17 April 2007

Weather Forecasting

I have an e-friend named Scott who works for KOMO TV in Seattle. He does the daily email forecasts. Somehow, Scott has figured out how to make a weather forecast funny. I don't know how he comes up with the ideas but he does. One forecast was based around ducks and bunnies. (It was beautiful out with lots of cumulus clouds). He writes about the holidays, he makes Mother Nature into a person frequently - a used car salesman once, he relates the weather to the stock report. Every day, there's a different theme.

I have to give a shout-out to my friend, Scott, who makes a boring forecast funny.
Anyone who can figure out how to write about rain, in some form 365 days a year, in an entertaining way deserves a shout-out.
I'll post some of his forecasts from now on. If you want to check it out for yourself: www.komotv.com and click on the weather.

Today, in honor of Tax Deadline Day, he posted the following forecast:

In honor of tax day, we were hoping Mother Nature would let us fill out the EZ version of the forecast form today, but with showers and thunderstorms roaming around, looks like we'll have to soldier through the longer version. No problem, we've got our calculators at the ready.
This evening and early tonight will continue to see scattered showers and thunderstorms as a cool, unstable air mass drifts overhead. Some showers could see hail and gusty winds, so keep an eye to the sky as you race to that mailbox to drop off your tax form. Once the sun goes down, showers and thunderstorms will decrease, with lows will drop into the upper 30s and low 40s.
Wednesday will be about the same as today, only half as wet. (Or, in tax speak: Take volume of water accumulated from Day 16 and multiply by 0.5. Enter that value on Line 23A.) The air won’t be quite as unstable, so while the sunbreaks should be there, the showers should be more sporadic and not as intense. There is still the risk of an isolated thunderstorm, so we're not completely out of the woods. Highs will top out in the low 50s.
The showers end Wednesday night as that trough of low pressure moves away, leaving us with a dry and partly sunny Thursday and Friday. (Although to claim the sunshine, you might have to fill out form 30-SY). Highs each day will warm into the mid-upper 50s.
The weather pattern changes for Saturday as another front approaches the area. As of right now, it looks like rain will develop by afternoon, but there are some signs that the rain might hold off until Saturday evening or even Saturday night. So there is hope for at least a dry start to the weekend. Temperatures will hit the mid 50s. That rain will linger through Saturday night and then leave us with showers and sunbreaks for Sunday (although one caveat -- if that Saturday rain holds off until Saturday night, that could make for a wetter Sunday morning. Sort of robbing Peter to pay Paul, but there you go. Just be sure to claim any sunshine losses on form 17-W.)
We should eke ourselves a dry day for Monday, before rain returns for next Tuesday. Or, for the IRS agents out there, "Monday will see an increase in our adjusted gross sunshine, but standard deductions will be applied on Tuesday." :)

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