It’s Spring!

Spring is here! It’s not as cool as it looks, but I’m going out in light-coloured, light-weight, spring clothing. The very air is mild and sensuous.

more cat pictures

LOLcats: impressionable

See more LOLcats

I have a tendency to watch nature shows when I’m home alone with no one to talk about the “paint-drying channel.”

Things I watch sometimes:

• Daily Planet science news
• The Hour
• How It’s Made
• Megastructures
• What Not to Wear
• Antiques Roadshow
• Myth Busters
• Storm Chasers
• Corner Gas
• Little Mosque on the Prairie
• History Channel
• Outdoor Life Network
• News

Collapsible nested outlines in HTML

My own brand of HTML is bland and static, so I welcome this chance to improve my skills.

Whither STC?

Bill Swallow’s Waxing TechComm is hosting a continued discussion of the direction of and appropriate strategies for the Society for Technical Communication.

Environment Canada’s weather review for Ontario

February 2007 — by Jack Saunders, Communications Advisor

C-c-c-cold enough for you?

TORONTO, ONTARIO–(CCNMatthews - March 1, 2007) - The above-normal temperatures that have been reported since November of last year have now been replaced with exceptionally cold temperatures. Across the province, the mean temperatures for the month have now dropped in a range of two to five degrees below normal.

Snowfall was also noteworthy this month. The Great Lakes, with most of the surface as open water in the early part of the month, was responsible for high snow reports in some areas. The typical snowbelt areas, and atypically Hamilton, had high accumulations - in the case of Wiarton, it was record breaking. Locations outside these snowbelt areas had near-normal or below-normal amounts.

Overall, the trend of precipitation was drier than normal across the province. The colder temperatures reduced the amount of available moisture in these cases.

Severe Weather

Lake-effect snows were the big story to start off the month. On February 1 and 2, a very cold flow of air from the southwest caused snow bands to set up off of Georgian Bay. These bands ended up dumping approximately 40 centimetres of snow in the North Bay area during these two days. On February 2, a series of snow bands from the southwest moved onshore near the Cobourg area and caused near-whiteout conditions that may have been an important factor in a fatal crash on Highway 401.

From February 4-7, the winds shifted and blew the cold air in from the northwest. This shifted snowsquall activity to the more traditional snowbelt areas to the lee of Lake Superior, Lake Huron and Georgian Bay. During this four-day period, Sault Ste Marie received a little more than 70 centimetres of snow and the Barrie area almost 60 centimetres. As well, in less than 12 hours during this timeframe, the Owen Sound area picked up approximately 50 centimetres of fresh snow.

St. Valentine’s Day turned out to be more for shovelers than for lovers, especially around the western end of Lake Ontario. A well-developed storm system that moved south of the lower Great Lakes combined with strong lake-effect snow bands generated with a wind from the northeast to give the Hamilton area an official 46 centimetres. This all occurred just between the evening of February 13 and the morning of February 14. However, unofficial estimates of the snow in areas around Hamilton and Burlington were upwards of 60 centimetres, with drifts well over a metre in height. Other parts of Southern Ontario which were not impacted by the off-lake snow received amounts between 10 and 15 centimetres.
(… more at link.)

View from a height

Michael D. Lemonick, of Time magazine’s Eye on Science blog, has a brief article about the Cassini space probe taking this wonderful image of Saturn from above.

Clear Language and Design

The Clear Language and Design, or CLAD, Web site is a plain language resource and the gateway to a plain-language editing service. Plain language provides clear, simple language that makes technical content or Web sites accessible to the average reader. It’s an important goal.

The Web site includes a very useful readability evaluation tool.

The consultants on the CLAD team contribute most of their fees to support Toronto’s East End Literacy project.

LavaCon is my fall conference

I won the door prize! I went to a meeting of my professional organization tonight, where the speaker, Mr. Jack Molisani, was offering a seat at a conference as the door prize. To my surprise, I won. It’s not til next fall, but the conference is packed with good information about documentation project management, content management, XML, perhaps DITA, new tools and techniques, and a host of other topics. After three days I’ll be reeling and muttering, “My brain is full.”

I have to find transportation myself. It’s normally held in Hawaii (hence the name), which would be much harder to pay for. New Orleans, here I come!