"Blue Northern" [was "Nor'easter"]

Wed Jan 20 14:32:57 UTC 2010

I loved the Ian & Sylvia song you just excerpted, Geoff. And it's the only
time I've ever heard the expression "blue norther" (sans "n", I believe, if
I was hearing it right).  I never knew Ian's surname, BTW, so thanks.

Never spent any time in the NW, so I wonder if "blue norther" is a common
term there.

Bill Palmer
----- Original Message -----
From: "Geoffrey Nathan" <geoffnathan at WAYNE.EDU>
To: <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
Sent: Wednesday, January 20, 2010 6:14 AM
Subject: Re: "Blue Northern" [was "Nor'easter"]

> ---------------------- Information from the mail
> header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Geoffrey Nathan <geoffnathan at WAYNE.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: "Blue Northern" [was "Nor'easter"]
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Some of you may remember the use of the phrase "Blue Norther" in Ian
> Tyson's _Someday Soon_:
>
> So blow, you old Blue Northern, blow my love to me
> He's ridin' in tonight from California
> He loves his damned old rodeo as much as he loves me
> Someday soon, goin' with him someday soon
>
> Clearly also a wind, but not associated with the Northeast.  I'm a little
> surprised that everyone didn't simply know that a Nor'easter was a major
> snowstorm that rolls up the east coast, hitting New York, Boston, Maine
> and then the Maritimes.  I thought it was just standard English. Certainly
> CNN and The Weather Channel use the term all the time.  Here's a
> definition:
>
> http://www.weather.com/encyclopedia/winter/noreast.html
>
> The word is polysemous for me, simultaneously meaning simply a wind from
> the North-East, and in that case it has no specific latitude and
> longitude.
>
> Geoff
>
>
>
> Geoffrey S. Nathan
> Faculty Liaison, C&IT
> and Associate Professor, Linguistics Program
> +1 (313) 577-1259 (C&IT)
> +1 (313) 577-8621 (English/Linguistics)
>
> ----- "Wilson Gray" <hwgray at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
>
>> From: "Wilson Gray" <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
>> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>> Sent: Tuesday, January 19, 2010 8:37:19 PM GMT -05:00 US/Canada Eastern
>> Subject: Re: "Nor'easter" -- missing definition? and an antedating
>>
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> -----------------------
>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
>> Subject:      Re: "Nor'easter" -- missing definition? and an
>> antedating
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> Has anybody here been to sea or know anyone who's been to sea and,
>> therefore, might know what contemporary seafarers, at least, say? I
>> read Jan freeman's Boston Globe article, which, for me, is the last
>> word on the subject of the *word* _nor'easter_.. As it happens, I
>> have
>> a brother who spent years on an aircraft carrier and, later, on a
>> destroyer, as both EM and officer. Unfortunately it has never
>> occurred
>> to me , before now, to ask him about the nor[th]easter, he being of
>> somewhat-waspish temperament, with nothing much more than contempt
>> for
>> the ignorance of others.
>>
>> IME from living in Boston, I consider a "nor[th]easter" to be a
>> full-blown (no pun intended) storm and not merely a wind. However, I
>> have no vested interest in this. So, it's fine with me, if others
>> choose to believe otherwise.
>>
>> WRT "blue norther," Kelli's mention of this storm is the only other
>> time that I've come across it, since that time when Sky King and his
>> sidekicks were trapped by a snow-bearing one in an episode of the old
>> radio show, back in the '40's. There's nothing like that in East
>> Texas, just eye-blasting, eardrum-shattering thunderstorms.
>>
>> There was an odd local(?) belief: if you made any kind of loud noise
>> during such a storm, you would call down the lightning onto wherever
>> it was that you were sheltering. I recall talking in whispers and
>> walking on tip-toe, during such storms. As a child, I really wanted
>> to
>> see whether a thunderbolt could actually set a house afire, when it
>> was pouring down rain. So, I always kinda hoped that some neighbor
>> would make a loud noise and cause his house to be struck by
>> lightning,
>> so that I could see whether the crib would consequently burn to the
>> ground, despite all the water falling from the sky.
>>
>> -Wilson
>>
>> On Tue, Jan 19, 2010 at 1:51 PM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net>
>> wrote:
>> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> -----------------------
>> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> > Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
>> > Subject:      Re: "Nor'easter" -- missing definition? and an
>> antedating
>> >
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> >
>> > At 1/19/2010 01:25 PM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
>> >>Literary? Then how explain customary nautical pronunciations
>> "nor'east,"
>> >>"nor'west," "nor'nor'west," etc.?
>> >
>> > The highly-educated seamen and fishermen of pre-colonial, colonial,
>> > and early Republic New England?  :-)
>> >
>> > Joel
>> >
>> > ------------------------------------------------------------
>> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>> >
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> -Wilson
>> ï¿½ï¿½ï¿½
>> All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"ï¿½ï¿½a strange complaint
>> to
>> come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
>> ï¿½Mark Twain
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

No virus found in this incoming message.
Checked by AVG - www.avg.com
Version: 8.5.432 / Virus Database: 270.14.150/2632 - Release Date: 01/19/10
07:34:00

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org