punxatawney phil glass half full / half empty? question for older folks.... [View all]
my father (now 90 years old), who grew up in pennsylvania, for what that's worth, has always insisted that when he was young, punxatawney phil's predictions were always either:
a) 6 more weeks of winter; or
b) only 6 weeks until spring.
so he never actually predicted an "early spring", it was always just putting either a pessimistic or optimistic face on a hard fact of the calendar, that the change of seasons was 6 weeks away in either case. basically, is the glass half full or half empty. same thing, just a different spin.
this always seemed to me to make sense and be very much in keeping with the tone of the whole ceremony and concept.
that said, i've never been able to find any corroboration for this view. everything i see online now is that b) is always "early spring".
does anyone else have this memory? or anything to back this up?
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