For Oregonians,
it's impossible to let a day go by without commenting on the
weather. State climatologist George Taylor says that we obsess
over climate more than other Americans. In his new book, The
Oregon Weather Book: A State of Extremes, Taylor gives
us the real deal.
Willamette Week: Would you say weather
is water-cooler conversation No. 1?
George Taylor: It
seems to be. My perception is probably skewed because people
associate me with weather anyway, so that's about all they
ever want to talk to me about.
Do you ever get sick of it?
I think the one thing
that grates on me after a while is people congratulating
me if it's a day they enjoy and cursing me if it's not--basically
implying I have some control over the weather, which of
course I don't. I know it's meant as a joke, but I hear
it about half a dozen times a day. It wears a little bit
thin.
As a native Californian, how do you think the climate
factors into people's decisions to move here?
I think
for a lot of people it factors in negatively. The middle
'80s until the early '90s was a period of tremendous influx,
and that coincided with a dry period here. I've often wondered,
now that we're five years into a much wetter period, if
this will perhaps deter a lot of that migration.
Is the wet weather easier for native Oregonians to deal
with?
Not necessarily. I've talked to a lot of natives
who live here and still complain about the weather. My answer
is usually, "There are plenty of places where it doesn't
rain this much. If it really bothers you, leave!"
At least all this moist air here is good for the skin,
right?
The best way to measure water vapor in the air
is dew point. Even though our relative humidity here is
high, the dew point is not nearly as high as in other parts
of the country.
I keep seeing people here wearing shorts in the dead
of winter: Do we delude ourselves about weather, or is this
a matter for the fashion police?
I think there's a perverse sense
of pride here in saying, "I'm tough enough, I can handle
it." I had this one friend who decided he was going to wear
shorts every day the whole winter. And this was actually
during a very cold winter, the winter of '92-'93. He made
it through, though.
What is the most severe weather Oregon has on record?
Probably
the Columbus Day Storm of October 1962. It was a typhoon
that came barreling up the coast and moved inward. The wind
speeds were actually way above hurricane strength, over
100 miles an hour in downtown Portland.
Is it true that animals can predict the weather?
It
seems to be. There's a story in the book about the Mount
Nebo goats, down near Roseburg. If the goats went up high
it would be fair weather and if they came down low it was
going to rain. According to one radio station that was keeping
tabs on the goats' forecast skill, they actually did better
than the National Weather Services at predicting rain.
Since we don't all have goats at our disposal, how do
most meteorologists do?
Typically they're correct about
70 percent of the time. But they've been going up steadily.
Are the guys on television for real or fakers?
In
Oregon there is actually a much higher percentage of academically
trained TV weather people than in most places I've been
to. Most places have journalists doing weather reports.
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Willamette Week | originally
published March 1,
2000
|
