I Mean It

Thinking of my American readers today.

Stay safe.  Stay safe.  Stay safe.

I Don’t Care What The Weatherman Says

If you controlled the weather, what would it be like outside today?

One of the things I’ve always loved about Britain is the changing seasons.  I like to see blossom on the trees in spring; sunshine in summer; I enjoy kicking leaves in autumn; sitting inside not freezing my butt off in winter.

It’s the height of summer here now, so it’s raining.  I’d like it to be sunny.  I’d like not to be sitting wrapped in a cardi, hoping it will dry up enough to put out the washing currently draped all over the house.  I’d like to know it’s summer and not just a long winter punctuated with one hot day (the day I choose to cook a roast).

The Hub has the perfect system: sunshine all day; rain in the middle of the night when everyone is in bed.

Spud doesn’t care, so long as he can play football/watch football/hit me with a snowball.

Tory Boy lives in another country, so I can’t ask him.  Actually, it’s not another country; it’s an hour’s drive from here; but it might as well be another country for all the time he takes to call his mother.

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There’s a hurricane in the Atlantic at the moment.  That’s what I call weather.  None of our British seventeen-types-of-rain-wrong-snow-on-the-line-a-hot-day-whip-off-the-vest-and-frighten-the-children wishy-washiness.

The problem with dramatic weather, however, is that it tends to rather inconvenience people unfortunate enough to live in its path; in fact, it tends to be downright vindictive.  I hope those of my readers affected or likely to be affected by Hurricane Irene are well prepared, and stay safe.  I don’t want a disruption to my blog reading.

For an excellent guide to hurricane preparations, read Nancy’s post on what to do.   There is also a link in my blogroll so you can track hurricanes in your area.

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All this weather talk reminds me of something I once read in Stephen Pile’s The Book Of Heroic Failures; I can’t recall it exactly, but it was a tv station’s apology for their intermittent weather report:

Whether the weather can be brought to you today depends on the weather, whether we like it or not.

The original quote was much funnier but I can’t find it; I did, however, come across a Penguin worksheet for high school students based on The Book Of Heroic Failures (and the media complains exams are getting easier…!).

Here’s an excerpt from the preamble:

Stephen Pile was born in Lincolnshire in 1949. In 1977, when he was 28 years old, he said, ‘I’m never going to write a book’.  The Book Of Heroic Failures was published two years later […] He therefore failed in his ambition never to write a book.

He and others started the Not Terribly Good Club of Great Britain in 1976, but it was such a success that they closed it down.

Good job he’s not in charge of the weather; all we’d have is rain in summer.

O-oh…

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