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

Wed Jan 20 14:43:37 UTC 2010

The final "n" heard in "blue northern" could be a barely enunciated "and."

 JL

On Wed, Jan 20, 2010 at 9:32 AM, Bill Palmer <w_a_palmer at bellsouth.net>wrote:

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> Poster:       Bill Palmer <w_a_palmer at BELLSOUTH.NET>
> Subject:      Re: "Blue Northern" [was "Nor'easter"]
>
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>
> 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"]
>
>
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> > 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
> >>
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> >> 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:
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> >> > 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
> >> >
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> >>
> >>
> >> --
> >> -Wilson
> >> ���
> >> All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"��a strange complaint
> >> to
> >> come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
> >> �Mark Twain
> >>
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