Whether

Fugita Friday.


I miss weather reports. Our local news used to have a real meteorologist who would explain jet stream and likelihood of weather, and wear a white jacket for snow. I like meteorology. I had a teacher who would start each day with a map of the US drawn on the board, and a thorough weather report showing fronts and flow.

I like meteorology. That it's not as accurate because of cell phone towers. That we get more storms in large urban areas on weekends. How recently it became a real science, along with the railroads. That the tornado rating scale comes from Ted Fujita , a researcher who started by studying Hiroshima damage. I love thunder and lightening and strong winds. I once walked to work in bottle green tornado weather.

Nowadays, the local news sucks so badly. I have not watched it for my news for well over a decade, and the weather pisses me off more than ever. Mostly because I don't think it's decent news to editorialize on it, if it isn't over 80˚ F and sunny, they bemoan the bad weather. Well, that's boring weather, only to be expected in California and parts of the Mediterranean. Most of us live with the real thing, and however much we might bitch, don't really mind. Rain is good, snow is fine except for driving when it isn't cleared from the roads. A day isn't "fantastic" because of sun and warmth. Welcome after a long stretch of cold and gloom, but let's all live within our climatological means, people. And if it's on the news, keep your damn opinions out of my weather forecast. I'll complain privately if I want, you stay professional!

Sorry. Local news is trash. National broadcast news is worse. Who knows what is actually going on? Journalism is dead, at least on television. A few large newspapers, AP, BBC, are all that's to be had, all to be taken with a grain of salt. Sifting through, trying to make sense of it all. Or any small bit of it.

If they can't keep bias out of the weather, how can they claim a balanced view of anything else?

From Pacian, Too good not to add here.