Alarmism

Several years ago I made a choice to stop reading or watching the news. I cannot emphasize how much better my quality of life is for it. Part of the reason I stopped paying attention to the news is because I got the feeling the American media was exaggerating certain events and issues to scare me and worse, just to scare me as there was never anything I could do about it. I avoid the news here for the most part as well, but sometimes you can't help being bombarded by the fear-mongering in the line at the grocery store. It's just that here it's of a different variety, namely, weather. The past few days we've been seeing warnings about the storm Simone and the chaos she would bring, including a recommendation to stay home early in the week. We haven't experienced any chaos whatsoever here in Stockholm, but further south in Söderköping they ought to have headed the warnings. Simone took poor Julia and Elin's trampoline.