The Cowboy Poet's Weather Alert

There must be a real cowboy poet working at the National Weather Service in Idaho considering the lonesome, introspective flourish of this recent 'Local Weather Alert' for Boise:

The recent reappearance of El Nino... And the often-discussed topic of climate change... May prompt the question... Why are we having this storm? Scientifically... This particular storm cannot be tied to any one process. For most of this warm season... Up until about three weeks ago...The Northwest United States was in a persistent pattern of below normal temperatures and above normal rainfall. This storm signals a return to that pattern. It appears likely that this pattern will dominate the summer of 2009. This is not to say we will not have another hot spell... But overall this summer will end up being relatively cool and wet for most folks in our part of the country.

Not only is our man reporting on the strangeness of observable weather conditions, he's tying it all back to larger concerns like man's vain attempt to classify and make meaning of the events surrounding us. Ultimately he asks, why it is; only to conclude that the feeble scientific tools at our disposal may never be up to the task of unraveling the mysteries of the world, like El Nino and the dread spectre of global warming. And we are left with our strange weather, our faith, and the familiar feeling that we may all be little more than victims of a world we can't control.