Let's talk about the weather

It's been a strange year for weather. Really.

Early this year, in late January or early February (hey, I don't remember exactly, I've slept since then), here in Harrison County Texas we had a tornado touch down in the morning and snow and ice that afternoon and overnight.

I should have known right then that it was going to be a brutal year. We've had tornado outbreaks that blew the minds of storm-chasers everywhere (North Carolina, Alabama, and Joplin). We've had record heatwaves and drought. We just had Irene rock and roll all the way up the east coast. And earthquakes in Japan (don't forget the massive tsunami), and of all places--Virginia.

I can't help it, this shit has been on my mind lately. How could it not be? The East Coast is getting drowned by all that rain from Irene and we have had negligible amounts of rain here in the ArkLaTex this year. North Dakota has areas under winter storm warnings, and it has been over 100 degrees around here for months (with the exception of yesterday, which was freaky as hell at 86).

I just can't help but wonder how bad we have fucked up the planet. When is she going to really turn on us? It's just a matter of time.Yet we have idiots like Palin out there screaming "drill baby drill" like that's going to help anything.

Speaking of dingbat right wing nuts, Bachmann going public with that idiocy about Irene was god telling politicians to cut the deficit (or whatever wacky shit she said god was telling us with Irene). I do not believe that Irene was a deity's message to politicians any more than I believe that Katrina was some deity's retribution on New Orleans for "wickedness". So there, right wing nut job bitch, eat that. And choke on it.

Sure, the planet goes through natural cycles with weather extremes (can you say "ice age"?), but I firmly believe that we are making the problem far worse than it would be without our interference.

It all makes me want to go recycle shit, use fabric shopping bags (check), and carpool (whenever possible, check), and all that earth friendly shit. I already give away my clothes & shoes that I don't wear anymore, I don't want my gross consumerism to wind up in landfills (even though my clothes would eventually return to the earth from whence they came, because I abhor synthetics). Speaking of recycling, why the fuck is it so hard to find a recycle drop-off here in the wilds of East Texas? Oh, yeah, "drill baby drill", because Texas is the land of oilmen and cows and shit.

Wherever you are, I hope that you survived Irene with a minimum of trauma. I hope that you are not experiencing record drought and heat. And I hope like hell that you are not under that winter storm watch shit in North Dakota--in motherfucking August, for Fuck's sake.