----------

Chilled Vancouver commuters faced their second day of winter hell today, as an additional =BC centimetre of the peculiar white stuff fell, bringing the Lower Mainland to its knees and causing millions of dollars' worth of damage to the marijuana crops.

Scientists suspect that the substance is some form of frozen water particles and experts from Saskatchewan are being flown in.

With temperatures dipping to the almost but not quite near zero mark, Vancouverites were warned to double insulate their lattes before venturing out.

Vancouver police recommended that people stay inside except for emergencies, such as running out of espresso or biscotti to see them through Vancouver's most terrible storm to date.

The local Canadian Tire reported that they had completely sold out of fur lined sandals.

Drivers were cautioned to put their convertible tops up, and several have been shocked to learn that their SUV's actually have four-wheel drive, although most have no idea how to use it.

Weary commuters faced soggy sushi, and the threat of frozen breast implants.

Dr. John Blatherwick, of the Coastal Health Authority reassured everyone that most breast implants were perfectly safe to 25 below.

"The government has to do something," snarled an angry Trevor Warburton. "I didn't pay $850,000 for my bachelor condo in the West End so I could sit around and be treated like someone from Toronto."

A mass of Latin words falls upon the facts like soft snow, blurring the outline and covering up all the details. The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap between one's real and one's declared aims, one turns as it were instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish spurting out ink. In our age there is no such thing as "keeping out of politics". All issues are political issues, and politics itself is a mass of lies, evasions, folly, hatred, and schizophrenia. When the general atmosphere is bad, language must suffer.

                        -- George Orwell, writer (1903-1950)

(1908 - 1999) Quentin Crisp's observations about euphemisms:

Euphemisms are not, as many young people think, useless verbiage for that which can and should be said bluntly; they are like secret agents on a delicate mission, they must airily pass by a stinking mess with barely so much as a nod of the head, make their point of constructive criticism and continue on in calm forbearance.  Euphemisms are unpleasant truths wearing diplomatic cologne.

Words are timeless. You should utter them or write them with a knowledge of their timelessness.

                        -- Khalil Gibran, mystic, poet, and artist (1883-1931)