From Norton Juster’s excellent book “The Phantom Tollbooth” comes “...the Whether Man, not the Weather Man, for after all it's more important to know whether there will be weather than what the weather will be.”
The Whether Man’s priorities are laudable, for a prediction only matters when it comes to events of consequence. His system fails, however, to acknowledge that there is always weather of a kind, if not the kind kind, and not the kind the Weather Man would acknowledge either.
Forecasting is a fool’s errand, but someone has to do it, so he may as well be a fool. Here’s an incomplete list of the trends to watch in the new year:
IN
shooting elephants
courage
lobster
in medias res
an uptown girl
sasuga
ends
pole position
surfin’ U.S.A.
tenor
quick trick brick stacks
quick trick chick stacks
duct tape
snapback hats
playoffs
showmanship
malvin
guitar
Argentina
Antarctica
rocketry
éminence grise
and
this publication
OUT:
shaving yaks
conviction
crab
inter alia
the bridge downtown
how the sausage gets made
means
poll position
surfing the warm industry
vehicle
quick trick block stacks
quick trick clock stacks
masking tape
dress sneakers
practice
artistry
jim
spoken word
the incumbents
Canada
the E.U.
white papers
and
haze