El Nino... Story of the Year... barely spoken about... Why?

Today's blog is dedicated to the bad boy of this winter that has been hiding in the Pacific while we worry on politics and bills in Congress and money that needs to go to rebuild Haiti and whether or not Sarah Palin is smart enough to write down reminders of the 3 most important points she wants to make vs men who have been President who could not remember where Estonia is...

In the play of politics and life and love... El Nino is the secret killer of this 2010 Winter Wonderland experience that is beginning to be a lot like Groundhog Day. What day is today? Oh, there's more snow... it must be the weekend.. or Tuesday.

El Nino is getting about as little play as heart disease for women usually gets, everyone worries on the man playing tennis or shoveling snow but forgets how many women die from what they think is a pain in their back or the flu.

http://www.goredforwomen.org (check out warning signs)

But, back to 1997. Seems it was a slow year. We had some measure of economic prosperity and there wasn't much to talk about other than smoking cigars in the White House... and El Nino took center stage as the Media played his presence up big time.

http://darwin.bio.uci.edu/~sustain/ENSO.html

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,986853,00.html

Good articles, can still learn a lot from that article and many others but every El Nino is a horse of a different color. They set up in different parts of the Pacific, at different depths of the ocean...they grow at different rates.. each has it's own inherent problems. When it was the Hurricane Season everyone on our side of the Pacific was cheering, those on the other side were dealing with nonstop tropical events. Now that the Southern Jet has been enhanced and the Pineapple Express is in place (meteorological term ...not the movie.......) we are besieged with one bout of snow from Oklahoma to the Mid-Atlantic States. Los Angeles is a muddy mess and homes are sliding down the hillsides faster than the cake that is melting in the rain near McArthur Park.... and I worked near McArthur Park in an El Nino Year in LA and telling you it was messy. Where's Dr. George when you need him?

The real McArthur Park in LA... pretty isn't it?



Very few articles out there today about El Nino, which I find odd as it is the reason that we are having an endless winter with record setting cold, snowfall and yet... it's barely being mentioned. It should be. Possibly, it is not politically correct to talk about the reality that Global Warming is a No Show for this year's Olympics.

So, do we pretend it doesn't exist and any day now we will go back to a busy hurricane season and warm temps somewhere and the snow will melt and we will move on with the misguided GW movement? Or is it time to possibly admit that we don't know as much as Dr. William Gray and other pretty infamous weather experts who ride their bikes to work and have great legs but have not totally bought into the Global Warming Conspiracy. And, that is what it is... a conspiracy .. because when you have friends (and I do) who have been told to talk about it on air and/or not to give their own negative thoughts on it for fear of losing their jobs... that's a conspiracy. That is not science working at a free market level of sharing data and doing research first before they publicize their work... flawed work.

I do believe in recycling, carpooling, riding a bike to work and leaving behind a smaller carbon footprint, but not because I believe in Global Warming but because I believe we need to be better stewards of this beautiful planet earth.

And, this winter El Nino is the man about town even if no one is talking about him. Even if he is an illegal alien denied entry to the party and we are just hoping he will go away like winter usually does and Spring does it's thing.

Shrimpers are talking about it, fighting over their fleet's productivity. It is a big issue in International Law.

Here in the States... I did find this mention online... a good mention, well written!

http://www.wral.com/weather/blogpost/6991455/

To quote the President just now speaking live, "over time will gravitate towards the truth" and though he was not talking about Global Warming I think it's a good comment.

The West Coast Press cannot ignore it. After the next snow storm hits New York City and creates havoc... will they be able to ignore it on this coast?

http://www.kbnd.com/376202.aspxhttp://articles.latimes.com/2010/feb/06/
local/la-me-rain6-2010feb06

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=123380157&ps=cprs

So, I ask again why is El Nino suddenly the odd man out in the media? No, it did not cause the earthquake in Haiti and no it did not cause the Economic Recession...though it will set back recovery some as food prices are affected at the market place.

My brother in Greece says Americans still have their head in the ground like the proverbial ostrich and only think on their part of the world.

In the Philippines it's a story...

http://www.malaya.com.ph/02102010/busi3.html

And, we are a global world and what affects another part of the world will affect our world. Our snow storm came due east all the way from Colorado to Oklahoma to Arkansas to North Carolina..

I wish newscasters would not dumb down weather to the general public and teach them, explain to them what is going on.

Dr. George, one of the best doing his thing out in KTLA land in Los Angeles in the 1980s.



Watch that man explain the weather, so few do that today...



Then again, there are a lot of things from my life in L.A. in the 1980s that I cannot begin to understand... oh what a time it was...



If you want to read a bit more about El Nino, this is a great place to do so..

http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/lanina/enso_evolution-status-fcsts-web.pdf

I'm a little out of it today, it's cold and gray and dreary in Raleigh. Missing Miami and worrying a bit on a few things down there that need to be taken care of and I will take care of when I get back. Have another Bar Mitzvah for a friend's son this weekend and then I am Bar Mitzvahed out and am moving on to the Jewish Holiday of Purim. I need warm weather and warm water and I do mean Wrightsville Beach lol. I mean a Florida Beach... but for now am going to enjoy the weather I have as a friend of mine likes to say... it's the only weather I got.

Chow for Now
Bobbi