Isn't "100% chance" an oxymoron?

I had to laugh. Listening to local radio this morning on my way to work in the pouring rain, the weather guy said "there's a 100% chance of rain today and a 70% chance of rain tomorrow." Now, in my book, 100% is a whole lot more than a chance. Am I crazy? Is it supposed to make us feel better, as if there is a chance it won't rain? If I tell someone they have a 100% chance of failing their driver's test if they crash while taking it, is that better than telling them failure is certain? Maybe the weatherman didn't want to be wrong, as they usually are, so he used the word chance to give himself some wiggle room, despite the fact that it was raining at that very moment (and has continued to rain all day long). I just had to chuckle.

Poor grammar, atrocious punctuation, unbelievably awful spelling, they are the bane of my existence. I am reading Eats, Shoots and Leaves by Lynne Truss, and thoroughly enjoying it. She is my latest idol. I thought I was alone in this world, but Lynne has made it acceptable to "come out" as a grammar stickler; now I find we number in the thousands. I am delighted! Unfortunately, I'm as much a spelling stickler as I am a grammar stickler, to my children's chagrin. My current pet peeve is the incorrect use of "less" when "fewer" is the proper adjective. There are FEWER calories, not less. There is less fat, but there are fewer carbs. Advertisers like the way it looks on a package when it says "LESS FAT, LESS CARBS", often putting "less" in large letters with the words "fat" and "carbs" on top of each other in smaller type immediately following the word "LESS." It has advertising appeal, though it lacks grammatical correctness. That's my current pet peeve. Although, the complete absence of adverbs in common speech today ranks a close second. "Easily" and "quickly" have vanished from usage; they have been replaced by "easy" and "quick". It's enough to make a grown woman cry. If you feel as I do about these abominations of grammar, read Lynne's book. You'll love it. Or you'll find, as I have found, that though you consider yourself a grammar nazi, you make mistakes; you use semicolons incorrectly - or not at all; you suffer from comma anxiety, wondering if you've used too many - or not enough. It has caused me to reread practically everything I've written herein - and to edit accordingly.

Now, I'm going to head out into the 100% chance of rain that is thundering down (literally - thunder and lightning fills the sky every few seconds, and rain is pouring down so hard I can't see across the street), and make my way home while I ponder missing apostrophes, misused commas, and forgotten adverbs. Ciao!