Hay Fever & Timing

So, on the drive to work this morning, I'm listening to a news station, waiting for John Madden to do his morning schtick... when I hear that "Authorities" are claiming that this will be the worst flu season ever, bringing together a perfect storm of pollen.

Hmm, I think. Didn't they use this last year or the year before when the hit movie was "A Perfect Storm" And then I started thinking, wait, I've heard this before... every year for the past 7-8 years in the Bay Area I hear the same thing, that *this* Spring, unprecedented pollen count is about to descend on hapless unsuspecting allergy sufferers.

I remember this because *EVERY* year I hear this pronouncement by the "authorities" I say a prayer of thankfulness and then kick myself because my allergies, though hardly ever as overwhelming as pollen sufferers seem to have it, are based on temperature.

Yeah, you heard that right, TEMPERATURE. Like, the second I hop out of bed in the morning I start sneezing and wheezing cause the temperature dropped 10 degrees between in bed and out of bed. But I digress....

Anyway, the whole point of this post is, WHO ARE THE AUTHORITIES who make this pronouncement every year, WHY IS EVERY YEAR THE WORST YEAR in a decade or so, and WHO IS PAYING FOR THIS ANNOUNCEMENT TO OCCUR EVERY damn year.

My guess is to all this is, gee, could it be that someone is making money off having news produced this way? Nah, not in America. No one could be manipulating the news....

*mutters to herself P.T. Barnum was right*