LOCAL STATIONS CAUGHT MAKING UP WEATHER

(Bland Junction) Police detained fifteen local weather persons in connection with the alleged misuse of FCC licenses and falsifying or concocting fictitious weather reports. In addition local officers confiscated an estimated ten dollars worth of sophisticated forecasting equipment, a host of neglected bunions and trick knees, several undernourished homing pigeons and a wide assortment of potentially pornographic weather charts.

     “It is clear to us that some really shady behavior was going on right under our noses,” said one arresting officer. “It’s clear that most of these weather hacks couldn’t pass a high school meteorology test!”

     Several of those in question admitted that the station had been making up the weather since about 1990 when the state government cut back on subsidies for toy telescopes and applied environmental controls to the procedures for collecting atmospheric tidings.

     “We admit it,” chided one station manager. “We’ve been rolling dice on weather for quite a while. If we throw a five or a six it’s going to be hot and dry. If we throw a four or a two it will be windy. Doubles usually means rain or snow depending on the time of the year,” he explained. “If we throw doubles twice in a row that means the world is going to end,” he laughed. “Fortunately with the downward spiraling attention span within our audience nobody seems to remember our program the next morning anyway.”

     At the preliminary arraignment one former “weather girl” told of wild parties where wine coolers and chips were often present on the set. The testimony was challenged by attorneys for management who asked, “Is this the kind of behavior one would expect from people who are on record as believing the summer solstice is an evil pagan holiday?”

     If convicted the entire crew could a stiff fine and banishment from the air waves but that is not likely. Calls for immediate deportation to proverbial fields of lore were waved off on the state level.

     “It’s really too bad citizens are too lazy to predict their own weather,” commented a chubby court reporter from the other side of her mouth. “It’s just like fishing. When I was younger my uncle Red used to throw dynamite into a pond and catch his limit in no time. You can’t do that today, can you?”

     She did not, nor was she asked, to elaborate.

-Uncle Pahgre