The Winnipeg Wind Chill Factor Omission (or Making a Virtue out of Necessity)

 

We are experiencing a cold spell here in Victoria. Recently, I read that the temperature was going down to minus 20. It wasn’t, of course. It was going down to something like minus 8, but with a strong wind…. Oh no, I thought. The Winnipeg Wind Chill Factor Omission has reached the west coast.

When I arrived in Winnipeg in 1970, degrees Fahrenheit were being replaced by degrees Celsius. One New Year’s Eve the temperature went down to minus 41. Fahrenheit or Celsius, I forget which, but it didn’t matter, for they crossed over at minus 40. Forty below was minus 40. Along with the temperature came the wind chill factor, as a warning, for you would be frost-bitten much sooner in the wind. The temperature is minus 40, we were told — minus 45 with the wind chill factor. 

And then, for some reason, perhaps in the late seventies or eighties, the wind chill was no longer expressed as a temperature, but a four digit number, something to do with joules. Nobody knew what it meant, but 2,000 and above was bad. It was serious brass-monkey weather. 

There was a certain logic in expressing the wind chill as an independent number rather than a temperature. It may be minus 45 outside with the wind chill factor, but who is standing in the wind? And how much wind? In reality, the temperature with the wind chill factor varies for every individual, depending on the exposure. So it made sense to do away with “minus 45 with the wind chill factor”.

But because nobody knew what the four-digit number meant, and because Winnipeggers liked to brag about how cold it was, and the lower the temperature the better, the old system of measuring the wind chill factor returned. Once again, people would say, “It’s bloody cold: minus 25, minus 40 with the wind chill factor."

And then something happened.

Minus 25, minus 40 with the wind chill factor, 

evolved into 

Minus 25. Minus 40 (pause) with the wind chill factor, 

and then simply, 

Minus 40.

Suddenly, the temperature was lower than ever!

I suppose if you live in the coldest place on earth, you have to make a virtue out of necessity. You have to enjoy it. Instead of somehow easing the pain by saying, “It’s a dry cold”, you can embrace it, and say to other Canadians, 

It’s minus 40 here in Winnipeg!

You may have travelled from your garage in your heated car to heated underground parking, without venturing outside at all, and you certainly didn’t experience the wind chill, and the temperature isn’t really minus 40, but no matter,

It’s minus 40 here in Winnipeg!

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Like or As

 COVID-19 is not ever likely to be eradicated from the planet. It will become something that we can quite easily live with, like we do any number of other diseases. In the meantime, I am going to continue to live my life just as I was before I knew anything about Omicron.

In a recent column in the Globe and Mail, Gary Mason illustrates the language in transition. First, he uses “like” instead of “as” in front of the clause “we do”, but then he seems to have remembered what he learned at school, that “like” is a preposition to be followed only by a noun, while  the conjunction “as” should introduce a clause (“just as I was”).

We see this construction almost daily in the Globe. Just this morning for example, 

If maple spirit stops flowing like it did in the springs of my youth, what will Canada become?

I winced, just as I winced fifty years ago when sports celebrities with less education than I (but twenty times the income) would say in every interview, “Like I said...” Now, the error is everywhere, and I suspect the style guides are saying it is acceptable. But it still grates on my ear.

Like other grammarians, I will continue to use “as” in front of a clause, as I did in the past, and “like” in front of a noun.

“Like I said” — how the words grate on my ears,

Like stone on the glass or like chalk on the board,

And I will use “as” in my declining years,

As I learned at school, as the text book implored.

But when I am gone, and "like I said" becomes the idiom,

It will be deemed correct by the grammatical praesidium.

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Singular “They” Again

I may have solved the “singular they” problem. The problem is that in English we don’t have a singular, non-gendered pronoun. We have “he” or “she”, but no pronoun for the person whose sex we don’t know, or for the person who doesn’t want to identify as either male or female. We have the neutral pronoun "it", but that will not do.

This was a problem even before the non-binary age. Old grammatical farts like me would say “he or she”, but that would become very clumsy. Now that some people do not wish to be referred to as “he” or “she”,  the problem is even greater. Here is a version of a news item that I saw this morning. I have changed the details.

Winston is missing. They were last seen driving up the Pat Bay Highway in a Ford truck.

Of course, at first I wondered, who was with him? Then I suspected that Winston didn’t identify as either male or female, or the reporter was afraid of using the wrong singular pronoun and committing an act of micro-aggression.

In 2014, the Vancouver School Board attempted to introduce the neutral pronouns “xe”, "xem" and "xyr”. Bizarre as these pronouns would have sounded, at least it would have been clear how many persons were involved. But as far as I know, the pronouns haven't caught on.

So singular “they”, and “them”, may be here to say. Here is my solution, and I'm probably not the first to suggest it. To avoid confusion, if we know that a person does not wish to be referred to as “he” or “she”, then let’s make the verb singular as well.

Winston is missing. They was last seen driving up the Pat Bay Highway in a Ford Truck.

Then we'll know that he was alone.

For more on "singular they", microagression, and the Woke, see the Table of Contents.

Olefacto Ergo Sum

What is going through that little head of yours?

You meander in quick time along the way

Drawing me hither and thither, following 

The scent along the pavement. A rabbit, deer, 

Raccoon, or some other creature of the night? 

You relieve yourself, lingeringly, 

In lady’s fashion, upon a neighbour’s lawn, 

But then, a quick impulse, a sudden tug, 

Towards a bush: peemail, some people call it. 

Weighty correspondence indeed! You sniff, 

You sniff at length. Who has gone before?

Old Shep, with rhythmic bark and lurching gait

Or the wily whippersnapper down the street?

But then, you cock your leg and pee 

Again, not ladylike this time, but with purpose

And with masculine insouciance, 

As if to say, “I was here, remember me.”

Hermaphroditic being, what pronoun should I use? 

You pause and sniff again, and then, trot off. 

Veni, olefactavi, minxi.

Those of you with dogs will appreciate how much the daily round is determined by your canine companion. A look, a sudden descent from the couch,  a gentle nudge with a paw or an insistent scratch, a whine or even a bark — it’s time to go out. Or early in the morning, a scratch, a refusal to jump on the bed and go back to sleep, a fiercer scratch until there is no choice.

The poo-turnaround. Half-dressed, sometimes in shoes without socks, I

I stagger out and up the street, usually tugged in a straight line to the neighbour’s lawn for a pee, her, not me, no nonsense, no indecision, no darting back and forth, just a quick squat and a long pee. I count the seconds: seven, this morning, but once after an early night and a late start, it was thirteen. And then it’s up and off again with satisfaction, boisterous, jovial even, sometimes even with a little prance of happiness. Not me. I just want to return to bed, or coffee.

Halfway up the street, she (I wish we had the French word) obliques on to the boulevard grass and moves with purpose. Six quick steps in one direction, and then back again, a sniff, no, not quite right, three further steps, then yes, at last, she crouches — and issues forth, a turd.

An anxious moment, do I have a poo bag? If not,the dog owner’s dilemma. What to do? Is anybody watching? A deft kick with the side of my boot, or if my conscience gets the better of me, a delicate manoeuvre with a used tissue or a Covid mask.

But all is well. I pull out a green bag, retrieved yesterday from the Government House dispenser, the very best of poo bags, vice-regal quality, and bend down, hoping for the best.

This is an anxious moment too. Quality, consistency, ductility, malleability, solidity. Position: sometimes the turd is wedged between the blades of grass, impossible to retrieve intact. (One of the joys of walking your dog in the prairie winter is embracing the turd in a handful of snow.)

But this morning, all is well. As I pick it up, firm, she scratches, scattering the sod with atavistic vigour upon the earth beneath, and me as well, if I don’t dodge out of the way.

We turn around. She understands. Not a longer walk so early in the morning. And so, back to bed. Or coffee. 

For more articles, see Table of Contents.