I Am Recovering From the Epic Nor’easter

First, I want to say that I send my sympathies to all those adversely affected by the storm in New England. What a mess, what a pain and hazard. That said…it did provide some very interesting moments.

One was a very serious report documenting the sad fact that you could not buy a generator anywhere in the area. A serious reporter in cold weather gear advised us that people went to the Home Depot and there were none to be had. Really. Two thoughts occur.

First, this story is as predictable as a reporter riding the elephant when the circus comes to town. Generators always sell out. Not only is this not news, it’s not even a surprise. A story should be a run on generators in July when right-thinking people decide to prepare for the winter which is no doubt ahead – unless they die in the duly-reported heat wave.

Second, standing out in a blizzard is going to be cold and messy. One reporter told us it really hurts when snow gets blown into your eye. Another confirmed that the roads were slick. We saw lines at the grocery store. We were reminded to stay indoors.

This time, the weather forecasters generally overestimated the amount of snow that would hit New York. Like giddy children, weather group-think encourages them to do this. I think it is better to prepare for the worst and then be happily surprised when it’s not so bad. But, oh no – DO NOT do that. You’d better hit it exactly right or you will be accused of overplaying the danger. But if you underestimated, you would have a worse situation, it seems to me.

So, which is better? Keep folks off the streets in warm shelter with some food supplies, or encourage them to take only regular precautions and gamble that you will be right?

We rode out the storm quite nicely here in Texas with warm temperatures and blue skies. We were all quite interested in what was going on, especially my family because our younger son is in New York. But all is well.

All of this makes me think of the general societal problem of LACK OF CONTEXT. My sainted father would say that some people are like geese – they wake up in a new world every morning. And that’s what is happening now. Reporters, editors, producers, bloggers, tweeters and communicators of all stripes have apparently never had ANYTHING happen to them before.

Like super-annulated babies they awake to discover their hands and toes. Everything is a surprise – usually an unpleasant one. Blame must be assessed for every misstep.

I am so deeply bored by them. It is no wonder that people have stopped reading newspapers and pay little attention to what largely passes for news.

The downside to this trend is that these are very dangerous times. We should be paying attention. There are real things to worry about. There ARE monsters under our beds. We just aren’t paying attention because we are worried about generators at Home Depot.