A massive blizzard has been descending on the Midwest for the past several days. Every weatherman has prognosticated road closures and snow drifts and whiteouts. As the blizzard descended on Sunday night, dumping massive amounts of snow and gusting with 80 mile-an-hour winds, school districts across the region announced school closures for Monday. The interstate closed. The mall and the bus-line closed. Police issued no-travel advisories.
Except for my school, which can never seem to figure out the signs of impending doom.
So I dragged my sorry self to school, slipping and sliding on the ice the whole way there. As I’m prepping for my classes, I get the following email:
Sent: Monday, March 23, 2008 10:00 AM
Subject: Classes to cancel at noonDue to unforeseen travel difficulties, many students and faculty have found it difficult or dangerous to make it to campus. Consequently, classes will be canceled today starting at 11:00 AM.
That a massive, impending blizzard could be described in any way as unforeseen suggests that the university administrators’ grasp of the weather is shaped less from the National Weather Service or the Weather Channel than it is from, say, this:
