Eye on Doppler

Batten down the hatches. Herd the cows and pigs into the barn and tell Aunt Sue-Ann to get baby Jimbo out of the alfalfa patch — we’re gonna have ourselves a snowstorm.

I know something’s gone terribly awry when the preceding rural rant is the only message I hear as I watch the evening weather report.

I’m convinced all our local “meteorologists,” even Fox 5’s Sue Palka, get instantly excited when the slightest green formation surfaces on the Doppler 907492.124XLPZV4.2. All my favorites sit at their news desks grinning like idiots, ready to break the news that yes, folks, this winter, it … just … may … snow. Excuse me while I choke on my hot chocolate with those cute little marshmallows in it. What? Snow? I don’t believe you, Mr. Topper Shutt, sir. Topper Shutt also happens to be the single most ridiculous name ever to exist, but I’ll refrain from taking this wintry whine to a personal level.

As if Topper feels my disbelief, he then turns to camera two and responds, “Yes, we could have a potential record-setter on our hands. Let’s go to the radar.”

Here we go the radar. Now we get someone with a college degree telling me the giant snowflake wearing a hat and earmuffs right on top of Washington means we could see some snow.

The whole Washington area loves to jump on the blizzard bandwagon. A few weeks ago, just days before the “huge storm” that gently blanketed my driveway with less than four inches of soft powder, I woke up to the morning weather report on the radio. “Well, it looks like we could have a real doozy on our hands,” the weather woman screamed in true meteorological form. Listen, if you’re getting paid to tell me what to wear and whether I’ll get wet if I walk outside, find something a little more descriptive than “doozy.”

The members of the Fox weather team, working around the clock to stick their collective hand out the window, will always remain my favorite. The only station that informed me my toaster could be plotting the murder of my daughter and anthrax is probably dripping from my closet hangers also tells me not to leave my house whenever it snows. Fox proudly shows roaming reporters with mucus icicles dangling from their noses standing in the middle of slushy side streets or in the barren toilet paper aisles of convenience stores. Are there toilet paper aisles? Exactly.

But between the “arctic blasts” and the “black ice,” I sense a curious conspiracy in the making. As the media reports on the precarious conditions, the public pretty much grants Transportation Services free reign to mitigate the situation. As a result, thousands of trucks are loaded with expert drivers, friction-packed sand and snow-melting salt and sent streetbound, ready to disperse their granulated greatness at the sign of the first flurry. And who pays for the trucks, sand, salt and the repaving of the roads, which are destroyed by the trucks, sand and salt? Ah, the taxpayers.

If the snow recovery portion of the budget increases and a cut of money goes to Fox 5 to push for more “blizzard” coverage, what could keep this gubernatorial conspiracy in check? Nothing.

Of course, this theory holds no factual basis. But next time the streets house more sand than snow and reporters have moved from “frigid temperatures” to “frozen tundra,” don’t be so quick to dismiss it.

What’s the point, you ask? I just wonder what would happen if it did snow. Mother Nature blitzed Boston with 30 inches in mid-January, and I’m sure life continues as normal in Beantown. If we somehow received 30 inches of snow, though, schools would close for at least a week and the waiting list for double-ply toilet paper would be longer than Sue Palka’s … 10-day forecast.

Bob, Topper, Sue and friends, I mean no harm. I need you. We need you. Keep exaggerating, keep pointing to your oversized map and keep eyeballing Doppler. We’ll finish this later, because the thermometer momentarily dipped to 31.5 degrees and millions of people remain peaceful and untroubled. Get back on the air, and let the hysteria begin.

Geremy Bass is a freshman journalism major. He can be reached at gbass@umd.edu.