I've never really complained about weather in days gone by. I read the daily discussions from the National Weather Service. I don't pick favorites on the local TV stations weather crews. Basically, that is because I have the same info tools that the local weather men do, plus, I have observed weather from my grandfathers storm cellar from a very young age. Mom, (God rest her soul) was a weather anxiety mother.) She had lived through tornadoes that put a 2x4 through the wall of a house where all of us were gathered during a violent thunderstorm and tornado out break. She would wake up my father and we would all get dressed and head out to my grandfather's farm. It was only a short distance from the edge of town and we were pretty safe being ahead of the storms. He had built a recessed cellar, constructed the walls with rail road ties and mounded the dirt about 10 feet high. Of course, the sod grew and mound because a green bump at the side of his farm. The cellar was big enough to fit my grandmother, grandfather, my uncle,his wife and there two kids along with mom and dad and me. My two brothers were yet to be born in those days. Once in a while, there might be an extra visitor show up if the storms got really bad and in that area, they did most often.
But, when I went to bed last night, there was a 20 % chance of rain. The reason I was even the remotely concerned with those odds was because I had an appointment with the eye doctor for today.With me still rehabilitating my leg, I do not walk as fast. A run is totally out of the question. But, like I said, with those odd, I felt pretty good. Even if they did roll in early with the sunrise, they would be out of the Metroplex by the time I had to negotiate the bus and rail rides to the eye doctor.
As luck would have it. That first jolt of thunder in the distance had me paying attention to what might be going on. It didn't look bad on the radar. There were strong cells off to the northwest and they were moving in this direction as they were falling apart.Well, the same reason I got fooled and the local weather men and ladies did as well, is that a few more elements were added to the dynamics of the cells.No one could have forecast that fact with 100% accuracy that it would come right over my house, but it did. Murphy's Law, of course. Long story short, I mad the trip dry, except that darn ice cub that slid out of my cup at Chipotle didn't hit the floor, of the tabletop I looked for it but never found it. Then, at the eye doctors I reached into my shirt pocket to get a piece of paper. It was wet. Guess I know now where that darn ice cube ended up.My shirt had a wet spot on the corner of the pocket about the size of my hand. Could not miss it in the mirror.
As I left the eye doctors and walked across the crosswalks to the bus stop it started to sprinkle again.This wasn't good. I had no rain gear with me. In fact, I had been out on the porch and locked the front door before unlocking the gate, when I decided that the rain was in deed over and back tracked to the tune of re-unlocking the door to put my rain gear back in the house. At that bus top, when I boarded the bus, it was coming down pretty good because the bus driver had his wipers on at a pretty good speed. It rained until I got to the rail station. Long story shorter, I made it home with dry cloths, although, that silly ice cube actually for told of the coming showers. Imagine that! Checkout my Accurate Forecast Humor Graph on my webpage.Then, you can relate totally to why weather is a learned response. We've all heard the old adages about, "
Red at night,sailors delight. Red in the morning, Sailor take warning." Or this one. "When clouds are high and thin, a weather system is moving in." The accurate weather forecast graph is even better yet.
Accurate Weather Forecasting
Stone is wet means it rained or is raining.
Stone is dry means it is not raining.
Stone casting shadow onto ground means it is sunny.
Stone white on top means it is snowing or has snowed.
Stone cannot be seen means it is foggy.
Stone swinging in its sling means it is windy.
Stone jumping up and down in its sling means there is an earthquake.
