build-up is days in advance. You are tuning in and nothing is happening. But you watch anyway as they describe what is happening miles out to sea.
And then day by day you tune in and the wind starts picking up. Then the ocean starts churning and you start to see some waves and then the rain starts. And our weather guy is out there reporting on it all. Every day. Even up to the point where the entire town, except for the one crazy guy and of course the Weather Channel guy, has left the town. You watch as it starts to rain, as the winds pick up, as the storm surge kicks in and the Weather Channel guy is being blown sideways but he’s still out there.
Into each life a little rain must fall. Also some snow depending on where you live. And on some days the sun will shine. Some days it will be cloudy. It will be hot in the summer and cold in the winter. That’s it people. Open your front door and see for yourself.