The Right Sort of Snow

And once more we return to the perennial subject of the British weather.  It’s like a standard filler for a slow news day; it’s something to say while you’re thinking of something else to say that might prove more interesting.

But! today the weather is quite interesting in itself; for not only has it snowed (yes, snow is general all over England) but it is quite positively the Right sort of snow; the sort you can make snowballs and snowmen out of, the sort that engages children of all ages in blizzardly activity in parks and gardens.  On Sunday when the snow first fell I decided to make a snow car.  In my head it looked like a perfectly-formed snow-child of Bertie: in real life it looked like a misshapen heap of white.  But all was not lost: along came a child who helped me to improve it.  Sadly I ran over Bertie’s snow-child while taking Bertie for his yearly check-up (he needs a couple of new tyres but apart from that he’s perfectly healthy) and I can report that out there it is not only freezing, it is Failing to Thaw.  Normally when we have snow it doesn’t last; if it freezes overnight it thaws during the day (thus causing more problems since the remaining slush refreezes and becomes treacherous) but this time it’s staying.  If anything it seems colder now than it was this morning when I literally had to unfreeze Bertie’s doors with a hairdryer, letting down the extension lead from upstairs like Rapunzel’s hair.

The roads were not too bad, considering, but I can’t see anything thawing out today.  Even in the sun it’s completely arctic.

Have I thought of anything more interesting to say?  Nope, we’re stuck with it.

Oh, and in case you’re not in the UK and don’t instantly recognise the reference, the title refers to a British Rail announcement years ago that a train was cancelled because of ‘the wrong sort of snow.’  They don’t make announcements like that any more…

Kirk out