My husband and I were on the coast for our anniversary and the weather was not idyllic. In fact it was a cross between rain and mist and was just over all damp. The term my husband informed me was it was "pishing" and that it was a British Term, and that is what we called it.
Fast forward a few weeks later and I am out with a friend doing shopping and the weather is very much the same sort of rain and mist combo. I told her about the fabulous word that described the event that was befalling upon us weather wise, and asked if she had heard it while is was across the pond. If there was anyone that would have a word for rain in its various stages it would them.
She had not heard that term and asked if what I really meant was "pissing" and it had been misheard, because she had heard the rain called that several times, but by no means was she on the up and up on all of the British colloquialisms. While we were having a coffee break from out daily adventures and discussing how we were doing on our
NaNoWriMo word could. I decided to turn to the internet looking for words that describe the rain.
Oh my. I came across a
charming article from several years back by BBC that bemoaned the lack of description on the way the water fell from the sky. I have never read a more British article or laughed so hard about it. It made me want to use all of their terms to describe rain, even the some what french one that was described as "raining like a cow relieving itself," which is to say it was probably a steady heavy down pour that will muck up your shoes considering the manner of cows.
While that article gave me a good chuckle and some inspiration for a little bit writing, it crossed my mind that perhaps I should continue my search for "pishing" and maybe it wasn't a British thing at all. This lead me to
Urban Dictionary. Yeah... Well... The answer they gave for "pishing" was much like a cow relieving itself on people that enjoy that sort of thing. Not the answering I was looking for, but did point me in the direction that perhaps my husband just heard the word wrong.
Once last search before giving up on the internet distraction and forcing myself to go back to my noveling brought me to
The Fine Art of Pishing, which thankfully had nothing to do with urination and everything to do with coaxing a bird out of a bush and also nothing to do with doing that in the rain. Giving up, I realize that sometimes that some of the best distractions are the one that leave you with more questions than answers, and that if I want to get anywhere on my novel I have to start giving my characters more interesting questions than them chatting about the weather.
