WEATHER OR NOT?

My goodness, it is that time of year again. No other part of the United States has the dread and trepidation that the deep south experiences from around June until October. We all wait with a mixture of calm and extreme anxiety as the latest "blow" comes across the ocean from Africa (I have figured out ANOTHER meaning to "Out of Africa").

Seriously, a southerner can be experiencing the kind of day that poets and artists dream of and pursue empirically, whiling away their time breathing in the balmy air. It can be only scant days later that you may see archival footage from the scary Weather Channel showing their scary frontman Jim Cantori hanging onto a palm tree while a stop sign is swaying in the background. So, then you are again "hooked" into the fantasy created (or not) by the Weather Channel and its sometimes terrifying warnings that may or may not turn into something to be concerned about.

In the interest of fairness however, I must concede that occasionally these dire warnings from TWC are not in vain, as witnessed by the 2005 fiasco of not one, but TWO major hurricanes within one month of each other!! As Randy Newman sang, "They're trying to wash us away".

Its true New Orleans almost got washed away, but the rest of the area could have changed the lyrics to "they're trying to BLOW us away". I lost a piece of fascia from my roofline during Rita and another piece during Lily (she was around 2003 I believe). Hurricane Katrina was no more than a puff of air where we live, and was a beautiful day. It was weird to think that only 70 or so miles away havoc was being wreaked by that mother Katrina.

In summation, I would like to send my condolences to Mexico and various other places in the Carribbean that just got SLAMMED by good ol hurricane Dean. Hopefully there are enough people in Mexico to help rebuild there, as it seems like the majority of the rebuilders of cities and countries are now housed in the southern part of the US rebuilding our cities, etc.