wetI've been out here eleven months and three days (one month from now is the anniversary of my first day at Microsoft) and I still haven't gotten used to the weather patterns. I guess it'll take a few years.
I knew when I moved to expect frequent rain. What I didn't expect was a shift in the definitions of "rain"; specifically, everything's been shifted down a notch. What I would call "wet fog" is a "mist". What I would call "mist" is "a drizzle". "A drizzle", as far as I'm concerned, gets identified as "rain". By the time it's actually "rain"ing, it's a storm, while what I would call a decent "storm" worthy of the name qualifies as a "statewide emergency", complete with flooding and closed highways. Which shows a lot about how the infrastructures of different cities are set up for different weather; St. Louis gets a few roads closed on occasion from moderate storms, but not major highways. It takes a severe thunderstorm to shut those down, and I haven't seen one of those out here yet.
To be honest, I kind of miss it. I do like the cooler temperatures and frequent precipitation, but that frequency is made up for by a disappointing lack of intensity, at least most of the time.
What I'm really not used to is one variety of "rain" I never got much of in the Midwest- that of the soaking drizzle. The rain is falling gently enough that it is indeed a drizzle; the formal meteorological difference between rain and a drizzle is not quantity of water over time, but the size of individual droplets. Subjectively, it feels like a drizzle, there's just a lot of it. I'm not used to a drizzle that does leave me as wet as a decent rainstorm. That could, I suppose, reasonably be called "rain", but it's not the only kind of drizzle called "rain"...
Either way, it makes for a wet morning. I'm glad I have a good raincoat; unfortunately, my pants are soaked. Such are the tribulations of bicycle people.
In unrelated news, I find it amusing how many people have, apparently, chased me over to Twitter- at least three new accounts of people who read here have been established since I set mine up.
* that you get damp outside, it's a "mist"
* that you get wet outside, it's a "drizzle"
* that you're thinking about putting a jacket on, it's "rain"
* that you'd consider actually owning an umbrella, it's a "storm"
At least, that seems roughly how it works. :)