1880

 

It tickles me to watch the “weather” reports on news programs. Tickles me even MORE to watch The Weather Channel.

I’ve been living in the Pacific Northwest for about 6 or 7 years now, and I’m here to tell you that we have wide deep rivers and massive lakes that are just chock full of fresh clean sweet water. It never really quits the rainy season here. The standing joke (based, of course, in truth) is that we have two seasons—Winter and August.

Typically, we usually have about 3 months of decent weather—middle of July into sometime in September. That’s it. Then it rains. A smattering of snow, and that’s always a treat, but it’s rain. And, frankly, it takes the gas right out of me after a month or so. Boredom and depression in the winter are very real things up in these parts. True, we’re not as hammered as, say, North Dakota, but it’s still pretty grim.

Which brings me to the weathermen (this included weatherwomen, just to make sure you know I’m not a sexist) and their reportage. They talk about how we’re in a drought here. Honestly. It’s been like that since I arrived. Drought, drought, drought…..We gotta get more snowpack and more rain or we’re going to become a desert—Chicken Little stuff.

The main issue here is that they talk about how we’re not getting “normal” amounts of rainfall. Same thing in all of the western states bordering on the Pacific ocean, and maybe the next couple of states attached to California, Oregon, and Washington.

Abnormally low rainfall with be the downfall, or something to that effect.

I did a simple Google search and discovered that meteorological records only started to be accumulated in 1880. That’s sorta recent history, planet-wise.

So, the weather pundits have NO IDEA what “normal” is. They only know what “average” has been since 1880. And I’m here to tell you that the Pacific coast area of North America has been around for a little longer than that—millions of years longer.

So, remember this—whenever you hear a weather guy or weather gal announce that we are having below normal (or above normal) anything, they’re completely full of shit. The only thing they know is that is might deviate from average, but only since 1880.

I contend that the western United States is historically a vast desert, like the Gobi, and that it’s been unusually wet only since 1880.

So There.