This weekend is supposed to be the first major winter storm of the season for us in the Twin Cities, which is always a news event worthy of front-and-center coverage. Bombs going off in front of embassies? Who cares. Michael Jackson turns out to be a pedophile? Already knew that (and we did, deep down). Massive pork-bomb of an energy bill dies in the senate? So what. We've got bigger fish to fry: it's gonna snow in Minneapolis in November!

Right now, the forecast is for 6-12 inches over the weekend, with the snow not ending until Monday. The ground is already somewhat frozen, so there's a good chance this will be here until next August sometime.

This gives the newscasters (both TV and radio) the opportunity to go out and interview slowplow drivers: "Well, this blade here scrapes the snow off the road into the ditch, then we use a smaller blade called a wing to push it further away from the side of the road so we don't get huge drift piling up. Then ya gotta watch the wear strip on the bottom of the plow, cuz if that wears off, you're grinding into the plow itself, and that gets expensive in a hurry. You betcha."

We also get treated to TV weather forecasters describing low pressure systems using terms like, "moist," and "powerful," and "massively developed," terms I usually associate with an entirely different sort of television.

In the end, I always enjoy a good snowstorm. It given me an excuse to cuddle inside for a few days with She Who Puts Up With Me, and it gives us that wonderful winter pristine look. Just don't make me report on it.

Bonus
Heard at the Technology Committee meeting for a local high school last night:

"Should be survey the students about what they want to use the school's network for?"

"You want to ask a bunch of 9th through 12th graders what they want to use the Internet for? Why bother? I can tell you what the answer will be."