dry lightning

[Jonathan Lighter]

I meant to imply that "heat lightning" is being eschewed.  I know I quit using it because it seems a misnomer to me.  Where I used to say, as a boy, "It's just heat lightning," now I'd say, "That lightning's too far away to bother us."

  Unless it hits sideways.

  Anyway, increased "knowledge" of physics has served to decrease my vocabulary.  Now I'm not even sure what "dry lightning" means. Damn.

  JL



James Smith <jsmithjamessmith at YAHOO.COM> wrote:
  ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: James Smith
Subject: Re: dry lightning
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

If meteorologists eschew the term dry lightning, I
would say it is because it is undefined and imprecise,
as evidenced by this discussion.

--- Jonathan Lighter wrote:

...
> Perhaps meteorologists are eschewing the term
> because it seems to imply some outmoded caloric
> theory of its nature.
>
> JL

James D. SMITH |If history teaches anything
South SLC, UT |it is that we will be sued
jsmithjamessmith at yahoo.com |whether we act quickly and decisively
|or slowly and cautiously.



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