Toronto Life - Snow

For a lot of us – Life After Steel is Toronto (pronounced tuh-RAHN-to, the last T sounding more like N ). Thus, I am starting a series on Toronto life. Things, places, events that are found in Toronto. If your Life After Steel is somewhere else, feel free to share anything about your new place, state, country, or your little corner of the world.

When you live in Toronto, you live with snow. If you have a 2 car garage – that means more snow.
Forget “I’m dreaming of a white Christmas”; those picturesque calendars showing people happily gliding in snow; or even those postcards you get from your friends from America with full snow gears. Snow is fun, nice, magical – yeah, but only for a day or two. Problem is, it does not stay for a day or two. Sometimes it starts as early as mid November and ends up to April – making that 5 months.

So, what is snow really?
Snow is frozen precipitation in the form of white or translucent hexagonal ice crystals that fall in soft, white flakes. Binisaya : Puti, morag gapas, mangahulog morag ulan.

Here are related snow terms we have learned to love and use.
Blizzard A long duration, wide area, snow event that is characterized by a heavy rate of snowfall, high winds and low temperatures. Binisaya : dugay ug daghan nga hulog sa snow kuyog sa kusog ug bugnaw kaayo nga hangin.
Blowing Snow. Airborne snow that is primarily being transported by the wind; precipitation may or may not be occurring . Bisaya : snow dala sa hangin
Freezing Rain. Supercooled rain that freezes on impact with a sufficiently cold surface. Binisaya : sobra ka bugnaw nga ulan, mahimong ice inig ka abot sa yuta nga bugnaw pud.
Heavy Snow, Moderate Snow, and Light Snow. - Still snow, the only difference is the varying rate of falling and visibility ranges. Binisaya : Aning tanan wala’y mapili – snow lang gihapon. Bisan ug light snow pero kon all day – mo daghan gihapon.
Sleet or Ice Pellets. A frozen mixture of rain and snow (pellets) that had been partially melted by falling through a layer of the atmosphere having a temperature above freezing, and subsequently refrozen by a colder layer or air near the surface of the earth. Binisaya : sagol nga frozen ulan ug snow.
White-out. A short duration situation, within a snow storm, where visibility drops to only to a few feet. Binisaya : Lisod mag drive, wala'y makita.
Hail. Many-layered ice balls, ranging from "pea" sized to "golf ball" sized or bigger. Hailstorm – a storm of hail. Binisaya : Dagko nga ice gyud mangahulog. Can cause damage to cars or even people.
Snow storm. A long storm of relatively heavy snow. Binisaya : Pirme sa weather news sugod December up to February.
Packing snow. Snow that is at or near the melting point, so that it can easily be packed into snowballs and hurled at other people or objects. This is perfect for snow fights and other winter fun, such as making a snowman, or a snow fort. Wow!
Slush. Snow which partially melts upon reaching the ground, to the point that it accumulates in in puddles of partially-frozen water. Binisaya: Dili na Wow! kay bugnaw, hugaw, ug makabasa sa imong karsones; mosulod pa gyud sa sapatos kon daghan.
Snirt. Snow covered with dirt, often seen by the side of roads and parking lots near areas that have been plowed. (Bet Torontonians didn't know this).
Wind Chill. The apparent temperature felt on exposed skin, which is a function of the air temperature and wind speed. Binisaya : Imong bati-on nga temperature human sa computation sa mga meteorologist using air temperature and kusog sa hangin. It is also known as "feels like".
Snow Plow – morag payloader ga tulod sa snow para maka agi ang mga sakyanan.
Salt - not for cooking, paliton sinako. Sprinkled by salting trucks along the roads to lower the freezing point of water, thus preventing the formation of ice.

And as if all these snow we get here is not enough -- we also make artificial snow. Go Figure!