Strange Weather
How many TV weathermen does it take to change a light bulb? Who knows? They always check the other bulbs in the house and decide that there's a 60% chance the bulb will recover tomorrow.
Notice that I refuse to call them meteorologists. No, not because meteorologists should study meteors, and if I ever find out who started that joke I will feed him to giant Scandinavian carnivorous rabbits. If I can find any.
Anyway, I reject the title because none of these guys has the brain power of shredded lettuce, and the only "ology" they might be capable of is numerology. It is a little known fact that the staff of the Numerology Hotline consists entirely of retired TV weathermen. If you call, you will see that their accuracy hasn't improved any.
The whole format of TV weather is annoying. They can't just read you their guess at the forecast. First, they have to go to their map to talk about what's going on on the other side of the country. Why would a person in Maine care that they are having tornadoes in Kansas? They are always having tornadoes in Kansas. That's why no one lives there.
Of course, the weather person only goes to the map for current conditions to insure that at least half of his segment will be correct. They certainly don't do it to demonstrate a keen knowledge of geography, since weather people invariably point to Cuba when talking about Idaho. No one who went to public school will know the difference though, and nobody is paying attention anyway because nobody lives in Idaho either. The whole section of the country between Chicago and California is pretty much unpopulated. You know, states like Oklahoma and Greenland.
Mostly the weather people wave their arms around generically over the entire country. Thanks to satellite technology, there are always a few large white areas on the map for them to talk about. "These white things here are what we meteorologists call clouds," they say, speaking in the most condescending tone humanly possible. I suspect, however, that they are not human at all, but rather a species of chameleonic space lizard from another galaxy. This would explain why they wear plaids in such hideous colors. Everyone knows lizards have poor taste.
Many of the weather people are sufficiently literate to read the forecast that they have received over the wire from the National Weather Service. There are also some who make up their own predictions after reading the chicken bones they have scattered. These are easily recognizable from the fact that their forecasts always call for a 30% chance of rain, 30% chance of mostly sun, 30% chance of snow, and 10% chance of something else entirely. They move on to the Numerology Hotline after a couple of years.
Unfortunately, some of the wire readers have not yet fully learned our language. "It's 64 diggers out, uh, degrees out right now," they say. "Look for increasing cloddiness tonight, with a chance of flowers. Partly Sunday to borrow, but a little Wendy out there, tin miles per hover with possible hired guests." Filthy lizards.
There are still a few of us humans left in weather forecasting, such as Joe Cupo at channel 6 (a reference for Maine locals only), who may even be an actual meteorologist. But I'm sure it will not be long before the lizard people discover them and abduct them away to nearby asteroids which will one day become meteors (everyone knows lizards also have a keen sense of irony). Then the plaid-suited back-up weather men are ready to take over, and I am dreading it. I can feel a low pleasure area moving in already.
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