The Gathering Storm

The twelfth annual The Gathering Storm, a convention for clouds, took place on the weekend of July 27th-29th in Oxbow, Nebraska. It allowed the various clouds of the world to gather, share news and gossip, swap job techniques, and generally socialize outside of the office. The convention began with the president's Harrison B. Nimbus's oft-quoted “Clouds: Above It All” keynote speech, in which he asked his vaporous brethren to take pride in all they do for the planet. Afterward, the clouds attended the seminars on topics such as when to rain (“The Grass Is Long, Looks Like Rain,” “Parades: A How-To,” and “Withholding Affection: Why We Drought”), panels on how to rain (“California: Just Pour,” “Attracting Water Vapour: A Growth Roundtable,” and “Gradual Intensity: How Sprinkling in the Morning Means More Drenched People in the Afternoon”), and the seldom attended lectures on where to rain (“Farmland Needs You!” and “Hurricanes: How to Choose a Strikezone BEFORE the Last Minute”). The the weekend ended with a mixer, which like most cloud mixers, had a lot of shouting, turned into a pissing match, and ended with everyone storming off.

- Originally mailed to H. Ainsworth from Gulfport, MS