6/1/07 Hurricane Season

Today is the first day of hurricane season, and the Weather Channel people are just giddy about it. Oh, they're trying to look somber and professional, but you can see the gleam in their eyes. (The first thing I do every day when the alarm goes off is to turn on the weather channel. I pretend like I need to know how hot its going to be in order to pick out what I'm going to wear. This is pointless because it's always 72 degrees inside my office no matter what it's like outside. I really just like to snooze until the Local on the 8's comes on). But today is not just any day! It's Hurricane Season! Ratings will skyrocket! They already have people posted at strategic places along the coast, just waiting for it to get nasty.

Official weather channel guy, decked out in full rain gear on a crowded beach: "I'm reporting live here from the some random beach where we're waiting for the hurricane season to begin. Right now the wind is calm and the sun is out...Look at that! That wave looked a little bigger than the last one! Can you zoom in on that? There! See those waves? They must be cresting at about 6 inches! That toddler can barely stand up in them! We'll be here with full coverage as the storm unfolds. Back to you Jim".
Jim (looking serious): "Thanks Mike. You be careful out there".

I guess if your goal is to make weather exciting, you can't really get better than a hurricane. Especially after Katrina. Even two years later, you just say the word hurricane and the whole country perks up. (And rightly so, because as the official Weather Channel video New Orleans Battles to Make a Comeback showed us this morning, the whole area was destroyed). Living in a landlocked state, I don't really worry about hurricanes so much, but I still get drawn in by all the excitement. The weather people do this on purpose. They have a formula for creating edge-of-your-seat weather. First, the anchorwoman will point out a large undefined mass on the screen (this is really a picture of her neighbor's last ultrasound, but Freddie Jr looks so much like a hurricane that no one can tell the difference). Anchorwoman: "See this thing that looks suspiciously like the eye of a baby in the third trimester? It's really the eye...of a storm!" Then they'll rename regular things with catchy titles. A weather report is called, "INTO THE EYE OF THE STORM", and the news studio is referred to as "HURRICANE CENTRAL". They have special code words too. That way the anchorman can lean towards the camera and say, "The rain bands from the eyewall are approaching landfall at 0400, causing the surge to increase as the hurricane upgrades to a category 3 on the Saffir-Simpson scale!" (Doesn't that sound more exciting than "A storm is coming. It's going to rain and the waves are big"?) Finally, they name the storms, to better sound like a serial killer is loose on the streets and bearing down on the unsuspecting public instead of just a bad thunderstorm. "Board up your windows! Flee the area! Charles is coming! Run for your lives!"

What I really love is the sweepstakes that they have going on the website. If you create an official Weather Ready Family Preparedness Plan, you could win a cruise! (Because nothing says weather safety like sailing out in the middle of the ocean during hurricane season!)

So stock up on plywood and bottled water, and stay glued to your TV, because it's HURRICANE SEASON 2007 and the meteorologists can't wait to share it with you!!! In a completely somber and emotionally detached way, of course.