Here in the volunteer state, news stories dripped in over
the last couple of week. Oh, Christmas and New Year’s Day have come, and a
peppering of break-ins and fires have made the nightly news programs. For the
most part, however, not much occurs during this time of year. The result is
that the normal becomes the spectacular.
Some television stations report car wrecks. I’m not talking
about the ones where serious injuries or even fatalities occur. No, I’m talking
about the ones where cars slide off the road when they hit slick spots and then
plummet into a ditches. I am all for traffic safety, and anyone who crashes has
my sympathies, but come on, nearly 17,000 car wrecks happen each day, so
they’re not newsworthy.
The flu always seems to garner plenty of air time. Each year
newscasts drown viewers with reports of the latest strands of flu and the
effects of them. I think I’ve had the flu one time and don’t recall the
experience as being a pleasant one. Over the years, colds and bronchitis (when
I was a smoker) laid me low. The truth is that the flu bug, colds, and
upper-respiratory ailments hit us Americans this time each and every year. It
can’t be news to us. Perhaps a better story might be about how dumb we are for
not taking a flu shot to avoid the misery.
Just the other night a local channel reported that three
hikers had been rescued after being lost in the Great Smoky National Park. I
was glad to hear it until the story went on to report what those rescued said.
It seems that they weren’t prepared for the cold weather or snow, and those
things contributed to their becoming lost.
What? Unless I’ve been unconscious or completely screwed up
most of my life (some would say that assessment is correct on both counts), the
end of December and beginning of January are part of the winter
The last few days stations have proven just how starved they
are for stories. The majority of the news time has discussed the cold weather
here in Tennessee, as well as the rest of the country. Snow storms and frigid
temperature hammer several states to the north and east. Even as far south as
Florida, temperatures are expected to drop into the teens.
Here in Knoxville, the prognosticators call for temperature
in the single digits with windchills dipping into minus numbers. Some reports
advise how to keep pipes from freezing and what to do with outside pets.
Are we really that stupid? I’m a native Knoxvillian, and I
can recall multiple times when the temperatures dropped as low as today’s
forecasted ones. In fact, one year the temperatures were so low that my car
froze to the driveway, and I had to call AAA to unstick it. Knoxville recorded
the lowest temperature in the nation with a -24 (January 21, 1985). Eleven days
later my son Dallas was born, and the temperatures still hovered around the
bottom of the thermometer.
In case anybody didn’t get the memo, IT’S WINTER! That
usually means that temperatures plunge and, albeit infrequently these days,
snow can fall. Many of us have crawled under houses to wrap water pipes with
newspapers or to thaw them with hair dryers. Only the cruelest persons leave
pets outside during unusually cold times. They should be the real new story.
Attention should be on their acts and the trials that sentence them to prison
for such terrible deeds. But the fact is that winter, even with all its
freezing temperatures and piles of snow, isn’t news; it’s life. Now, folks who
are hardest hit have our thoughts and prayers, but if they want to avoid such
times, they might consider moving wise south of the Mason-Dixon Line, where
temperatures are moderate.
I’ll be glad to see spring come. The terrible stories of the
winter will be long gone. However, on a slow news day we will probably hear
about all the rain and soggy weather that is coming. I, for one, would just as
soon not hear anything about the weather other than the highs, lows, and
chances of rain. If no important news is available for the day, a rerun of
“Judge Judy” suits me fine.
1 comment:
Hey be Happy you old GRUMP!!
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