Saturday, July 09, 2005
______________________________________________________________________________
Pissing Rain
Piss rain sucks. Piss rain is what happens pretty much ALL WINTER LONG. And Fall. And Spring. So when Summer comes, please don't give me this piss rain bullshit.
But Vancouver weather is hardly ever obliging. For the past couple of weeks, despite the fact that it's officially summer, it's been piss rain in the mornings. Don't get me wrong guys. I love rain. REAL rain. The kind that comes down in large sloppy drops that splash into a high speed cameraman's wet dream. The kind where you count from when you see lightning so you know how far away it struck. The kind where if you're caught in it, umbrellas be damned, there's no running away from it. The kind that gives you a lame excuse to call in sick for work. The kind that you can smell before it arrives and again long after it's done, mmmm, that fresh, showered earth smell that cleans your insides if you take deep breaths. The kind which provides a nice backdrop that covers the noise of the city so that you can read and listen to nature nurturing itself. I miss monsoons in Singapore. Hell, I miss Singapore, but that's not really the point.
The point is that it doesn't rain for real in Vancouver, even though it's always bloody raining. Piss rain is rain that can't commit to being rain. It falls in sparse, cold drops. It wets your feet even though a small, foldable umbrella can take it on. It can't decide if it's started or stopped. It sure as hell can't affect the feel of the place, except to make everything grey, but as it is, it's no excuse to take the day off to enjoy it, because there's nothing to enjoy. In its aftermath everything's just vaguely muddy, everybody's just vaguely moist. Discomforted. Nothing more. Like a housefly you keep hearing buzzing against a window pane, only you haven't spotted it yet so you can't let it out.
Summer is supposed to be our reprise, but it's just another one of the Lower Mainland's broken promises. I mean, it's already late July, the solstice came and went a month ago, if we're not getting summer weather now, we're probably not going to get it for all that long this year.
I can't wait to move away from here. I can't believe that finally, for real, in less than a year I could well be experiencing a monsoon. Preferably on a bike, in East Coast Park, laughing and trying to find a shelter, but with no real conviction because hey, I'd already be as wet as I'm ever going to be.
posted by Joie! at
9:47 a.m.
______________________________________________________________________________
