Raining cat and dog food

TRUST a weatherman to know which way the wind blows. Since it started operating as a “trading fund” in April 1996, the Meteorological Office, the official British weather forecasting service, has learned to hustle for business. Instead of receiving its funding as a dollop from the Ministry of Defence, the Met Office now collects its annual £145m ($232m) budget as fees from “customers”. Most of these remain government departments--the Royal Air Force is the largest buyer of its forecasts--but £20m last year came from commercial customers, and the rain doctors want more.