I tend to gauge the importance of international news on whether it shows up in the Welsh-language newscasts I listen to each morning. If an item can somehow find its way on the agenda past stories of attempts to restore seaside resorts to their Victorian glory, or hand-wringing over the latest sporting defeat, it must be important.

This is how I know that Hurricane Dean is important.

Or that the producer for the Welsh-language news has a friend who's vacationing in Mexico.

When I thought about Dean, and how American news networks were likely responding to the story, I couldn't help but get a bit melancholy. After more than a year of living out of the United States, I have come to accept that homesickness can be brought on by just about anything. But getting misty for hurricane coverage ranks up there as particularly weird.

I've mentioned before that the weather in Britain is generally pretty tame. As such, they don't really do weather reporting here. They tried earlier this summer, when floods hit middle England, but it just wasn't very exciting: "As you know, Britain is very wet. I am standing now in some water, which indicates that it is presently wetter than usual. This water isn't doing much. And behind me you can see some drunken teenagers playing in it, so it's not really very scary at all."

It wasn't anywhere close to the sort of thing I am used to. Many moons ago, when I worked for the Reno, Nev., branch of the Liberal Media Conspiracy, I had an assignment editor who was fond of using the phrase "attack weather." This meant that anytime rain or snow fell in the Reno viewing area, we went chasing after it with all available resources.

Mind you, "all available resources" in a small-market town meant two cameramen and an 8-year-old with a Mr. Microphone. But we went at it, boy howdy, providing viewers with multiple angles and fancy edited shots of all that they could just as easily see by looking out the window.

Obviously, our attitude toward weather wasn't exactly groundbreaking. TV news organizations have a particular fondness for a weather story because it is information that is relevant, doesn't require a great deal of skill to report and is less likely to result in angry letters from political extremists. So they throw themselves at it like Britney Spears to a bucket full of crazy.

And hurricane coverage is where they really shine. My favorite element is Idiot Guy. This is the chap who does everything you're not supposed to do, while telling you that you're not supposed to do it: "I'm standing here on the end of a jetty, as this category 4 hurricane rolls in. And I want to emphasize to viewers at home that the worst place to be during a category 4 hurricane is standing on the end of a jetty."

The competitive nature of American news media means that network Idiot Guys are always trying to top one another. I am waiting for one of them to just go all out: "Well, here I am at the end of a jetty during a category 4 hurricane, and one of the things you should never do in such a situation is strap on a parachute and release it into the 100 mph winds. This is especially true if you have a live cobra in your pants. So, here's acclaimed conservationist Jeff Corwin to release a king cobra into my trousers as I pull this ripcord and AAAAAHHHHIEEEEEEEEEEE!"

Obviously the devastation left by a hurricane isn't funny at all, but the way we to respond to it can be. And even though I make fun of the annual news ritual, I can't help but miss it a bit.

I am far away both physically and personally. When I left the United States in 2006, I also left a career. I came to Wales because I was eager to move in an entirely new direction. And while it's possible that I will one day return to the United States (I still often refer to it as "home"), I am less likely to return to journalism. That's a good thing -- I was as fine a journalist as J-Lo is an actress -- but I can't help occasionally missing parts of my past.

Still, life carries on forward. There's little point in thinking about the past, because it's already happened. That's a wisdom you often hear from the actual people who have to deal with hurricanes.

So, I'll stay here, in my comfortable land of excitement-free weather. Maybe, though, I'll go stand in the bay as the tide comes in and shout at people to let them know that what I'm doing is really dumb. It would be just like old times.

Chris Cope lives with his wife in Cardiff, Wales. His column appears every other Tuesday.