Mementos, Notes, and Fragments

The Bay Area’s famous fog has been rolling in from the Pacific Ocean since long before Mark Twain quipped that the coldest winter he ever spent was a summer in San Francisco, and in August 2010 the fog finally revealed it has a name: Karl. Via Twitter, Karl announced that it was, well, Karl. As weather phenomena go, the name lacks the inherent drama of Diablo winds or bomb cyclones or firenadoes, but it’s far more personable (literally, as the kids say). And if Karl identifies as Karl, isn’t that Karl’s right?

The creator behind @KarlTheFog has only acknowledged that the profile was launched in response to parody Twitter accounts like now-deleted British Petroleum Global Public Relations (@BPGlobalPR), which after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill tweeted, “Thousands of people are attacked by sea creatures every year. We at BP are dedicated to bringing that number down.