Wednesday, January 27, 2021

An unambiguous forecast

From a National Weather Service alert for our area:

Between 1 and 2 inches of snow is expected by supper time today.
Do you see what they did there? For some people dinner is a mid-day meal; for others, an evening meal. Supper leaves no ambiguity. Merriam-Webster explains both words.

Now I want to know whether the NWS uses supper regionally or nationally.

Idle question, Michael, let it go.

*

I know myself too well to know that I could leave the question alone. So I e-mailed the Central Illinois office of National Weather Service to ask. Chris Geelhart, lead meteorologist, replied:
The forecaster that issued that statement comes from a farming background in the Midwest, which is probably why he used that wording. My mom also comes from a farming background (in South Dakota) and would use similar wording when I was growing up. Typically we tend to lean toward using actual clock times or more broad terms such as “mid afternoon”, “early evening”, etc. The NWS doesn't have a formal policy on regional terminology, as far as I know.
Chris noted that the use of supper in this morning’s alert was a subject of conversation on social media.

And it’s snowing.

[Thanks to Chris Geelhart for permission to quote him here.]

comments: 5

Fresca said...

But when IS supper time?
Midwestern, I'm thinking about 5:30 pm.

I love that you wrote and they replied so personally.

Michael Leddy said...

I’d say it’s somewhere around there.

Yes, I was really happy to get a response (from the lead meteorologist) and to get permission to quote it here.

Slywy said...

On a somewhat unrelated note, there may (or may not be, given the pandemic) a supper club on the other side of Washington Park someday.
https://www.theparksupperclub.com/

Slywy said...

Our supper time in western New York was 5ish, IIRC. Early enough to eat and wash, dry, and put dishes away before the 6 o’clock news. When “o’clock” was still in our vocabulary.

Michael Leddy said...

I wish that supper club well. But jeez — the Cotton Club was for white people only.

Dinnertime is usually around 5:30 here. Yeah, “o’clock” has faded, but we still have The 11th Hour. :)