Conference thebay::joyoflex

My Second College Edition American Heritage Dictionary lists nor'easter as
simply an alternate pronounciation secondary to northeaster. The same is true
for northeast and northeasterly. Oddly, the same is not true for northwester,
though it is for northwest and northwesterly, at least in my 1985 edition. I
suspect an editorial oversight. In fact, all the compound, non-cardinal
directions have a secondary pronunciation which omits the "th" except
northwester, of course.

It's interesting to note the sound changes in "south" (sowth with unvoiced th)
versus "souther" (sowther with voiced th) versus "southerly" (suhtherly with
voiced th). Can anyone with a more erudite dictionary shed some light on the
origin of this sound change? Is this part of a systematic shift, or is it more
the Kent versus Mercia versus Northumbria thing?

There seems to be winds and/or storms listed for each of the eight compass
points. Here's what I found in AHD.

norther		Sudden, cold gale from the north
northerlies	Storm or wind from the north

northeaster	Storm or gale from the northeast

easterlies	Storm or wind from the east

southeaster	Storm or gale blowing from the southeast

souther		Strong wind coming from the south
southerlies	Storm or wind from the south

southwester	a. Storm from the southwest
		b. Strong wind from the southwest

wester		Storm or wind coming from the west 
westerlies	Storm or wind from the west

northwester	Storm or gale from the northwest

Being a religious man, I'd remiss if I didn't point out that Easter was a strong
wind (or storm) from the east, at least from a European perspective, eh?

Wook

    G'day,
     
    A sou'wester is an oilskin hat worn by fishermen... hence would be
    common parlance
    
    Nowlooky here, young Wook.... why the bait? You know as well as I, Easter
    comes from Eoster the pagan fertility festival of spring...
    
    
    ;-) nice try
    
    and try saying sowtherly more than once, and the origin of sutherly
    soon appears - it's just so much easier to say..
    
    
    
    
    and there *could* be nor by nor'westers too.. all goes back to
    boxing the compass and all the Cardinals, half cardinals, quarter
    cardinals, 'by' points and (going for broke) the quarter points...
    
    North
    N 1/4 E
    N 1/2 E
    N 3/4 E
    N by E
    N by E 1/4 E
    N by E 1/2 E
    N by E 3/4 E
    NNE
    NNE 1/4 E
    NNE 1/2 E
    NNE 3/4 E
     NE by N
    NE 3/4 N
    NE 1/2 N
    NE 1/4 N
    NE
    NE 1/4 E
    NE 1/2 E
    NE 3/4 E
    NE by E
    
    etc
       (think that's right from memory)
    
    
    derek
    
    
    derek
    
    
    
    

        There is a Norwest bank (no appostrophe) in Colorado.
        
        Dan

    Re .2
    
    >Nowlooky here, young Wook.... why the bait? You know as well as I, Easter
    >comes from Eoster the pagan fertility festival of spring...
    
    Sounds religious to me.
    
    (Pagan is still one of the most religious-oriented cities in the world.)

    G'day,
     not disagreeing... only the allusion to an easter(ly) wind for easter
    rather than the eoster reference... which I am sure is known..
    
    
    thought it might be a blatant stir.. in which case it worked....
    
    regards
    derek
    

Just me attempting a bit of levity, though it does explain why we don't use the
term for storms, gales and strong winds from that direction. The collision with
the Easter holiday makes it a problematic term.

Can anyone think of an appropriate variation of orient as a substitute? Orienter
just doesn't do it for me. Perhaps the Orient Express, a la Montreal Express or 
Alberta Clipper (both are storms or cold winds that we get here in New England
which come in out of Canada.)

Any other weather terms based on place names?

Wook

a lot of vw car models were named for winds. i don't know if there are
corresponding place names.
the climate in california and many other places is called mediterranean.
no wind is sometimes called doldrums. it is on most maps of the atlantic ocean.
there are other doldrum regions, but i do not recall seeing them labelled.
dry winds from the interior are called santa anas in southern california.

    In Canada, unusually cold weather is called an Arctic air mass.
    It would be theoretically possible to blame a nationality instead,
    but everyone forgets their existence.
    
    In Japan, I've occasionally seen cold weather blamed on Siberia.
    
    -- Norman Diamond

    In Colorado Springs, the local tele-meteorologists occasionally refer
    to an 'Albuquerque Low': a warm, moist air mass from the south which,
    if it merges with a colder air mass, can produce heavy snow. Don't know
    if the Albuquerquians* have a similar term of mild derision for 'bad'
    weather originating from the north.  (BTW, why is weather considered
    'good' or 'bad' anyway?)
    
    Though the name is not geographic in origin, in the winter we sometimes
    brace against a 'chinook' (which the tele-meteorologists are fond of
    calling, to my annoyance, 'chinook winds', a term kind of like the
    Sierra Nevada Mountains): a Native American (tribe unknown to me but
    probably Ute, the local tribe) term that means snow-eating wind.  
    According to the US Census Bureau's Gazetter, there is a Chinook, MT
    and a Chinook, WA, but I suspect that these place names succeeded the
    name of the wind.
    
    I suspect also that many of these geographic-based names for weather,
    as quaint as they sound, are rather new incarnations foisted on the
    public by corporate media marketing types in an attempt to make weather
    more interesting (as if it needed their help).  Before the relatively
    recent advent of long-term, macro-scale weather forecasting, people
    probably had little idea from where a particular weather system
    originated other than the cardinal directions.
    
    We also have here a 'Rocky Mountain High', but the rules of this
    conference probably prohibit further elaboration.
    
    
    Kevin
    
    * Anybody know if there are rules for "geographying" people?

    Of course, the Shetland islands are in the horse latitudes, but I'm not
    sure if that's germane here...
    
    Uncle Roy

    G'day,
    ... and is that why Shetland poinies are so small... theyhave been
    dessiccated?
    
    dj