How can I cover past, present and future in one statement?
I can make statements about rain in the past, present and future:
- "it has rained" covers the past, as does "it has been raining all day today"
- "It is raining" covers the present
- "It will rain today" covers the future
How can I cover all three time periods with one statement? That it has rained prior to the moment, in the current moment and is expected to rain after the current moment.
Is there anything syntactically or grammatically wrong about the sentence "It is raining the whole day today", which I believe covers all bases? If so, what rule does it break?
Solution 1:
The tense you are looking for is the Simple Present Tense.
Although called the 'present:
The simple present tense [...] is used to describe habits, unchanging situations, general truths, and fixed arrangements.
So for example:
It is hot in the desert.
Does not just mean that right now the desert is hot, or only that it has been in the past, or will be in the future, but that the ongoing, continuous temperature in the desert is "hot".
The simple present version of your sentence is
It rains.
Examples of the simple present are:
The rain in Spain falls mainly in the plain.
I take my holidays in France
He drinks coffee after dinner
Solution 2:
The way to say this is:
It has been raining all day.
One continuing event
We use the present perfect continuous for a single activity that began at a point in the past and is still continuing:
I’ve been reading your book – it’s great. (I’m still reading it.)
He’s been living in the village since 1995. (He is still living in the village.)
She has been writing her autobiography since 1987.
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/grammar/british-grammar/present-perfect-continuous-i-have-been-working