I get tired of saying it, but we’re…
…rained out again. I know, this is more disappointing than a Hostess Donut.
We got a complaint from one of our own about our calling it rained out when it didn’t rain at the exact time of the usual event this past Saturday. Blame NOAA. We have none of the fancy weather gear on a pole, or a big Doppler in our yards. Not one of us owns a satellite, either.
For those of you who recently escaped from Fresno, we started making our weather call on Thursday afternoons after our second season. This was after a lot of debate, and plenty of wasted time arguing about it. The debate got to be silly, so to settle it, especially after Apple Weather was more factually incorrect than Amber Herd, we decided to go with the average forecast for the Saturday, using several sources, such as local TV, NOAA, the Weather Channel, including our favorite, Weather Underground.
Sure, some of these sources draw from the same raw data, but they add their own spin and some are slow or fast to update. Weather Underground is the more accurate, but even they have a hard time. We read the NOAA narrative every six hours for the day and sometimes they call it, but leave the door open in case they are wrong. Deciding on if we’re on or off is time-consuming and all of the professionals do get it wrong because of two primary reasons: One, it’s hard to predict how fast a system will move, and two, it’s that darn convergence zone that pushes things north or south at the last minute and makes it tough to pin down the various microclimates around the Eastside. It could be nice in Kirkland while raining in Redmond. Those who gripe are never the ones who do the research on this, they just gripe when we call it and they got it wrong.
Okay, so why do we call the weather on a Thursday when it can still turn out to be a nice day by Saturday? Good question ke-mo sah-bee! By the way, did you know that “kemo sahbee” means, “trusted scout” in Potawatomi? According to an old Gary Larson cartoon, it also means “horses ass,” however, I mean it in the Potawatomi translation of the word. It’s a tiny bit complicated, especially for those in Fresno, but I will explain. By the way, did you know that Fresno is the only city that has the welcome sign as you leave town?
Annual car events, such as the Avants event last Saturday are typically rain or shine. We’re one of the few shows that’s weather-dependent. When it rains, you don’t show up.
For annual shows, it’s not as simple as calling it rained out and shooting for the next Saturday. They don’t do those specific events all summer as we do, where we can just continue the following Saturday. When you’re dealing with food trucks, and other logistics, especially where expenses go out, it’s not so simple. It’s in part why we stopped doing the “Stay-Cation” at Ste. Michelle years ago. It was too much hassle for us and a constant financial risk. That, and the winery was hard to work with under the old ownership. Besides, we’re not a for-profit business like some other car gatherings.
Anyhow, back to our calls. We make the decision on a Thursday at 3 PM when we check the weather for that day and look for an average forecast. We’re a no-go at 30% or higher, but even then, if the window is too narrow, showing a nice morning between rain, we’re going to average it, and lean on the rained-out side, especially if it’s too close to call.
Remember when we tried to play the window on Italian Car Day and got dumped on? That was a lot of cleanup!
The Thursday weather call gives our volunteers advance notice for a day off and we don’t have a big expense just waiting for the following Saturday to continue. Besides it’s usually harder to tell the Saturdays apart than the Olson Twins.
There is nothing worse than expecting volunteers to stand in the rain, then expect them to continue to volunteer for the next pile of Saturdays. We run down valuable resources and none of us want that. It’s difficult to just stand by for good Saturdays as it is.
Weather-dependency is also a part of our E@RTC culture. You unplug from that special someone in the morning and look outside and see it’s soupy, you’re not going to come out, you’ll instead wait for the next nice Saturday. Right? So even if we did call it that we’re on, you’re not going to stop that morning snog just for us.
We’ve got typically about 20-22 decent Saturdays in a season. So, not only do you not show up, few people show up, and so in conclusion, it’s not worth trying to hold it as a rain or shine event.
It’s very different if it’s the only show all season. Then you have to be there or you eat a lot of expense, even when you have a lighter turnout, especially if you’re for profit.
We hope this explains it. It’s a popular topic, we know.
We’d recommend following Cliff Maas if you want to read about the complexity of Northwest weather. I know I learn a lot in the process.
We will try again next week.