The Weather.

I have always been a bit puzzled by our fascination with the weather.

By "our," I mean the average American living in or near a large city, and not the farmer who depends on the right weather conditions for his livelihood. Weather to him means prosperity or poverty.

But for the rest of us: Why do a half-dozen local television stations have a weather segment in the morning, mid-day, evening, and late-evening news? Personally, my interest could be satisfied with one statement, once a day: "it's 65 in the DFW area and no precipitation expected." Or on the average summer day, "same hellish temperatures as yesterday, we'll let you know when it changes"

Who cares about the two degree difference between Dallas and Denton? How many viewers understand what a high pressure system is, or what a thirty percent chance of precipitation means?  Thirty percent of what? How dependable is the fifth day of a five day forecast? Not very, I say.

Then there is the Weather Channel itself and its "more meteorological than thou" attitude. Honestly, I hate the Weather Channel. Smug WASP bastards. They act like it is their weather, that they understand the hidden secrets of weather forecasting, and that they will dispense their wisdom to the lowly masses as an act of kindness.  Like Prometheus bringing us fire. 

And another thing. I don't like the newsman's restrained excitement when the weather is really bad, like in a hurricane. It seems to me that they are enjoying the spotlight a little too much.  And, during those extreme weather days, the channel plays one commercial after another because that's when people are watching. There's something about profiting from the demise of others that bothers me.  But the entire news business seems that way. Sharks feeding on minnows.

But enough of them.

I understand putting a temperature gauge in your backyard, or even a weather vane. I understand looking out the window to see if it's going to rain, or whether it will be cold or hot, mild or muggy.  All perfectly understandable actions to satisfy our curiosity.

"Normal May temperatures in DFW today, about 85 degrees, cloudy, but no rain expected."

What else do I need to know?

 

R J Matson

The New York Observer and Roll Call.

A (temporary) New World Order

Yesterday, my wife departed Fort Worth on a short trip to visit our son in Philadelphia.

She and I are more grandparents than parents these days, so when she is gone I am left in the house to fend for myself. I don't mind, in fact, I kind of like a few days to watch too much television, leave the potato chip bag on the coffee table, and find my books and magazines wherever it is that I had last left them.

I have a re-organizational ritual on occasions like this which, I am sure, is rooted in a male territorial instinct. Here it is:

1. I clean and reorganize the refrigerator. It doesn't need cleaning but I like to be able to easily get to the few things I want.
2. I do my laundry and stack the clean clothes on the dryer. Why bother putting them away?
3. Bathroom. I find the biggest towel I can and throw it on the floor. It's more masculine, like a locker room.
4. I put the dishes away and close up the dishwasher for the duration. No need for dishes now, I'm going to paper plates, baby.
5. Clear the kitchen counters of all bric-a-brac. Bricabrac is defined as anything that looks nice but serves no purpose and just gets in my way.
6. Pull out a roll of paper towels, place on kitchen counter. I'm feeling better already.
7. Rearrange the living room furniture to maximize comfort and to minimize extraneous movement (see photo above). The goal is for everything that is frequently needed to be at arms length of the couch. I then run through a mental checklist of the near-couch necessities:

Books -- check,
Crossword puzzles -- check,
Pens -- got 'em,
TV Remote on coffee table -- check
Wall Street Journal -- check.
Laptop on coffee table, check.
Baseball schedule and basketball playoffs for the week. AOK.

 The final step in this domicilic-bonding is to go shopping for items that I particularly like. Not that the wife doesn't keep me supplied, but I always need a few things. This time I went to my favorite store, Dollar General, and picked up the following (see picture): paper plates, bag of dry pinto beans (not sure why I bought those), jalapeno papers, cereal, lots of cereal, paper towels, albacore tuna in water, Triscuit wheat crackers.

Upon completion of all these things, I look at all that I have done, and declare, "It is good." Male order has been restored. I have re-marked my territory.

In a couple days I'll be complaining about it being too quiet, but for now, I'm ready for some serious time-wasting.

(Miss you, dear, and I will clean up before you get back. Love, Me)

Fort Worth Blogs. What's New? What's Changing?

We have a healthy list of active bloggers in Fort Worth. We have a few dropping off but many more starting. 

Following is a list of new blogs and a couple of our most prominent blogs. For a more complete list of Fort Worth sites and blogs see the column to the right: "Local Sites I like."

June Naylor. Fort Worth Star Telegram food critic, June Naylor, started a blog a few months ago and is commenting on her travels around Texas. This blog provides reviews of popular and out-of-the-way restaurants in Fort Worth and all of Texas. She promotes her Texas Toast Culinary Tours through the blog. It is well written, of course, and a great resource for Texas lovers.

FortWorthology. Still "numero uno" for building and development information in Fort Worth as well as up to date business news on restaurants. Great photos and detailed information. Kevin Buchanan is a part of the Near Southside development group that promotes the area just south of downtown, including my favorite street, Magnolia.

Eat This Fort Worth. The best blog for information on what to do in Fort Worth -- this weekend. And good reviews of area restaurants. Always up-to-date information for food lovers in Fort Worth.

Steven Wade Smith. Steve hasn't posted much lately but he does have a sidebar on his blog where he reports on what he is reading, watching, or listening to. The sidebar always has something good. Steve is a writer worth emulating.

DFW.com the food blog: The most visited food-related site in Fort Worth. DFW.com is a product of the Fort Worth Star Telegram.

Long Horn Lucy. I think she is retiring. Sorry to say. I like her posts.

Thoughts of Net Developer. Jake is not posting on his blog as much as he used to but if you follow him on Twitter (gooberdlx) you can keep up with the web, cloud computing, Apple,  assorted tech things, Drop.io -- and restaurants, pubs, etc., in Fort Worth.

Hole in the Wall -- still cranking out good restaurant reviews. One or two a month. Unless I'm mistaken Hole in the Wall hasn't posted in about a month.

The Ravelled Sleave. A frequent commenter on F&FW. A good blogger and a devoted knitter.

Food and Fort Worth: Drivel -- don't waste your time.

New to me:

Just Me Saying. I like this blog. Easy to read and informative. Food, tech, Fort Worth.

Doohickie. Fort Worth guy writing about life in Fort Worth, especially bicycling.

Horsebits. This one is hard to put in a category but I have been going there often since I found it. Very bright guy, written in a stream-of-consciousness type way with lots of interesting links. Book reviews, business practices. One of my favorites.

Jack Bauer. A Man of Constant Sorrows.

"Odysseus slept. And lightly the ship sped on, bearing that man who had suffered so much sorrow of heart in passing through wars of men and through troublous seas--the ship sped on." The Odyssey by Homer.

Once again, Jack Bauer has been rejected by everyone around him in the final hours of his 24 hour assignment. Even the President of the United States has tried to arrest him. And Chloe. Although we knew that couldn't last. Now she has been replaced as CTU Director by an evil henchman of President Logan and, I feel certain, will find a way back to Jack's team.

And another love interest is dead. Renee. Not my favorite character in many ways, but I have to admit I was sorry to see her go. Jack seems to like the muscular but well endowed types. All a little too androgynous for me. But I have never been attracted to girls who can beat me in an arm wrestle. Be that as it may, Renee is dead. As are all the girls with whom Jack has been romantically involved. Jack is a male black widow. First bed, then dead. It's a tragic formula.

Jack being the self-conscious man that he is, blames himself for the pain he has brought to his friends, and rightly so. SWM seeks SWF. Former love-interests: Teri Bauer, Nina Myers, Audrey Raines, Renee Walker. All dead or whereabouts unknown.

But I love Jack, he follows in the great tradition of sad and reluctant heroes, from the ancient Odysseus to our modern day Spiderman. Something in us likes our heroes to suffer.

All Jack Bauer wants is to return to his daughter, to find a woman to love and who can stay alive more than one year, and for justice to rule the earth. Not too much to ask. But I doubt he will get any of the above. He will not walk off into the sunset at the end of the series. He will have succeeded in saving the world but he will be alone at the end. There are unforeseeable twists to come; maybe his first wife is still alive, maybe Dalia Hassan was motivated by revenge and plotted her husband's death, maybe Tony's still alive. Who knows, but the surprises are not over.

Which reminds me that there is another Jack in TV Land whose plot has twisted one too many times for me, and that Jack, albeit a man of sorrows as well, whines too much to be a really cool hero -- and I have abandoned any hope of understanding "alto" world. I am referring, of course, to LOST.

But I get 24's Jack Bauer. And it's been fun.
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Post Scripts

1. Heroes in TV and Movie frequently have names that begin with a "J". Jack being the most frequent. See an old post: Jack Bauer's Man-Purse
2. My thanks to Schuyler Whately, from whom I first heard the phrase "a man of constant sorrows" in reference to Jack Bauer. The phrase comes from song lyrics of Dick Burnett, circa 1913, and was made popular in the movie, Oh Brother Where art Thou. I believe the earliest origin of the phrase is from the Book of Isaiah: He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not.