DEATH STORM 2010 IS COMING!!!!

So I was watching the news yesterday and today, and the latest weather reports show that us Michiganders will be getting our first "real" snow tonight/tomorrow morning. In keeping with long-standing (ahem!) tradition, it's time once again for me to post this ditty that I first wrote 5 years ago...with the occasional edit or 2 here and there, it still applies to today, as well as anytime we have any snowfall forecast around here. Enjoy!

DEATH STORM 2010!!!!

Since yesterday, the Detroit media has been full of warning as a nice little snow shower is hitting our area tonight and tomorrow. In Metro Detroit I can expect to see a couple inches of snow by tomorrow morning (That oughta make rush-hour fun!), for example. That being said, by later on this evening, you'll swear that "The Event" is taking place or something, the way these asshats blow everything out of proportion.

What always amazes me about the news coverage is that you end up seeing the same shit on the TV stations with every storm. Each and every station could, and should, just run a tape of their broadcasts from the last time a snowstorm came through town, since the same shit is always reported. Keep this in mind when you are watching the news broadcasts the next day or 2:

Here's how it works in Detroit, at least:

1) First, you get the overweight reporter (and it's always a black guy, too....Jesse Jackson needs to forget about non-existant Diebold vote fraud in Ohio and Florida, and instead look into this obvious form of racial discrimination!) who stands outside in the falling torrent of snow, then proceeds to tell you that "Yep, it's snowing pretty good now!".

2) Next, you have the blond reporterette who's hanging out with the salt truck drivers. Always get the obligatory reference from one of the workers that "we'll be doing this all night!", somehow, as well. Imagine that, working until the job is actually done...what a concept!

3) Cut over to video of some senior citizens standing in line to buy shovels and snowblowers hours before the storm hits...because we know that Michigan never gets snow in the wintertime! There are plenty of unemployed kids teenagers who could use extra money shoveling your snow, grandpa.

4) Next, we get the weather guy, who's been "on alert" all day just for us, telling us just how bad the snow is going to make life for us. Yes, without the weatherman around, I wouldn't know that I should allow a few extra minutes to get to wherever I'm going, or that I should probably slow down when driving on 3 inches of unplowed snow. Thanks, dude!

5. Make sure that no matter what, this snowstorm is the STORM OF THE CENTURY (complete with ominous-sounding music at the beginning of the updates)! Either that, or regardless of what may have happened in earlier year, this snowstorm is definitively THE BLIZZARD OF '10!!

6. Break into everyone's favorite daytime and evening programming to remind them that it's snowing. Yes, because people, evidently, are either too stupid or too lazy to peek out of their windows and figure that out for themselves.

7. Special reports from the local supermarket, where senior citizens are falling over each other in the aisles to get to the last available gallon of water, the last available gallon of milk, or the last loaf of bread. As we all know, milk and bread are the two most important items to have when protecting one's self from inclement weather.

8. Cue the safety czar up, reminding everyone to keep a warm blanket and a shovel in your car should go off into a ditch and get stuck for a couple of days.

9. Don't forget the friendly county sheriff (Mark Hackel seems to be the go-to guy in Detroit - he's quite the handsome fellow, too!) who shows up, making his plea to people to stay off the roads "if you absolutely don't have to be on the roads". That's actually pretty good advice when it's also 80 and sunny outside, but somehow it's supposed to sound more impressive when it's said during wintertime.

Somehow, we'll manage to survive all of this, until DEATH STORM 2010 V2 hits us, at least.