Mr Cooper always carried his umbrella when he went out, even if it wasn’t going to rain. There are some days when one can be one hundred percent certain that it will not rain, such as a beautiful blue-sky mid-summer’s day. Still, on such a day, Mr Cooper took his umbrella.
“Why do you take your umbrella with you when the sky is blue, the air is clear, the birds are singing, and it’s a let’s-go-on-a-picnic day?” asked Mrs Harker poetically.
“The meteorologists are unreliable at best,” said Mr Cooper dourly and judgementally. “Take their forecast as gospel and one day you’ll get caught out.”
However, the reliability of the meteorologists was proven one day. It rained as predicted. Mr Cooper’s raised his umbrella. Lightning struck. Mr Cooper died.
“He may as well have flown a kite like Benjamin Franklin in 1752 from the spire on Christ Church in Philadelphia built in 1754,” observed Mrs Harker knowledgeably, wryly, and unsympathetically.