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C J Strolin 's post in biz buzz, about rain
An older expression that I haven't heard for years is "It's raining pitchforks." I was reminded of this expression recently while reading a postcard which was written in the late 1800's which mentioned the weather as "raining pitchforks and hammer handles." "Pitchforks", OK, but "hammer handles"?! You KNOW that had to be a drencher!! got me thinking about rain and other stuff
how do you define rain?
when it just starts, it could be "spittin'"
but if it is a light, misty rain, its "soft" (as in a soft day)
then there is just rain
which can be steady (steady rain)which sometimes becomes bubble rain (the rain drop, magically from bubbles on impact, -- a summer only thing, from the heat of the tarmac)
then there is heavy rain (which i privately call "check rain" the heavy drop clearly bounce and drop again, so each drop is like a check mark )
and raining buckets.. which is very heavy, and finally
sheet rain.
sheet rain is a wall of water, sometimes found on the leading edge of thunder storm, it is sometimes so heavy, your car windshield wipers can't deal with it!
and this is just wet rain.. not counting hail (not to common in NY even with thunder storms, i have never seen hail much bigger than large peas.)
and sleet, and ice... and snow.. and there must be words for fog...
last week the i almost had an accident, the rain was hitting the front hood of my car, and dancing there for a minute as a drop.. the car hood was just hot enough to create a water vapor barrior, and the drops dances, as they do on hot pan or griddle, before being vaporized themselves. it was hard not to watch them.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Raining cats and dogs wouldn't be as heavy as sheet rain. My favorite expression of rain--and definitely in the hard rain category--is the gullywasher. There is a bright day, and suddenly the rain comes down in torrents. The gullies and gutters fill quickly, and then, just as suddenly, the gullywasher has bellied up. I like seeing gullywashers just to have an excuse to say gullywasher. Maybe I should put this term on Raven's Tripping thread!  But how do I define rain? Sure, the misty rain qualifies as rain, but when the atmosphere is simply heavy with humidity and even mist, I wouldn't call that rain. I like my rain, misty or otherwise, to perceptively fall. However, that's just my take. Raining pitchforks sounds like painful rain--rain falling so hard, it causes a stinging sensation in the flesh. Definitely not a "Singin' in the Rain" kind of rain. The coolest name for fog I know is pogonip, the fog that contains frozen moisture that can actually kill. People who live in the pogonip regions of the US know to run inside when a pogonip arrives. Deadly.
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old hand
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I'm sure I've mentioned this one before but in Newfoundland we get weather forecasts of "RDF" = Rain, Drizzle, and Fog. And it is precisely that. I've started to differentiate between raining and non-raining fogs but I have no nice words for them.
In late July, it can be warm and foggy and drizzly all at the same time, and the Newfoundland word for this is mauzy. It is also called capelin weather because during weather like that, the capelin "come in", and it's a great time to see whales (who come to eat capelin). You don't even need a boat, they're right below you as you stand on the cliffs.
Then on the sea during the winter you can have slob ice which is a slushy mixture of ice and water.
My husband and I differentiate between cold and warm snow. The cold snow, which we rarely get in Newfoundland (but is the standard in Winnipeg) crunches under your feet. The warms snow just goes "schlup".
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Carpal Tunnel
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Dear of troy: here is a good URL about hailstone formation: http://www.islandnet.com/~see/weather/elements/hailform.htmOnce when our carpool was going home at about 4:45 PM, we saw a thundercloud ahead, and just a few monents later hailstones the size of golfballs were hitting the windshield, threatening to shatter it. I have read that rising air currents may delay fall of stones and build up extra layers on them. I have read about military pilots having to eject at high altitudes and having rising air currents actually causing them to be lifted up quite a ways.
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Pooh-Bah
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Raining cats and dogs wouldn't be as heavy as sheet rain
- but you'd have to watch that you didn't step in a poodle.
My favourite word for that really fine rain which is really not much more than a fog but which soaks you through, is "Scotch Mist."
The Scots, themselves, call such weather "dreich" (pronounced "dreek", more or less.)
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Carpal Tunnel
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Somebody somewhere (!) coined mizzle, for a precip. that is partway between mist and drizzle, I think. WW, I too like a rain that falls with understanding... 
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Carpal Tunnel
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In Ithaca we call it wet sunshine.
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veteran
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Somebody somewhere (!) coined mizzleQuite an old word, Jackie (certainly been around since I was a child  ), and is common where it's common - http://www.bartleby.com/61/50/M0355000.html
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enthusiast
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i have never seen hail much bigger than large peas.)[...]and there must be words for fog...
I haven't either (about the hail), though I have heard of thick fog being described as a pea-souper.
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veteran
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I have heard of thick fog being described as a pea-souperI'd presume incorrectly so these days, bonzai - pea-soupers were fairly specifically thick fogs mixed with smoke from thousands of (old) coal fires, as you used to get in London. Nasty stuff. http://www.cloudman.com/fog/londonfog.htm
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Carpal Tunnel
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pea-soupers were fairly specifically thick fogs mixed with smoke from thousands of (old) coal fires
Not to mention the small chunks of ham floating about through the air.
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Carpal Tunnel
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In reply to:
Not to mention the small chunks of ham floating about through the
air.
Faldage, you've become such a ham!
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Pooh-Bah
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small chunks of ham floating about through the air.
- which is how East ham (in the East-end of London) got its name of course! The "pea-souper", to which shona refers, was also know, in the C19, as "a London particular." It is a phrase whose originas I've never managed to unravel - I s'pose I'll have to LIU [ sigh ] Certainly, the term "pea-souper" was common when I was at school, because we were sent home early when one occurred. I have been out in london fog where you could barely see your hand at the end of your outstretched arm - literally, "you couldn't see your hand in front of your face!" as the common expressionn had it. Crossing the road was an adventure and it was very easy to lose your way, even on familiar territory. Driving a motor vehiclae was a nightmare. Then came the Clean Air Act, in the late '50s, I think, and within five years, thick fogs of that sort just did not happen.
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The coolest fog I remember being in was in Honey, Hidalgo, Mexico. Honey is a small town in the mountains near Tulancingo, Hidalgo, founded by a group of British ex-pats. It has the feel of an English village, sorta. The groves of pines looked particularly eerie at dusk with the fog rolling through. Fortunately we weren't far from our vehicle when the fog surrounded us and reduced visibility to about one foot. Come to think of it, Mexico City and all it's air pollution is not that far from there. Hmmmmm. I wonder how much effect it had on that fog?
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Pooh-Bah
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Certainly, the term "pea-souper" was common when I was at school
Those last pea-soupers in London in the ‘50s! I had forgotten them until reading your post Rhuby, then it all came back. I recall in the early 1950s that there were evenings (late afternoon really – but it was dark by 3.30 anyway) in winter when we had to be escorted home by the teachers and on each intersection there were large, greasy black Aladdin’s lamp type of oil lamps set down on the pavement with a flaring oily flame coming out of the spout. These were not to help pedestrians but to assist the bus drivers; the buses crawled along the kerb with the conductor walking in front shouting instructions to the driver who literally could not see the kerb or the electric street lamps overhead. It all seemed exciting then, the groups of us children all well wrapped up with scarves over our mouths, heading off in different directions into the gloom shouting and chattering, seeing the orange glow of an oil lamp in front of us and being upon it practically before we knew we were there; your group diminished in size as kids gradually reached their homes and were dropped off. On the way vehicles would appear from the murk, usually with drivers who were lost and asking directions – I hope, but doubt, that our multiple and varied responses were of help!
Incidentally an expression on rain from those days was “Its raining stair-rods” for that heavy vertical rain that comes down in straight lines. You don’t hear that now, but then you don’t see stair-rods now either.
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old hand
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you don’t see stair-rods now either.
dxb, what is a stair-rod? Is it the vertical supports for the hand-railing, or the railing itself? Or something else entirely?
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Carpal Tunnel
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that heavy vertical rain that comes down in straight lines
Which reminds me of the quote from the on-the-scene reporter at a hurricane a year or two ago, "The rain is coming down horizontally."
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Pooh-Bah
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dxb, what is a stair-rod?A stair rod was a thin rod, sometimes of quarter inch (6mm) diameter brass with a little knob on each end to finish it off nicely, sometimes wooden (in which case it had a right angled isosceles triangle cross section and was rather stouter, say 20mm a side, and varnished) that went across the stair at the bottom of each riser to hold the stair carpet in place. The rod itself was held in place with metal eyes, one at each end of the rod, that were screwed to the tread and riser of each step. These days it is usual to hold the carpet with metal grippers that run across the stair screwed to the tread and riser of each step behind the carpet, hence you can't see them.  Hope that's clear.
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old hand
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The rain is coming down horizontallyI know it sounds illogical but that is the normal state of affairs in Newfoundland, especially for snow. Once in a while you get a snowstorm occurring somehow in the absence of wind, and you look outside to see the snow coming straight down, and you think to yourself - "My, doesn't that look odd? What is it? I can't quite put my finger on it". Then you realize that you just aren't used to snow or rain falling vertically!
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old hand
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Hope that's clear.Why, yes it is. I've seen stair rods before, especially in old historic buildings, but I never would have known what they are called. Thanks!
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Carpal Tunnel
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Let us remember that there are other forms of precipitation, especially in chemistry,
We get sugar by boiling off water from syrup. Confectioners sugar results from rapid
precipitation, and larger crystals from slower precipitation.
Many useful products from precipitation in various types of brine. And slow precipitation
is the typical means of purifying many imortant chemicals and medications, because the
formation of crystals excludes impurities.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Ask a body builder [grin]
TEd
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Impolite to stare at rods, TEd/
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newbie
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...and appropriate for this holiday (Oct 31st) season:
I work part time in a gym that has a gorgeous Olympic-sized HEATED swimming pool. Every once in a while, the heat will go out in the room housing the pool (Yes, I know, "natatorium," but some of the muscleheads I deal with barely understand the concept of "swimming pool") but the water heater will continue to function. If this occurs on a cold winter's day, a very thick and spooky fog will form over the water and surrounding deck area to a depth of up to two feet. When this happens, we rename the pool "Lake Transylvania" and the skinny-dippers have a field day!
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stranger
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My mother referred to a heavy snowfall as a "fanny-dragger."
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Pooh-Bah
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I grew up differentiating between a mizzle and the lighter Scotch mist which, when you first walk outside, feels like champagne bubbles against your face. A mizzle just feels wet but without the wonderful sound of raindrops.
When my mother moved from the praries her family laughed at her for saying that the rain "isn't as wet" on the coast. But it's true, the clouds have all day so they don't dump everything at once.
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Pooh-Bah
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PS Beanie, I presume you're North American as I understand that phrase could have a quite different meaning elsewhere. 
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old hand
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In reply to:
An older expression that I haven't heard for years is "It's raining pitchforks."
When I first moved to Oregon some years ago, I heard the phrase: "it's raining pitchforks and n*gger babies." Let me tell you, I was outraged and gave the person who said that a scolding!! 
He was a man in his late 60's and just didn't understand why I thought it was wrong.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Okay, three things: CB, my father and his brothers used that expression, too. [distate e]; I have no idea what "other" meaning fanny-dragger could have; and, um, frankly it sounds funny to me to hear that "the clouds have all day". Under what circumstances would they NOT have all day?
Sorry to be so churlish, but I am away from home until the 6th., using my laptop. I am trying to keep in mind that I am lucky to be able to be on-line at all, but. The keyboard is different, it is much slower than my "real" computer, I'm using an el-cheapo service provider which means that ads pop up about every five minutes--I can tell one's coming because the keys suddenly quit working and I have to wait till the ad pops up, then close it; and it is too frustrating to deal with PM's: my laptop really cannot deal with loading my Check Private page. It takes about 20 minutes to download it, and another 10 to bring up the message. And twice already it has frozen up completely when I've tried to Check Private. Oh, and every half-hour there comes that lovely little box that says my service provider has detected no activity in the last 30 minutes(??), and they will shut me down in X number of seconds unless I click the little Resume button.
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RE: "the clouds have all day". Under what circumstances would they NOT have all day?
funny thing weather, we often think its the same every where, (and it is, in that it's always changing!)
but inland storms tend to be at the leading edge of fronts, (where the air pressure changes from high to low -- which is why a drop in barametric pressure is usually an indicator of a coming rain) and especially on the flat plains of North America (from texas to hudson bay!) these storms can be very fast moving...and very intense. it always seem that when they don't develop into tornado's, they instead dump huge amounts of rain, and cause flash floods.
but coastal areas, can get rain from off shore breezes, which carry moisture onto the land--and this rain, can come and go. I spent a week's vacation in Seattle, and it rained every day--and everyday was beautiful-- they rain rarely lasted more than a 1/2 hour, you ducked into a store, or better yet a starbucks, had a coffee, and when the rain stopped, you went on your way. an hour or two later, you need sunglasses, and sun screen... and then again, in the afternoon or evening, it was raining again...never very hard. just on and off showers..
Upstate NY (and parts of MI and other north east states) get this kind of weather all the time, and in the winter, they often get "lake effect snow". when the wind picks up, it speeds over the water, picking up moisture, and then as it hits land, it slows..the change in speed also causes a change in air pressure, and bingo, rain..(or snow).
which coast you are on also makes a difference, (since the jet stream tends move from the west to the east, (so the pacific north west has a rain forest, and New England just has forest) and mountains and other geographical features can also effect storms (and well as ocean currents like the gulf stream...)
I always think of there being 4 seasons, (spring, summer, autumn and winter) but many places have 2(wet and dry) and some have three (what they call the three seasons varries-sometimes wet,dry and winter, sometimes winter, mud and summer)
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Carpal Tunnel
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In reply to:
(what they call the three seasons varries-sometimes wet,dry and winter, sometimes winter, mud and summer)
up heayah, we got nine months a' winter, and three months a' damn poor sleddin'...
formerly known as etaoin...
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Pooh-Bah
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Jackie
No churlishness noted, here's my three answers :
The rain on the prairies tends to come in downpours which are over soon. In Vancouver the rain can mizzle and drizzle and sprinkle and spit all day. (but when the sun shines the whole place sparkles!)
About the term fannydragger. I lived in England for a while and was told not to use the term fannypack (brit bum bag) as fanny was a rude word for a slightly different portion of the female anatomy. In fact there was nearly a fist fight when a well meaning US'n said it to the female half of an young English couple.
I sympathise about the computer. I don't have one at all except at work and they turn off the heat at 6PM. Now I'm going to stop typing and go home [shiver e]
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Carpal Tunnel
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We had a thunderstorm roll through here earlier that was a real beauty. At one point the thunder rumbled so loud and so long it sounded more like a train going through a long tunnel and I could feel it vibrate the whole house from my second story nest. What would you call that? As far as I know, it wasn't a tornado.
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Pooh-Bah
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I'm not sure whether /weather I'd call it terrifying or exilerating!
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Pooh-Bah
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I love thunder storms. To me, they are totally exhilarating, especially if the lightning is visible.
One of my most enduring memories is standing one summer night on the east end of the "White Cliffs of Dover", watching a thunder and lightning storm out over the English channel. It was na intense storm that lasted for nearly half-an-hour (a long time for such things, over here) with almost continuous lightning. It was like November the Fifth!
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Pooh-Bah
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The most dramatic storm I remember started with big, fat raindrops coming down while I was waterskiing. Then we heard thunder back in the hills around the lake. I thought "lightning hits the tallest thing around. That would be me, standing here in the middle of the lake with my feet in water!" We headed for shore. Half an hour later we could see lighning arcing down to the surface of the lake about a kilometer away.
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Pooh-Bah
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Yes, that is a lovely poem, maahey. It's years since I last thought of it and have usually just seen the last verse quoted - totally out of context, of course!
Arnold isn't one of my top favourites, but of all his work, that is probably the one that appeals to me most.
Thank you for reminding me of it.
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maahey - thanks for posting the poem. My church choir is doing this very piece for our spring program. Seeing the poem this way has made me appreciate the words much more (sometimes when rehearsing the music gets in the way of the meaning - too busy working on notes to make sense of it!)
You erudite folks did this earlier with the knitting thread when of troy was asking about clocks - someone (I forget, sorry) posted the verse from "The Nightmare Song" about black socks with gold clocks. Well, my choir was working on that piece just then as well! So I got to explain to all of them about clocks on socks. Pretty neat and what I'd call a real cooincidence!
What sane person could live in this world and not be crazy? -Ursula K. Le Guin, author (1929- )
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Pooh-Bah
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It sounds like it would be lovely with music.
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Carpal Tunnel
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You're safe with Samuel Barber at the pen.
Thanks for the link, maahey.
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I remember those pea-soupers in London. I loved them - they had a particularly disgusting smell, but you couldn't see your own hand stretched out, and the sounds of the streets were amplified. It was also very strange how the fog swirled around outside, but did not really have much effect indoors. I remember standing by the front door at my granny's house, with it wide open, to try to get the fog to come in and fill all the rooms up, but it didn't. I was just a small girl then, but have clear memories of the smog.
I wanted to say how astonishing I find it that mostly (unless you are up in the mountains) clouds start at such a convenient height above the ground. They contain so much water. They weigh thousands of tons. It is a pretty amazing thing that they don't come crashing down. And if clouds usually 'lived' on the ground, presumably animal life would never have bothered to develop eyes, as we would all have been living in a permanent fog. (This is setting sunny days aside, of course). Nations would not have emerged, as we would have had a completely different view of territory. I am not a religious person, but I do think this is a miraculous whim of whoever or whatever created us. All of life would have been completely different.
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Carpal Tunnel
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and a very big welcome to you, Griselda!
formerly known as etaoin...
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Pooh-Bah
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Hi Griselda
and just think, there wouldn't be rainbows!!!
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Pooh-Bah
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...and we'd all be fitted with fog horns. Hi Griselda, a nice picture.
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I had a very strange (to me anyway) occurrence with rain some years ago. I was standing in the middle of my street, chatting with aneighbor, when I suddenly heard a stampede of feet running down the street towards us. I looked down the street, ready to bolt from the "stampede", and saw instead a wall of rain fast approaching. I could actually see where it was already wet, just a few houses down, and yet we were standing there perfectly dry......for another few seconds, anyway.
Of course I know rain has to start and stop somewhere, so that was not what was strange......it was the speed with which it approached, and the surreal idea that it was a stampede of feet (on a very quiet dead-end street) that was so bizarre.
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i remember a storm just like that once when i was a child..
it had gotten over cast, rain was predicted, we were heading home from a local beach, and stuck in traffic..
the road ahead was a hill, and we could see the rain coming like a sheet of water... the car ahead of us was a convertable, and we watched them scramble to get the hood up, (or advance to a near by underpass...) they didn't quite make it, the wall of water advanced fast than they could move! I have never been in storm like that since.
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I may be reaching YART territory here, but I pumped gas at the unleaded pump once, while the regular pump was getting drenched.
Nebraska had some of the best storms...
formerly known as etaoin...
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old hand
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>Nebraska had some of the best storms...
Which reminds me of something I mentioned to a friend here recently. I have noticed that some people from the Atlantic seaboard of the US feel that they must assert their eligibiilty for earthquakes On another board somewhere else, a person from a part of the States not known for seismic activity was quick to point out all the faultlines in the eastern part of the US, saying more or less, "hey, we can have quakes too". This is an interesting phenomenon that I have now seen in at least two different web boards. In one instance, an Easterner jumped into a discussion about quakes that I was having with a Californian. This desire to insist that the East Coast is not excluded from the "earthquake club" makes me smile, because the eagerness thus displayed to claim seismic activity indicates very strongly that the claimant has never experienced a real quake. If they had, they would not feel that it was something to brag about.
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assert their eligibiilty for earthquakes
"The fault, Dear Brutus, lies not within our stars, but in our _____"
Help, all you clever people - this cries out for a punchline!
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journeyman
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I have experienced two earthquakes here in Central Ohio. Neither very strong, but a reminder that this can happen elsewhere from the Pacific Rim area. And no, it didn't make me want to boast about it - I sure wish we couldn't have quakes here, we already got tornadoes.
What sane person could live in this world and not be crazy? -Ursula K. Le Guin, author (1929- )
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something to brag about.
ah, good point, sjm. I hadn't thought about it in quite that way. though I spent many a summer night in the basement, waiting for the tornado warnngs to end, my experiences were always relatively uneventful. watching thunderstorms roll in on a 30-40 minute schedule, able to see them several miles off, then getting drenched for about five minutes... the bluest skies that followed... pure enjoyment of the physical world realm...
I have also experienced a couple of small temblors, again, no damage, just some crazy shaking and a sonic rumble that permeated my soul...
formerly known as etaoin...
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> I sure wish we couldn't have quakes here,
Amen. I've grown up with quakes, and I still hate them. The town I grew up in, Rotorua, has dozens of small tremors each year, the city my father grew up in, Quetta, was devastated by a quake in 1935, and the town I now live in, Hastings, was badly damaged by one in 1931, so I have a long family history of being on shaky ground. Your reply proves my point - that those who have not experienced signiifcant quakes are not missing out on anything.
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Hi! Enjoying this thread. We call the long, steady rain "well fillers."
Whereas the short bursts of heavy rain that run off rather than sinking into the earth are called "frog chokers."
Have felt only minor tremors as far as earthquakes go - here in New Hampshire - and am in no hurry to feel a "real" quake. What concerns me about the New England "faults" is that one runs right under the Seabrook Nuclear Power Plant -just about four miles away as the crow flies across the salt water marsh!
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A belated welcome to you, Griselda. Mmmm, the very thought of Kent makes me smile a secret smile...
Something tells me that I would not enjoy a pea-souper; certainly not unless I knew the territory VERY well. What makes it smell, do you know? That's cute, the image of a small girl inviting the fog in!
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Pooh-Bah
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Welcome, Griselda - it's good to see some more support from this side of the pond. jmh, dxb and I have been doing our best to withstand the hordes of USns, with some timely help from dodyskin when required, but we are a bit thin on the ground - and infiltrated by Zildians right in the heart of our country! Hi Capfka! You're right - I can still smell and taste pea-soupers! Very distinctive! [aside to Jackie] It was a sulphurous sort of smell,as though the seven-fold gates of hell had been unfolded to allow Lucifer and Beëlzebub to foray forth to harry the earth! Caused by too many coal-burning fires in an area prone to temperature inversions across a damp valley[/aside to J]
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RE:a sulphurous sort of smell,as though the seven-fold gates of hell had been unfolded
to those who know, this won't be a surprise, but i actually like the smell of sulfur..(well, mild sulfur odors..)
as a child, our family doctor was very careful with anti-biotics, and generally did not prescribe them, but prescribed sulfur based compounds... they were chalky and grey (later they added a chocolate flavor, but it didn't really cover the sulfur taste up)
my pavlovian response is to associate sulfur with good things (ie, the sore throat feeling better, the fever passing)
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Pooh-Bah
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That figures, helen.
In the days just before I was born, the local doctors used to prescribe that children with Whooping Cough be stood in the Gas Retorts at the Gas Works, just after they had been emptied. The smell of sulphur would have been very intense and the fumes would have made them cough and gasp, to say nothing of their eyes watering. However, it apparently worked as a cure.
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Pooh-Bah
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If you like the smell of sulphur and sulphur-like odorous gasses, I suggest you shift to Rotorua, New Zealand. The place smells like a fart that just never goes away ... Some say it's due to a digestion problem that the mayor has had for years, but most people settle for the obvious - the geothermal zones in the area. The one most people go to is Whakarewarewa. I used to think that it was the home of the Weretewhakawi tribe, but sjm has disabused me of the notion. 
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shift to Rotorua, New Zealand. The place smells like a fart
Sure you didn't leave out a t in that town name, Pfranz? Rotoruta?
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Pooh-Bah
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Nope, absolutely certain, Faldo. Never misplace things like stray "t"s. According to sjm I DO misplace "a"s in things Maori, especially "Maori"!
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Pooh-Bah
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Anyone can be forgiven for getting their "aah"s in the wrong place occasionally - but no-one should ever mislay their tea.
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Seems I missed this thread twice, now...back in October, too. Always loved weather, so I've enjoyed all the offerings. fogWhen I worked as a mate on a tour boat here we where out on the ocean with the usual large group when a fog rolled in out-of-nowhere, as they often do on the coast. but this was the thickest pea-soup I ever saw. You literally almost couldn't see your hand extended in front of your face...out on the water the fog is much more opaque then on land, even right at the coast. The Captain couldn't see a thing...literally. And this was a good-sized boat, too, the size of a PT Boat. I knew we were in real trouble when the Captain summoned me to the bridge and told me, and the other hands, we had to go to the bowsrpit and keep lookout for other boats. The fog was so blinding there was really nothing to see...I literally couldn't see past the edge of the boat, it was like staring into a blind whiteness. I had heard of such paralysing maritime fogs in literature and meteorological writings, but I never experienced it first-hand. And, folks, it is truly frightening. I knew there was no way we could detect an approaching vessel in time. And this was back in the late 70's before a lot of today's new sound technologies 9though I doubt anything new would help in a situation like this). The Captain just kept blaring his fog horn. And he couldn't head for the inlet because we couldn't see the mile-long jetties there...and the thought of those rocks was always on your mind. Were we near them? We meandered around out there for almost an hour before the fog thinned enough to navigate towards shore again...a truly scary moment. Wouldn't want to go through it again. It was then I learned the significance of the refrain Eugene O'Neill (who spent much time at sea in his youth) used through the character of Kris Kristofferson, an old seaman, in his play Anna Christie..."Dat ol' devil fog." (and a foghorn is an important sound effect, constantly in the background, in Long Day's Journey Into Night. (BTW, I grew up, here in New Jersey, to the expression "thick as pea soup" or "it's as thick as pea soup out there" whenever there was a particulary heavy fog, and driving was dangerous.) slanted rainHere on the East coast we get swiped by many Tropical Storms and minimal hurricanes. I remember my first experience with a Tropical Storm (sustained winds of up to 70 miles per hour with higher gusts and torrential rains) was in July of 1972 when I was vacationing here in Wildwood, NJ. A group of us had gone to an Elton John concert at the Wildwood Convention Hall on the Boardwalk that night which didn't cancel out despite the heavy weather. After a great concert, and a 20 minute encore of Take Me To The Pilot..."na!na!na!, na!na!na!"...(and a few of the usual party embellishments ), we walked out of the hall and onto the boardwalk in the driving wind and rain...and just hung there, suspended, at a 45% angle, the stinging pellets of rain driving into our faces in a horizontal fusillade like machine-gun bullets. Cool!  I'll never forget it. Since then, whenever there's a Tropical Storm, or a minimal hurricane brushing the coast, we'd always try to capture that same experience, but, somehow, it's never quite the same as that night... earthquake braggadocioThink you may be reading that "brag" into posting by Easterners about earthquake faults in this region, sjm. While I'm a geology and meteorology buff, and know these faults are extant, and the damage they have done in the past, through studies...and sometimes like to mention their existence as a point of geological accuracy, I have no desire to experience an earthquake and would love it if these East Coast faults weren't extant at all. The main point is, most folks don't know the danger exists, and an East Coast quake, with most cities not built to withstand a tremor (no earthquake codes), could be a disaster and horror, depending on the intensity of the quake, which, I, for one, hope to never witness or experience. Not to mention the prospect of quake generated tsunami tidal waves when I live practically on the beach [shudder]...no thanks. (I'd rather keep playing Russian Roulette with hurricanes...at least you get a running start)
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Pooh-Bah
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Despite frequently visiting parts of the world prone to earthquakes I am glad to say that I have not experienced an earthquake, but I have a couple of tales.
Our Chief Engineer flew into San Francisco early afternoon on October 17th 1998, went straight to his hotel (Hyatt-Regency I think) and went to sleep about 4.00pm. At breakfast next morning in response to a question from the waiter he said “Earthquake? I didn’t notice.” It’s just possible that this is apocryphal – but I suspect not.
I was sitting in a conference room in Indian Wells a few years ago listening to a presenter talking about the failure mode of various types of buildings during earthquakes. At one point the presenter showed a coloured map of the Coachella Valley, which includes Palm Springs and Indian Wells. There were many more or less parallel red lines on the chart. Pointing at these he told us that these were active fault lines. Then pointing at a spot where many of these lines came together to make a wide red band he said, “This is under where you are all sitting right now.” There was a silence – then a voice from the back called out, “If I don’t stay for dinner do I get a refund?” Everyone laughed, but there were some uneasy glances exchanged.
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If you like the smell of sulphur and sulphur-like odorous gasses, I suggest you shift to Rotorua, New Zealand. The place smells like a fart that just never goes away ...
Some say it's due to a digestion problem that the mayor has had for years, but most people settle for the obvious - the geothermal zones in the area. The one most people go to is Whakarewarewa. I used to think that it was the home of the Weretewhakawi tribe, but sjm has disabused me of the notion.
Having been born there, I never smelled its distinctive aroma until we moved away when I was 10. A month or so after laving we came back for a weekend, and when We got near the place I burst out in horror,"what's that SMELL?"
By the way, I haven't heard of the Weretewhakawi tribe, but I do remember William James portaying a reporter by the name of Abe Whakatawhainau.
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The main point is, most folks don't know the danger exists, and an East Coast quake, with most cities not built to withstand a tremor (no earthquake codes), could be a disaster and horror, depending on the intensity of the quake, which, I, for one, hope to never witness or experience.Absolutely. For an example of this phenomenon, see http://www.allshookup.org/images/ncquake/ncquake.htmWhen it happened, it was hard to believe that a 5.6 could do so much damage, but it was exactly as you state above.
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actually, even tho our earthquakes tend to be 1. and 2. deals, (and are mistaken for heavy trucks speeding by) NYC does have an earth quake standard. its rather new, and it is not manditory, but many building do meet a minimal standard..(and some are build to very high earthquake resistant standards.)
way off topic...in white
after the Towers came down, one fact that came out was, the designer/engineer/ had thought about a plane hitting the building..(after all a fighter plane had hit empire state building in the 40's) He just didn't plan on the fuel-- and fire... the terrorist thought they could hit them and topple them in seconds.
in many ways the best thing that happened to NYC was the attack on the TWC in '93--it took them over 4 hours to evacuate the buildings then..but after that, every one took safety, and evacuation drills seriously, and on that day in September, every one below the plane crash floors was out of the building in 45 minutes! what a change!
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One of the very earliest questions ever asked on this board was is there a word for slanting rain. Nobody ever found one, to my disappointment.
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No term for slanted rain, but would a slanted drip be obleak? Having grown up in Los Angeles, California, and lived there until I was 22, I experienced a great many earthquakes. I remember the big one in '71, -- it happened early in the morning and the great rolling effect woke me up. Truly, they are nothing to brag about. But it's funny listening to you all prefer hurricanes, etc. to earthquakes. I've always said the opposite! We have gobs of fog here in Oregon, in the winter. Pea-soupers, for sure. Rain is rain; drizzle, a little less; less than that is called mist. Sudden downpours are gulley-washers -- at least, that is what I call them. That's a term I heard growing up. There was one major earthquake here in Oregon, about 10 years ago, and it did a lot of damage to old brick buildings. Note: there was one fatality which occurred on the highway, as the result of a rock slide hitting a truck. We have no hurricanes, no tornadoes, very few earthquakes and very few floods. I found it interesting that there were 2 or 3 days last week in which we had sunny skies followed by rain, then hail, then snow, then the wind blew it all away and the sun shone again!
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From sjm's link:
The photographs below are of the rescue operation in the proceeding hours just after the earthquake and the resulting demolition of the Newcastle Workers Club.
Do our representatives of the Southern Hemisphere find this use of proceeding at all uncommon? What do others think of it?
Bingley
Bingley
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>Do our representatives of the Southern Hemisphere find this use of proceeding at all uncommon? What do others think of it?
I am sure that the usage would be very uncommon, were it used in a country where the first language is English, but it wasn't, so it probably isn't.
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Okay-ay...I assume, sjm, that you mean first as in original? It took some doing, but I believe I have determined that the location of the earthquake in the link is Australia.
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a country where the first language is English
the location of the earthquake in the link is Australia
As Jackie slides inexorably down the slippery slope into the unfathomable depths of the Chasm of Sar.
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Pooh-Bah
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In response to Bingley's question, the use of proceeding didn't strike me as unusual when I read it, but probably I wouldn't have used the word in that way myself. Probably would have used "...in the hours following...", but for me it's fine as written.
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...this use of proceeding...
I would have expected "ensuing" or "subsequent" instead.
Besides, even if it's meant to be the converse of preceding=coming before, the word is "precede," not "preceed". Is there another word "procede"? That would be the more precise analogue. If it exists.
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proceed, proceeds
Perhaps proceeding has fallen out of disusue to a large degree because we have become used to the noun form (proceeds: The amount of money derived from a commercial or fundraising venture; the yield)and the shorter verb form (proceeds: moves farther along).
Yet preceding seems to be in wider use than precedes.
Here is the original verb form of proceed from Merrian-Webster's, from which the noun form proceeds evolved circa 1645. Notice in the etymology there is originally one "e", why and when was the second "e" added to proceed, when precede was left alone?:
Main Entry: pro·ceed
Pronunciation: prO-'sEd, pr&-
Function: intransitive verb
Etymology: Middle English proceden, from Middle French proceder, from Latin procedere, from pro- forward + cedere to go; more at PRO-
Date: 14th century
1 : to come forth from a source : ISSUE
2 a : to continue after a pause or interruption b : to go on in an orderly regulated way
3 a : to begin and carry on an action, process , or movement b : to be in the process of being accomplished
4 : to move along a course : ADVANCE
synonym see SPRING
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Pooh-Bah
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Slanted rain is what I've always pictured when someone says "driving rain". Rain that is driven
side
....ways
..........by
............the
...............wind.
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I see what is meant.
formerly known as etaoin...
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According to the writer's biography he comes from Lower Hutt, NZ.
Bingley
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>According to the writer's biography he comes from Lower Hutt, NZ. Well then, 'nuff said. We have one member not long removed from that part of the world - I'll let him defend the usage or not.
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Pooh-Bah
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I would take driven rain to mean rain that is, in the words of the on-site reporter at the hurricane several years ago, "coming down horizontally."
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