I traded emails today, with a girl I used to know. (I say "Used to know" since we were once friends and due to my moving 8 times in ten years, kind of lost contact). She's the near-twin of a bit of a hero of mine, Katherine Turner. Okay, at my age, I should use the word "Woman"... but you don't think of your previous bar-buddies as adults. Especially when you were busy coping with life by not dealing with it. "Drowning your sorrows" as it were.
She asked me if all of the meteorologists I know, were making bets on where Wilma was expected to make landfall (thanks to M.W. for the image). Okay, I have to say before I told you my reply, that I'm on super-charged hormonal PMS-dom today. Everything is making me cry... even the Hydrogen Semi-truck parked downstairs, with a nearby town from where I grew up, plastered on the side: Fenton, MI. So what did I say to "Ms. Turner"? At first, we get all excited about this powerful, awesome force of Nature. Then we start to feel ill, realizing that this power is going to kill people and ruin homes and lives.
Bleh.
It really came home to me back in 2003 when I peered out from under a mattress in my then-home, happy to find that I did not, in fact, die in a tornado that was a mere mile from my home. Phew.
So no, this girl isn't interested in wagering on people's lives. I don't think any of us are. We have a certain... respect... for the power, the uncertainty, the fear of making a bad forecast that will change people's lives. It's a big responsibility.
And Thank God I'm not part of FEMA....
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