the big picture
Amid a deluge of doubtful descriptors, the risk of showers is a forecast most fine, writes MICHAEL McCOY
Ihereby call for a reset of the vocabulary used for all weather reporting henceforth. For a start, ‘fine’ weather and ‘bad’ or ‘poor’ weather need to be redefined. There have been many times in summers of the past 20 years when these descriptors should have been reversed. More heat and sunshine felt like bad weather to me, and rain would have felt very fine indeed. Surely an excess of either is ‘bad’, and both, in balance, could be described as ‘fine’.
I was incredulous, in the middle of the devastating fire season this past summer, when I heard a meteorologist providing a routine report on the radio and repeatedly using the word ‘risk’ in regard to upcoming rain events. “A slight risk of some rain tomorrow afternoon, and a further risk on the weekend.” ‘Hope’, as a replacement word, would have much more accurately described the feelings of every listener. We were desperate for rain!
And I assume it’s the need to appear down-to-earth and cosily unscientific that leads weather reporters to use hilariously vague or anti-negative terminology. I couldn’t count the number of times I’ve heard meteorologists on the radio say, “We’re not expecting too much in the way of showers.”
Not too much? A double negative? Really? What they meant, of course, was ‘maybe very little rain’. But ‘not too much’ reinforces the idea that wet weather is inherently bad. I’ve never heard them say, “We’re not expecting too much sunshine,” as the underlying assumption is there’d be no such thing. I guess that reporting on what they’re not expecting an excess of leaves a wider margin of error.
Alternatively, perhaps we just accept this as the status quo and start to adopt the use of vague and erratically reversed value judgments in garden writing as well. It might be kind of fun. As an example, I randomly provide the following description of my garden, should I ever be brave enough to open it to the public.
“Visitors to Michael McCoy’s garden shouldn’t expect too much in the way of expensive hard-landscaping construction, nor too many delphiniums, roses, geraniums or other traditional English garden plants. There is a small risk of stumbling across a David Austin rose down the back near the clothesline but, in such an event, visitors need not be overly concerned about experiencing too many blooms. Those expecting a small garden may be disappointed, as might those who seek a very large garden experience. All visitors should be warned that there is a high risk of experiencing an excessive diversity of flowers from climates that habitually pose little risk of bad weather.”
Michael blogs at thegardenist.com.au