Blind Date

Here's a bad setup:

I don't usually post one-liners, but this one was funny.  (And, I'm kind of short on time this week.)  Happy Wednesday everyone! 

PS:  Hope you all survived the tornadoes!  We were watching Pirates: On Stranger Tides and the theatre made us all go out into the halls to wait out the storm . . . ultimately, our movie started 2 hours late.  Boo!  Our date night turned into a late night.

Fat Snowman

Fat Snowman


Now that's a real American snowman right there!

Looks like he had a few too many super-sized McFlurries.

Global Huh?

Global Huh?

Global warming advocates are probably reeling right now.  I’ve lived in DFW my whole life and these last two winters have seen more snow than all of the previous winters I’ve seen combined, especially with that thirteen-incher back in February 2010.  It stuck for a week!  Remember Washington D.C. got a record double-blasting, too!  This year, the storm is hitting everyone!  I was never convinced about the idea of global warming, but now I have a radical counter-question.  Is this a global cooling? 

Even after asking that question, my answer is probably ‘no.’  I do believe, however, that the Earth just has some natural cycles and we may just be in the middle of a string of colder winters.  For all we know, we might have just been lucky enough to have all the right weather ingredients to have crippling ice and snow here.  Even further in the back of my mind, I can’t help but return to questioning global warming.  I mean, if it’s snowing in Texas, what’s going on at the North Pole?

Well, Santa’s probably freezing his butt off!  I’m no climatologist (in this life), but behind all of the cold air that brought us snow, there’s got to be even colder air, right?  It’s pretty basic knowledge that the further north you get, the colder it is.  Sometimes, the arctic puffs its cheeks and blows that mess down to Texas.  I see the temperature map of the whole country, and I see thirty-something degrees here, twenty-somethings in Kansas and Nebraska, and single digits inMinnesota.  What’s going on north of that?  They’re probably freezing mercury up there! (That’s a sweltering -37.89۫F, by the way).  I have a hard time believing there’s a whole lot of glacial meltdown going on, (but remember, I’m no climatologist.)

I’m not planning on starting an anti-global-warming rally or anything, just raising questions.  When was the last time you heard about the ozone problem?  I thought the hurricanes were supposed to get worse and worse after 2005.  The 2006 and 2009 hurricane seasons were below average and 2007 and 2008 were average.

Global warming, shmobal warming.  I'm freezing my butt off in DFW with the lowest temperature we've had in like a hundred years or something.

Hot Playground

Hot Playground


Awesome comment-leaver Sarah brought something to my attention yesterday that usually would never cross my mind: how hot it is in December. . . in Texas.  Our high temperature yesterday was 79 degrees, just a week shy of the first day of winter.  But I might not have noticed because 79 is a cool breeze compared to the 107 we hit over the summer this year.  Blah!!!  (Thanks for the cruel reminder of how season-less Texas can be...)

Oddly enough, earlier this year, we had over a foot of snow!  (Back in January, in case you're wondering.)  It was, without a doubt, the most snow I have ever seen in Texas.  In remembrance, here is a photo of the 6 foot snowman we made... It was as tall as me!!!

And this is a picture of a typical Texas playground, covered in snow:

:-P

Thursday 8/19

Heat Wave

It has been hot lately.  And not just any kind of hot.  It has been hot-so-many-days-in-a-row-that-it-might-as-well-just-stay-hot-a-couple-more-days-so-we-can-at-least-set-a-record-or-something hot.  Well, that record is going to have to wait until another year. We had an 18-day streak of 100 degree or more highs.  The official high temperature in DFW yesterday was a measly 96 degrees.  (I know, bummer, right?)  The local meteorologist jokingly assured us, however, that we’ll be right back up there in the triple digits for another seven days or so.  Personally, I don’t think it’s much of a joke.  The record, by the way, was 40 days in a row back in 1980.

So how do you entertain yourself when the heat is so blistering?  Even swimming doesn’t sound very appealing because when it’s this hot, the water becomes warm.  (No thanks.  If I want to take a bath in my swim trunks, I’ll just do it at home.  It’s also less crowded.)  You could stay inside all day and watch crime show marathons.  You could even put on your jogging shorts and running shoes so that it feels more like a marathon. 

Or . . .

Since there’s an almost-national egg recall right now, there is one thing you could do.

Around four in the afternoon, you could run out and cook up some eggs on the sidewalk.  You don’t even need a pan!  Just mist the walkway in some non-stick cooking spray and get crackin’!  I wouldn’t recommend eating them, though.  I’m about 86% sure this doesn’t cook the salmonella out.

 Even though the eggs in your fridge probably don’t have salmonella, I still wouldn’t recommend eating this sidewalk experiment.

Friday 7/2

Alex

Weathermen officially need cue cards.  I heard this on the news Wednesday morning:

“Luckily, hurricane Alex has taken a swing South and will now be hitting northern Mexico, and not Texas.”

Lucky, huh?  Not very sympathetic, is he?  (I’m not going to tell you who it was, because I don’t want to throw anyone under the bus.)  If you ask me, hurricanes are bad news no matter what country they hit.  I don’t care if we do have illegal immigration problems with our southern neighbor, I wouldn’t wish them ill will.  If we were all lucky the hurricane would have died back down to a tropical storm and then down to just some drizzle that hits the coast. 

You know what, though?  The anchor probably didn’t even realize what he said.  (He probably didn’t mean it that way, either, but he said it.)  But do you think the weather people on the Mexican news stations proclaim their good fortune when a hurricane turns to Texas?  I doubt seriously. 

So if a fire ever burns down your neighbor’s house with everyone in it, don’t tell an interviewer, “Luckily, it wasn’t us!”  Have some compassion.

By: S. Cole Garrett

Thursday 4/15

Weather man (or woman)

I checked the weather the other day and the chance of precipitation for the next day was ten percent.  I woke up and walked out the door and it was raining and there were clouds as far as the eye could see.  Ten percent, huh?  Looked more like a hundred and ten.  I drove to work while it rained.  I sit next to a window at work.  It rained all day.  I couldn’t help but wonder how great a weather anchor’s job is.  They get paid to guess!  I’ll bet for the vast majority of the rest of us, guessing all day would just get us fired.

I’m pretty sure it’s a little more complicated than that.  I’m also sure that there are computers and algorithms and patterns all used to speculate upcoming weather.  The truth is, we probably don’t need a person at all.  It seems like they’re wrong all the time anyway.  All they do is smile and tell you in rhymes that they’re eventually going to tell you the weather.  So who would sign up for that job?  It’s like someone applied at the news station for a clerical job and they said, “no, we don’t need any paper pushers, but we have a weather anchor opening!”

Here’s a clip from a mock interview for a weather anchor job:

Interviewer:      Do you lie well?

  Candidate:      Of course I do, heh heh, I have three kids.

Interviewer:      Um, ok.  Rate your personality on a scale of one to ten.

  Candidate:      Eleven!  Get it?  (awkward silence) because it’s off the charts?

Interviewer:      Please take this seriously, sir.

  Candidate:      Oh.  I’m sorry.  Well then, I’d say ten.

Interviewer:      Can you point at things that aren’t really there?

  Candidate:      Like what?

Interviewer:      Exactly. 

  Candidate:      Exactly what?

Interviewer:      Never mind.  Have you ever correctly predicted a weather event?

  Candidate:     Sure I have.

Interviewer:      Explain.

  Candidate:     One time, I called my mom, who lives an hour East of me and she said it was a raining cats and dogs.  I told my kids to come inside because it was about to rain cats and dogs.

Interviewer:      I see.  Well, congratulations, you’ll start Monday!

I suppose the plus side for the weather anchor is they get to be on TV.  If that’s enough

consolation for someone to get paid to stand in front of a blank screen and point at

imaginary images like a crazy person, then more power to them, but I’d rather watch and laugh at that shmuck than be that shmuck.

By: S. Cole Garrett

Tuesday

Global What?

The first day of spring this year was March 20^th.  My family and I had just polished off some delicious flounder and eel at a fantastic local sushi joint (because that’s the cool thing to do).  We walked outside and lo and behold!  Snow!  Let me be a little more specific: sideways-blowing snow!  We couldn’t see the windows from where we were sitting, so needless to say, we were surprised.  Why were we surprised?  The weatherman did say we were expecting it, but who really believes them?  Now, snow may not be a big deal for some folks, but we live in Texas.  Snow (not to be confused with sleet (or “wintery mix”)) is a big deal!

Global warming advocates are probably reeling right now.  I’ve lived in DFW my whole life and this winter past has seen more snow than all of the previous I’ve seen combined, especially with that thirteen-incher back in February.  It stuck for a week.  We even built a seven foot snow man.  Remember Washington D.C. got a record double-blasting, too!  I was never convinced about the idea of global warming, but now I have a radical counter-question.  Is this a global cooling? 

Even after asking that question, my answer is probably ‘no.’  I do believe, however, that the Earth just has some natural cycles and we may just be in the middle of a string of colder winters.  For all we know, we might have just been lucky enough to have all the right weather ingredients to have snow here.  Even further in the back of my mind, I can’t help but return to questioning global warming.  I mean, if it’s snowing in Texas, what’s going on at the North Pole?

Well, Santa’s probably freezing his butt off!  I’m no climatologist (in this life), but behind all of the cold air that brought us snow, there’s got to be even colder air, right?  It’s pretty basic knowledge that the further north you get, the colder it is.  Sometimes, the arctic puffs its cheeks and blows that mess down to Texas.  I see the temperature map of the whole country, and I see thirty-something degrees here, twenty-somethings in Kansas and Nebraska, and single digits in Minnesota.  What’s going on north of that?  They’re probably freezing mercury up there! (That’s a sweltering -37.89۫F, by the way).  I doubt there’s a whole lot of glacial meltdown going on, but remember, I’m no climatologist.

I’m not planning on starting an anti-global warming rally or anything, just raising questions.  When was the last time you heard about the ozone problem?  I thought the hurricanes were supposed to get worse and worse after 2005.  The 2006 and 2009 hurricane seasons were below average and 2007 and 2008 were average.

I realize that hurricanes and blizzards are worse for people who actually get hit by them so it’s kind of a matter of perspective, but they still choose to live there, right?  As for the polar bears, don’t hold your breath for that global summer vacation.

By: S. Cole Garrett