Blogtrek

Transgender Hurricane

I have been looking at the hurricane map to see if any more storms threaten our neck of the woods. Juan formed but then went north to hit Nova Scotia. Kate formed; she headed north, then northeast, then back to the southwest, and now west. She is heading first for Bermuda and then for the Carolinas. But the weather forecasters say this big beautiful too cold for this time of the year air mass over us is going to block Kate and make her go north, about now. So we don't have to worry about her.

Then there's Larry. He formed deep in the Gulf of Mexico near Honduras, and has been sitting there the past few days. Then they said he was going to cross to the south and get out into the Pacific, where it will climb up the coast as a Pacific hurricane. This means supposedly that he gets a new name, since the Pacific has their own system of hurricane names. Hurricanes have changed names before. Fifi changed her name to Orlene after causing thousands of deaths in Honduras. That was back when they named all hurricanes after women. Himmicanes did not come into existence until 1979. But when they did, that brought up the possibility that a hurricane will undergo a sex change. The latest attempt at this was Himmicane Cesar in 1996, which was going to become Chantal or something like that when he crossed Central America. But some other storm became Chantal instead, and so Cesar merely changed his name to Douglas. But now Larry wants to get into the Pacific. If so, the latest tropical storm in the Pacific is Olaf, near Cabo San Lucas. The next name is Patricia. So will Larry become Patricia? Will a tropical storm change gender? Is Larry transgender?

Then I read in the 12 noon hurricane report that if Larry retains tropical storm strength as he crosses Central America, he will retain the name of Larry in the Pacific, but if he dissipates (I suppose become depression or lower), then regains strength as a tropical storm in the Pacific, then it becomes Patricia, provided another storm hasn't appeared first in the Pacific. Besides, the latest predictions call for Larry to dissipate and stay dissipated. That's that with transgender hurricanes; apparently it won't happen.