Conditioned response
The weather channel does this great thing on their website when there’s a winter storm warning in effect. It’s a red band across the top of the page. It looks like this:
The thing about it is, I’ve gotten so incredibly accustomed to having that red bar there that I’ve pretty much stopped
paying attention. At this point, I’m not exclaiming, “oh no, a storm!” but “again, a storm?”
So, I’ve decided to recommend a sliding scale, much akin to the terror watch colors. We could start with a string cyan to indicate that there’s winter weather ahead. A magenta could indicate accumulations of up to 7 inches. Pink could indicate a likelihood of ice accumulations. Orange could indicate up to 14 inches. Red would be 14 on up. And we’d add blAck and orange stripes around the edges when there was wind involved.
That way, instead Of the boy crying wolf, he’d be calling dog, cat, lizard, bird, cow, and giraffe. At least we’d know what exactly to expect: exactly what we expect now… nothing at all like what they forecast.
if only they could predict power outages…and how long we can expect to be without electricity. now THAT is information i would be interested in!
The weather is nice and sunny here in Mexico today. The grass was cut yesterday. We went on a morning walk. Very pleasant.
Gina, that would be useful… we were definitely feeling your pain this weekend.
As I think of it, I’m imagining a whole movie dedicated to the idea… kind of like Twister. I’ll play the role of the guy from Princess Bride, ultimately dying in a power outage as I try to figure out Bill Pullman’s system for predicting them. Genius.
Ken… you are blessed.