Scott Thompson: An Ontario chinook?

Yesterday, we were thawing out snow banks, now we will be shoveling them back up again.

After experiencing bone-chilling cold through the holidays, we’ve been treated to a thaw the last couple of days that Ontarians were waiting for after hearing the forecast.

I was at my kid’s hockey game last weekend, and everyone was looking forward to the upcoming thaw, and why not?

This reminds me of when I lived in Calgary back in the late 1980s.

The infamous statement from a true Calgarian, other than “Eastern scums and pigs,” was ‘Don’t like the weather? Wait an hour.”

The reason was, Calgary is in the foothills of the beautiful Rocky Mountains and was very susceptible to winter weather from either side of the mountain range.

Sometimes warm, mostly very cold.

It is common in a Calgary winter to experience a “chinook” which is warm air flowing over the mountains from the south-west to break up the cold Calgary winters.

For a few days, it was -30 C, then after a week or two, a spring-like 15 C.

It was great to combat the winter blues!

But the mountains were the reason.

I’m not sure how we explain this, other than the obvious.

But I’ll take an Ontario chinook, wherever it’s from.

Scott Thompson is host of The Scott Thompson Show! on 900CHML and is a commentator for Global News.