Tag archives: weather

Better the weather you know: proverbs and quotations about the weather

22 March is World Water Day, and 23 March is World Meteorological Day, so what better time to celebrate our fascination with foreboding forecasts? Threatening thunderstorms and disconcerting downpours crop up time and time again in popular proverbs and quotations, and not least because of the abundance of words that rhyme with ‘rain’. Perhaps the [...]

Posted on: 22 March 2013 | Posted by: | Comments: 2 | Categories: Dictionaries and lexicography, English in use | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,

All about the weather

As was noted here a few weeks back, there are a variety of regional words to choose from when describing the weather in the UK. Many of these words are, unsurprisingly, related to different kinds of rain. Here in the US we also have a healthy crop of regionalisms with which to describe our inclement weather, [...]

Posted on: 25 July 2012 | Posted by: | Comments: 0 | Categories: Varieties of English, Word trends and new words | Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

Mochy, mizzly, or mothery? Ten regional words to describe the weather

The UK is often characterised (particularly in the US) as a damp and windy island with unusually changeable weather. The past week here has done little to dispel this impression, with flash floods in the North and muggy heat here in the South. Last week we asked our Twitter followers to describe the weather in [...]

Posted on: 29 June 2012 | Comments: 4 | Categories: English in use, Varieties of English | Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

It’s raining; it’s pouring

Much, if not all, of the East Coast of the United States was subject to a good drenching last week, courtesy of Hurricane Irene (which might be viewed as an odd name for a storm, given that it shares an etymological root with irenic). Consequently, we who live in that area have been pummeled not [...]

Posted on: 1 September 2011 | Posted by: | Comments: 2 | Categories: English in use, Word origins | Tags: , ,