The Canadian Pastime - Talking About The Weather

Samuel L. Clemens, aka Mark Twain, has often been quoted as saying: "Everybody talks about the weather, but nobody does anything about it."

I'm just like all the rest, I'm going to talk about it. It's a Canadian pastime really. While in the lineup at the grocery store or filling the car with gas, people say things like, "too hot, can't wait for winter" or "too cold, can't wait for summer". Otherwise articulate people say things like, "Hot enough for ya?" on warm days, or when it's raining, "At least we don't have to shovel it!".

As far as the weather goes, I've decided to stop calling it "global warming" and call it "climate change". I used to think it was a lot of hype, but now, I believe it is really happening, after having seen what's going on in the Arctic and Antarctica. They tell us that in general the earth is warming up, but especially at the poles and that we should expect lots more "weather extremes". We're seeing that here.

We got an e-mail from our daughter in South Texas, she says this has been the hottest summer ever down there. We have been down there a couple of times in May, and it was stinkin' hot. I can't even imagine what it's like mid-summer; it'd suck the moisture out of your skin in seconds. Here in Central Ontario, it's been chilly and damp this summer. Oh, we've had some nice days, but, on many days drizzle, or all out rain.

Yesterday, it never got above 19C (66F) until early evening, when it got to a whopping 21C (70F). We had an outdoor concert in the evening, and my hands had been cold all day. Playing a metal flute that never really warmed up, as the sun was going down, didn't help matters.

But hey, it gets better. Right now it's 3:00 in the afternoon and the temperature is 14C (57F) and it's been raining all day. For the first time ever, on July 14th, we actually had to turn the furnace on and warm up the house. Anyone who knows me knows I'm not a big fan of housework, oh, I do it, but I don't like it. Today, I LOVED washing the dishes! For the first time in three days, my hands were warm for a few minutes.

So, what can we expect for the next week? It's supposed to warm up to about 22C (72F) by Tuesday and we should expect "variable cloudiness" "scattered showers" and "showers" until Friday. By the following Tuesday (July 24th) we should get up to our average temperature, 25C (77F).

I'm not complaining, think of this as commenting. Those who have the right to complain have been having unrelenting rain and flooding, or no rain and fires burning out of control.

So as I sit here typing with cold hands in the middle of a cold, rainy, summer afternoon, I should be grateful, really. We DON'T have to shovel it. Soon enough we'll have five foot piles of snow outside the door, from shovelling it! Maybe I'll think up some new statements to make about the weather, since after so many days, I can't use the "We needed the rain" one.

So despite what Samuel L. Clemens said, I'm doing my part to help slow the climate change. I'm turning off any lights that don't need to be on, washing out my plastic zip-lock bags and re-using them, I've got my super-duper re-usable grocery bags that I remember to take to the grocery store most of the time. For today, however, I'm using the oil, the furnace is on ... in July.