1. A recent study in Science Direct on sleep and video games found that habitual (<7h/week) and casual video game playing is not associated with poor sleep. However, playing something like an FPS title before bedtime may increase the time it takes to sleep and your sleep efficiency. Stick to cozy games around bedtime 😴 

2. The world of Dr. Seuss comes to Minecraft - Two family friendly brands come together for special worlds based around The Lorax, The Cat in the Hat, and Oh, The Places You’ll Go. The Dr. Seuss team realized that while kids read they better meet children where they are and ensure access to enriching and entertaining experiences online.

3. People who played games as kids earn an average of $5,451 more than those who didn't per a recent survey. Not surprising when we’ve mentioned gamers being key hires for companies in the past. It’s not too late to get your kids started 🤑 

October is also Hurricane Season ⛈️ 

We caught up with Heather Zons from The Weather Channel to talk hurricane tracking, weather graphics, and gaming. Heather is self-professed gamer and a key member of The Weather Channel’s coverage.

Heather, so great to chat with you. Thanks for the time, I know it’s been a busy few weeks! Can you share a bit about what you do?

At a basic level, a weather producer creates all of the graphics that are used on the air. But it’s more than that, I work in a visual medium with graphics so the first step is to just make sure it looks good for broadcast.  But the second, more important thing, is to ensure the graphic is understandable by a broad audience. Have you ever seen the discourse around some games where a developer will paint a ladder bright yellow to make it super obvious? And then people complain about it but the developer then responds with ‘you’d be surprised by the number of people who don’t know they need to climb the ladder’? Well, that’s kind of me, I need to help the graphics make sense to the normal person. We know the people watching didn’t go to school for this, so we need to make sure the info is as digestible as possible.  The graphics help guide the story and showcase the important things that the audience needs to know, then the meteorologists who are on air tell it to the viewer.

So what was it like over the past few weeks tracking a a hurricane during hurricane season? What don't people realize goes into that?

It’s usually really taxing mainly because even the normal person isn’t really looking at this stuff until the cone is pointed at them. But we’ve been tracking the storm for 7 to 10 days already at this point. They are probably seeing it within two to three days.

Sometimes it feels like we are repeating ourselves, especially if you watch us every single day but most people are slowly trickling in and starting to get that information so we want to catch them.

When it comes to hurricanes, we’re kind of a middleman because the National Hurricane Center, a government funded organization, is the one putting out all the forecasts and it is on us to distill all the information down into what the audience needs to know.

With Hurricane Helene, for example, that was about stressing the rainfall and the flooding.

It’s stressful because for us, we know that what we say could impact people’s lives, positively or negatively, and we don’t take that lightly, so we try to give important, life saving information. It does get really stressful and the past two to three weeks have been pretty exhausting. Sometimes you are on the clock 24/7.

How did you get into this career?

I went to school at University of Miami and double majored in meteorology and broadcast journalism. So I had to do all the math and the physics courses and everything like that, and then the broadcast journalism degree which was more about writing for news and talking on air and stuff.  Those courses were still really valuable to me, but I didn't see myself as being the on-air personality

There aren't too many jobs like this. You would find some weather producers at bigger news stations because the meteorologists get paid the big money to just talk and then the producers help do everything else. If you go to school for just broadcast meteorology, they're not teaching you about the graphics that you need to make, they just teach you ‘here's the best way to say this information.’ I really liked the visual side of the business.

I have always loved gaming and the weather, but for me weather was always the end goal.

Has gaming helped you in your weather career?

In a roundabout way, yes. For my role it’s assumed you have graphical experience, but being a gamer and playing games, you know what a screen should look like, what a good UI is, how to make things digestible to a variety of people.  Plus, being good with a computer is always useful!

Being a gamer has also helped me branch out and build my own brand. I host a climate gaming series where I play games with an environmental message. The whole point is showing you can get really great stories out of games too.  I’m playing a game right now ‘Terra Nil’ where you’re just playing the game and telling people like, hey this game makes you stop and think about some of the environmental impacts but it’s not super in your face about it because it is a game. It just opens people's eyes that games are really good at telling stories.

Lately you’ve been giving weather forecasts for esports events; I love it because no one has done it before, but it’s kind of funny because the events happen indoors. What prompted you to start this?

It was a fun way to take my job and my passion and marry it together to tie the two worlds. If you are traveling to another country or city you will check your phone app for the weather but if you just see a rain cloud, does that mean it’s going to rain all day? Or what about when you leave the arena? The last thing you’re thinking about is that when you’re at an event.

But with so many people on Twitter/X scrolling during or after an event, I can put out the info towards the end of an event so if they are about to leave they can see that it’ll be raining when they head out.  I try to keep it topical because while it’s the last thing on most people’s minds it’s the first thing on mine, so I might as well!

Finally, what games are you playing now?

I’m a big World of Warcraft fan, the new expansion just came out like a month ago. So, I’ve been deep into that.  I’ve also been playing a lot of VALORANT and Teamfight Tactics. Those are kind of my big games right now.

Thanks for the time, Heather! For esports related weather, gaming, other weather fun, follow Heather on X 

Cracked: (adjective) - Used to describe someone who is playing insanely well and skillfully

Synonyms: skilled, ‘goated’, godlike, filthy

My kids actually bugged me this week because we haven’t played video games in a while. They’re right, we haven’t. But the weather has been so good in the PNW recently that I’m trying to make the most of it before the rain season comes.

Our next issue will be on Halloween - hope everyone is ready for a fun holiday 👻 !

GLHF,

Chris

What I’m playing: Elden Ring