Today’s forecast

One of my peeves on the island is the weather forecasting’s lack of accuracy and it’s consistent lack of decisiveness.  I don’t know why the weather forecasting upsets me so much.  I am concerned it’s part of getting older, and the next step will involve writing letters to the editor or sternly toned notes to the ad executives who have made poor commercials.  On average most days the forecast will read either sunny periods chance of showers, or cloudy periods chance of showers.  This covers everything and I wish that they would just grow some nards and make a bold prediction.  Some thoughts on said chance of showers would be nice too, because it could rain any day, but how likely today is what most of us want to know. Probability of Precipitation seems to be as foreign a concept as driving on the right side of the road.

While I am sure they try their best, I think I have found at least part of the reason they can’t do any better.  Check out the weather map that they print in the newspaper.  This is from today’s newspaper and I suppose represents official information that a weathertician or weathertologist might use.

If you squint you can barely see the dot that is Bermuda.  This map looks like it was drawn by Ralph Wiggum with a set of dull crayons.  Fortunately though they have labeled the parts that are "seas", so you know, the boats know which way to go to get to the Walmart.  Was this the best map they could find draw that the average newspaper reader would find useful?  Couldn’t they get anything a bit more zoomed in, it’s like trying to show what’s happening in California with a picture of the globe.  Thankfully they include a legend so people didn’t think all those squiggly lines were seagulls, although I still don’t know whether it’s going to rain tomorrow…