A Perfectly Normal Weather Event

Your Guide to This Weekend’s Bomb Cyclone

So there’s a bomb cyclone coming.

Not a metaphorical one. Not a political one. An actual meteorological phenomenon with a name that sounds like it was invented by a teenager playing a weather-themed video game. A “bomb cyclone.” The kind that makes emergency planners use words like “dangerous” and “outages” and “please God stay inside.”

The US East Coast is about to get absolutely battered this weekend. Heavy snow. Strong winds. Coastal disruption. The sort of thing that makes you wonder if Mother Nature has finally had enough of our nonsense and decided to respond in kind.

But here’s the thing… and I want to be very clear about this… this is completely normal.

Nothing to see here.

Just weather doing weather things.

The Art of Not Mentioning It

There’s a peculiar skill we’re all developing these days. It’s the ability to watch a bomb cyclone form, see emergency services scrambling, observe meteorologists using phrases like “rapid intensification” and “unprecedented conditions,” and then… not mention the thing.

You know the thing I mean.

The thing that the current administration has made very clear does not exist. The thing that, according to Trump and his team, is a hoax. A liberal conspiracy. Fake news. Something invented by people who hate freedom and probably don’t even own trucks.

Climate change.

There. I said it. The forbidden phrase. The Voldemort of weather conversations.

But don’t worry, I won’t say it again. Because apparently, we’re all meant to pretend that these “extreme weather events” are just… what? Coincidence? God’s sense of humour? A series of completely unrelated atmospheric tantrums that have absolutely nothing to do with the carbon we’ve been pumping into the sky like it’s going out of fashion?

Your Approved Vocabulary Guide

To help you navigate this weekend’s festivities without accidentally suggesting that anything unusual is happening, I’ve prepared a handy lexicon of approved replacement phrases:

Instead of: “This is terrifying and clearly connected to global warming”
Say: “What a characterful bit of weather we’re having!”

Instead of: “The climate is collapsing”
Say: “The atmosphere is feeling rather spirited today”

Instead of: “We need urgent systemic change”
Say: “Perhaps we could all try recycling a bit more?”

Instead of: “This bomb cyclone is a symptom of a dying planet”
Say: “Gosh, winter really is wintry this year, isn’t it?”

See? Easy. You just have to train yourself to look directly at a crisis and describe it in the tone of someone commenting on a slightly overcooked roast.

The Emperor’s New Weather

There’s a famous story about an emperor who walks around naked whilst everyone pretends he’s wearing magnificent clothes. I think about that story a lot these days.

Except in our version, the emperor isn’t naked. He’s standing in the middle of a bomb cyclone, getting absolutely pummelled by unprecedented weather, whilst insisting that nothing is happening. And we’re all supposed to nod along and say, “Yes, Your Majesty, perfectly normal Saturday, lovely day for it.”

Meanwhile, emergency planners… the people whose actual job is to keep humans alive… are frantically telling residents to prepare. Stock up. Stay home. Assume the power will go out. Assume the roads will be undrivable. Assume this is going to be bad.

But bad in a completely normal, nothing-to-worry-about, this-is-just-how-weather-has-always-been sort of way.

The Gaslight Special

Here’s what’s particularly exhausting about all this: it’s not even new gaslighting. It’s vintage gaslighting. Trump and his administration have been at this for years now. Calling climate science a hoax. Pulling out of international agreements. Appointing oil executives to environmental positions like it’s some sort of dark comedy sketch.

And now, as actual bomb cyclones form and actual emergency services mobilise and actual human beings prepare for actual danger… we’re still meant to pretend it’s all fine.

Nothing systemic happening here.

Just a spot of weather.

Bit breezy.

Might want to bring in the garden furniture.

The truly maddening part is how this forces everyone else to participate in the delusion. Meteorologists have to present forecasts like they’re describing a slightly inconvenient rain shower, careful not to connect too many dots. News anchors report on “extreme weather events” without mentioning the extremely obvious pattern of extreme weather events. We all tiptoe around the elephant in the room, except the elephant is actually a bomb cyclone and it’s about to trash the entire Eastern seaboard.

What We’re Actually Doing

Let’s be honest about what’s happening here.

We’re watching the climate collapse in real-time, being told it’s not happening, and then being expected to prepare for the consequences of the thing that’s definitely not happening.

It’s Schrödinger’s crisis. It both exists and doesn’t exist, depending on who’s asking and what’s politically convenient.

Emergency planners know it exists. They’re living in reality, trying to keep people safe. Meteorologists know it exists. They can literally see it forming on their satellites and models. Scientists have known it exists for decades, screaming into the void whilst being called alarmists and fear-mongers.

But according to the people in charge? Nothing to see here. Just weather. Normal weather. The kind of normal weather that requires emergency declarations and mass evacuations and phrases like “life-threatening conditions.”

You know. Normal.

The Quiet Bit

Here’s the part where the satire drops away for a moment.

People are going to be hurt by this storm. Some might die. Homes will be damaged. Lives will be disrupted. And this isn’t a one-off. This is the new baseline. Bomb cyclones. Atmospheric rivers. Heat domes. Polar vortexes. All the fun new weather terms we’re learning because the old weather patterns have gone absolutely feral.

And whilst all this happens, whilst real humans deal with real consequences, the official position remains: this isn’t real.

It’s an almost impressive level of denial. The kind that would be funny if it wasn’t so catastrophically dangerous.

Your Weekend Plans

So what do you do with all this? How do you prepare for a storm that officially isn’t connected to anything systemic?

You stock up on supplies. You charge your devices. You check on vulnerable neighbours. You do all the practical things that emergency planners are begging you to do.

And then, if you have any energy left, you hold two completely contradictory thoughts in your head at once: this is just weather, and also this is absolutely not just weather.

You become fluent in doublethink. You learn to see the truth whilst pretending you don’t. You prepare for a crisis whilst officially acknowledging that no crisis exists.

It’s exhausting, isn’t it?

But apparently, this is where we are now. This is the game we’re all playing. Preparing for disasters caused by a thing we’re not allowed to name. Taking emergency precautions against perfectly normal weather. Watching the world change in obvious, measurable, catastrophic ways whilst being told that actually, everything’s fine, stop being so dramatic.

The Punchline

The thing about satire is that it’s supposed to exaggerate reality to make a point. But I’m not sure I’ve exaggerated anything here. This is just… what’s happening. A bomb cyclone is coming. The administration says climate change isn’t real. Emergency planners are telling you to prepare for dangerous conditions caused by the thing that isn’t happening.

That’s not satire.

That’s just Saturday.

So stay safe this weekend. Stock up. Hunker down. Look after each other. And whatever you do, don’t mention the thing we’re not meant to mention.

Even as it literally tries to blow your house down.