- By Jim Evans
- Around Town
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SMART TALK
by Dr. Will S. Sert
DOWNPOUR: At the Institute for English as a First Language, we teach patients that redundancies can sneak up on you. They become so embedded in our language that we don't hear them. Downpour, for instance. A perfectly good word that we use ourselves, but with awareness.
Years ago, I once scuttled into a saloon to get out of a roaring rainstorm. As I stood panting in the puddle that was forming at my feet, a barfly looked up from the bottom of his glass, glanced blearily through the streaked front window, and remarked, "Look at that rain come down!"
To which a voice retorted from the gloom at the far end of of the bar, "Sure would look funny goin' up!"
Clear thinking for a man in his condition.
Downpour invites a similar wisecrack. After all, gravity isn't just a good idea, it's the law.
But we're stuck with downpour as handy shorthand for torrential rain. Just use it wisely, my friends.
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