Only dead fish go with the flow

I thought it deserved title billing. I have nothing else to say about that.

What I want to talk about is weather. I liked it better when there was more mystery to the forecast. That is a recurrent theme here, not as prevalent as apathy, but a second to be sure: demystification as my own personal tragedy. I liked it when the weatherman wasn't so cocksure, didn't know, for instance, within a single degree of certainty, what would happen. I like getting caught in the rain, or being surprised by a too-hot day. I like weather that sneaks up on you. I guess I should live on the gulf coast of Florida, although they too have weather men sitting on their beaten shores, cameras poised for every breath of wind. I should be grateful, I guess, that we don't name our weather and have to consider gender and the pc-ness of hurricane women. I'm a hurricane and damned proud of it. Well, I used to be a contender.

Anyway, I liked having to pack for a day in the insincere, or maybe capricious, no... indecisive might be the perfect word... northwest. (As inappropriate as it is, I enjoy assigning human characteristics to non-human stuff. Reification? I think that's the word.) I liked having to carry a sweater because maybe, just maybe, a cloud might come by and relieve the monstrous heat. I liked layering, even though it made me look fatter. Now, weatherguys are obsolete. They could post the weather on the rolling marquee at the bottom of the TV screen and stop standing in front of a photorealistic map and saying stupid shit, like, "Well, the expected high is 120 but we might see 122. Tomorrow, Portland residents can look for some relief as a cooling trend will give us a high of 118." Nowadays, there's even a screen that tells you what the temperature will be at 6,10, 2, 8 and midnight. That's no fun. Where is the surprise of a sweetly cool Saturday morning, sitting outside for breakfast and getting caught in a sprinkle of summer rain if you know its coming. You can act surprised and like you wish you hadn't straightened your hair, but fuck it. You knew it was coming. Admit it.