We slept with flash lights by our beds last night. For the umpteenth time in a few weeks, there was a tornado warning for our area.
In our nearly 3 years in Illinois, we've yet to be hit by a tornado. (Wood? Wood? Where are you?) I don't know if it's because we live in a suburban area, sheer luck, or we just smell bad, but all these false alarms are creating a false sense of security.
Last night, as the Weather Channel beeped out hideous warnings and promises - "A dangerous storm with damaging winds will reach you in 10 minutes! Seek shelter! Put on some deodorant!" - Mr. Dub got out the flashlights and emergency backpacks, while I typed some emails.
Maybe I'm just mad. Coming from Arizona, where our big natural worry is drought, it's hard to live in a place where deadly tornadoes are commonplace. And now, apparently, we also have earthquakes to worry about. So I'm sorta ticked, and I think the tornadoes know it.
Anyhow, there was no tornado. There were no damaging winds. There was no soft-ball sized hail. There was an intense downpour ... and a lingering distrust in meteorology.
Do you trust your weatherman?
In our nearly 3 years in Illinois, we've yet to be hit by a tornado. (Wood? Wood? Where are you?) I don't know if it's because we live in a suburban area, sheer luck, or we just smell bad, but all these false alarms are creating a false sense of security.
Last night, as the Weather Channel beeped out hideous warnings and promises - "A dangerous storm with damaging winds will reach you in 10 minutes! Seek shelter! Put on some deodorant!" - Mr. Dub got out the flashlights and emergency backpacks, while I typed some emails.
Maybe I'm just mad. Coming from Arizona, where our big natural worry is drought, it's hard to live in a place where deadly tornadoes are commonplace. And now, apparently, we also have earthquakes to worry about. So I'm sorta ticked, and I think the tornadoes know it.
Anyhow, there was no tornado. There were no damaging winds. There was no soft-ball sized hail. There was an intense downpour ... and a lingering distrust in meteorology.
Do you trust your weatherman?
14 comments:
well, nyc definitely got some lightning/t-storms... intenso. oh, and there's the whole heat wave, so it feels like monsoon season... 900% humidity and 95 degree weather.
cruel joke.
you should feel lucky w/o tornadoes. they scare the heebies out of me.
On Friday night, shortly after I talked to you, we saw on the news that there WAS a tornado right in area that would describe where you live. Dad was all worried. I said "I just talked to her" and didn't give it another worry.
But of course, now I am completely worried.
Great.
Um no....back in Portland, we would just pick the forecast we liked and hoped the weather would be the same. Here in Texas...we don't really bother. They don't see torrential rains coming and the heat hasn't bothered us yet.
as static as az weather is... i still don't believe our weatherman lol
i'm desperately HOPING the weatherman is wrong today... 101 degrees with 60% humidity! i had no idea i moved to the amazon rainforest!
and we actually DID have a tornado here last week, almost to the minute of when the weatherman said we would... but it took my sister-in-law and i few minutes of saying "wow! look at that storm! that's SO cool!" before we looked at each other and said "hmm... maybe we should go down to the basement." rookies.
I love how on one of our local stations the weather man will give a ten degree span of what the weather will be like for that day. Something like "it will be between 72-83 degrees tomorrow" Really! Did you have to go to school for that prediction. Guess what, I be whoever has the most points at the end of a basketball game will win, and I didn't even go to school to predict that!
I feel your pain... we, too, were a little concerned about the weather this weekend, living in Will County and all, but I guess we're just a little too far north and west, so we missed all the drama... not that I'm complaining or anything. I have a "weatherman" living with me - the husband - who watches the Weather Channel constantly... not that they really know what they're doing either!
Try Texas. Every single day there's a "chance of severe thunderstorms." While most of the time it's just overcast, there have been some real scary thunderstorms like I never saw living in either Seattle, Utah or Illinois. Rain that dumps like Noah's flood and 90 mph winds. Freaky.
YES I absolutely trust the weatherman... if I have absolutely nothing going on that day.
If he says it's going to rain and I have cancelled plans to go to the zoo, chances are it ends up being a beautiful day.
If I arrange for a babysitter so I can golf with my husband (because the weatherman said on Wednesday that Saturday would be beautiful) it is frigid on Saturday.
But if the kids are sick and we're not going anywhere all week anyway he is dead on... bless his heart.
Oh man, what a hassle. Given that the usual forecast around here is "sunny, hot" I would have to say that yes my weatherman is always dead on!
NO! I consider him a dignified idiot. Many news "weathermen" these days aren't even real meteorologists. They take classes on how to look good and point the right direction on the green screen. Oh and read the weather feed that comes into their station.
Some of my friends who I graduated in Broadcasting with ended up being the local news "weatherman" b/c the station was desperate to fill the position. They got familiar with the computer program and voila! Expert "weatherman"!
I "trust" the weatherman in the instances in which I can hear the horrific thunder and my windows are shaking so bad they are about to break. In that case, I watch the scary little red, green and purple (!) blogs dance across my TV and if he says that in 25 mins there will be a storm (with the purple, nonetheless) in my area, then, yes, I believe him. I do not however, believe him when he tells me it is going to be sunny when in fact it's cloudy (today). Ha. Because really, his job is to actually mess with my outfit and hair. I'm sure of it.
No, we planned an awesome trip to Block Island on Friday with a good forecast the day before and then it rained that night/day. Saturday was really nice though! Too little too late!
I always laughed myself when the weather man didn't give the accuracy for the evening. For example, living in Southern California during Spring usually end up either sunshine or warm-- nothing else.
Well this year was a totally opposite- it was light windy with bright sunny during the day time at the park. Later on that night, it was about the same: windy yet cold. Shortly before I tucked my sons to bed, my younger son said to me (I'm deaf), "Momma, I hear it is rainy very hard" looking at the roof. So, I let them to look out in the front door. To our surprise,it turned out that two huge hailstorms.
Nowadays, we cannot trust the "expert" meteorologists. All we can do is to follow our guts.
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