Day Forty-four: This is Getting Ridiculous

It's currently Tuesday night, and the Northeastern United States is sending itself into a tizzy because -- oh, my God -- it's going to snow.

Keep in mind, if you are not from this area (which is unlikely, if you are reading this) it snowed a whole hell of a lot on Saturday. The roads, while almost completely clear, are still icy and snowy in some spots on side streets. Now, it's going to snow again. And everyone is freaking out. Personally, I don't understand why meteorologists get so worked up over a snow storm to the point where they broadcast coverage from multiple areas for hours and hours on end, tracking the amount sticking to the ground, and putting their cameras on cars stuck in snowbanks because somebody thought whatever they had to do was more important than their safety. In one story predicting tomorrow's impending storm (which will be anywhere from six to twenty inches), they actually referred to this string of constant snowstorms as the "Snowmageddon". I'm really sick of this crap. Snow, in itself, is not life-threatening. And I would be extremely surprised if two decent snowstorms within a week is enough to end the world. New England deals with it all the time.

Sure, power might go out, but we're an advanced and wealthy enough society that we can cover ourselves in several layers of clothing and blankets and either read by candlelight or play stupid drinking games for entertainment. Pipes might freeze, which would be extremely unfortunate and slightly more dangerous, but mostly it would be inconvenient. But, I don't think we'd die. So enough with the drama. It's not like it's a hurricane or an earthquake, because those are legitimate catastrophes and actually injure people and wreak havoc.

In addition to trying to frighten viewers into staying glued to their televisions, there's also this mess with constant information. Do I really need to know that PennDot is working around the clock to salt and plow roads? Do I really need to know that it has snowed half an inch in the past hour? Do I really need to know what Delaware looks like? And most of all, do I REALLY need to know that it is, in fact, STILL snowing? While it's certainly entertaining to watch blithering overpaid morons stand outside in their Totes and company-provided parka and be continuously pelted in the face with wet, cold powder, it's not doing me any good. Any of the information these dimwits are providing me I can either get by looking out my window or actually going outside. Given, in fact, that I actually care. If it's blizzarding outside, there isn't really much I can do about it, is there? Short of standing in front of the window thinking, "wow, that's going to be a real bitch to shovel," I can't do anything else. I cannot make it stop snowing, I can't clear my driveway, and I can't prevent it from getting colder. So why is it necessary that I stay alert on the current snow situation? When it stops, I'll go outside and deal with it. And by then, the news crews won't find the storm nearly as interesting and will move on to sticking cameras in the faces of people trying to clear their sidewalks.

So really, it's getting ridiculous. Enough with the storm coverage. Maybe, just maybe, because we've had one really good snow storm already, the news crews will not care quite as much about this bout of snow. And I'll sit inside and watch it snow and go stir-crazy, again.