weather

[ewt]

I am delighted by the snow, although it would be nice to have rather more of it - North London seems to have been skipped over a bit. The huge-and-lots flakes coming down last night at Blackheath were a joy.


Yes I said MILD weather. Yes, it is a bit on the cold side, but get some warm clothes on and stop complaining about it already. I have refrained from having this rant so far this year but today I have lost my patience. It really is NOT all that cold outside, and yes it would be great if houses here had effective heating and/or insulation, but they don't. Deal with it. Put on another sweater. Wear your coat inside. Wear gloves inside if you must - mittens if you don't have to type or write (mittens are warmer). Drink endless cups of hot tea/water/chocolate/milk. Get a hot water bottle for crying aloud. Learn that walking to the next stop or indeed for your whole journey is going to be MUCH warmer than waiting for the bus. Wear a hat and gloves and scarf. Wear long underwear and extra socks.

I don't like being cold any more than the next person does, but it seems the correct thing to do when cold in this country is to sit and complain about being cold rather than do something about it. I know some people feel the cold more than others but I don't believe it is impossible to deal with.

It could be much, much worse.

I have gone out to deliver a paper route when it was -30C and windy and come back without getting particularly chilled. I could still feel my toes and fingers. There was ICE on the outside of my scarf and glasses but I still managed to keep warm through wearing a hell of a lot of clothing and keeping moving. I know you don't have as much hi-tech goretex windproof blah blah blah equipment here, but I also know it sure as hell isn't -30C out there. Accuweather tells me it is 2C and feels like -4C (that'd be the windchill factor then, ooh a whole six degrees!). Also, I have not had great trouble acquiring things like long underwear here.

If I see you complain about the cold I also want to see you list all the things you've done to get warm so I can laugh at you. If you've done the stuff I listed behind the cut and you're still cold then you have my sympathies but I reserve the right to think you may be a wimp.

EDIT: *Sigh* I know not all of you do this, but enough do that it bothers me. Perspective, people.

Comments

[edwards.livejournal.com]

Yes, it's mild. Yes, it's quite tolerable. However, I'd trade this soggy, icy crap for a Canadian winter anytime. I love seeing Canadian drivers go "Oh, it's just a little snow, we get more than this at home, eh?" and then promptly smack into a lamppost because a: Winter Tyres are unobtainable and possibly illegal here (speed ratings et al), and b: dry snow is nothing compared to slush and ice.

But I'm sitting around in a t-shirt. It's not COLD. PEI was cold. And it was mild for Canadian weather apparently.

[ewtikins.livejournal.com]

I have a separate rant for people who try to drive on snow/ice/slush/whatever without proper gear. It's similar to the one for people who think trainers won't slip on the pavement.

What do you think happens to dry snow when lots of cars drive over it? It gets packed into ice, that's what. Also, what do you think happens in the spring when we get the melt/freeze/melt/freeze cycles? Canadians should be well used to driving on slush and ice; the main difference in road conditions is that in Canada we have the infrastructure to plough and grit the roads before it gets too bad. This is no excuse for smacking into lampposts though.

[edwards.livejournal.com]

I've driven on packed ice in Canada. At 160kph. With one set of wheels on tarmac and the other set on ice.

I've also driven in fresh snow.

Proper gear and training makes a huge difference, but Canada is simply not as wet as the UK, period ;)

[ewtikins.livejournal.com]

As a non-driver I can't really comment on which driving conditions are more difficult, although I would respectfully suggest that driving 160kph on packed ice is probably just foolhardiness... although not as foolish as trying to brake suddenly in such conditions.

Whether Canada is wetter than the UK depends very much on to which bit of Canada you refer. My original rant, however, was about people complaining about the cold - and I think we both agree on that.

[edwards.livejournal.com]

I was driving a Dodge Durango SUV - AWD and a 4.7 V8. Very safe and secure in those conditions, mostly because it was on the Highway from Toronto to New Brunswick and visibility was excellent. No sudden braking needed because I dropped to 130 or below for anything which might involve outside influences (such as Moose, other cars and the like).

And Ontario and east - I understand the west is pretty soggy, but I doubt it's as wet as the UK.

[pplfichi.livejournal.com]

The UK simply isn't *that* wet. It's all a misconception brought on by whinging Brits. IIRC technically parts of Kent and the like get enough rain to class them as semi arid - it's just that it comes as showers and drizzles instead of sudden downpours which makes it work.

The British like to complain about everything. Cold, hot, wet, dry, trains etc etc. It's a national pastime and one of the many plus points of living here!

And WTF is this snow anyway? There's nothing on the ground and when I've been out it's just been rain. me wants snow!

[edwards.livejournal.com]

The UK isn't just Kent. Scotland is astonishingly wet - perhaps you should compare living here to living in, say, Ontario for a while.

[pplfichi.livejournal.com]

Scotland isn't that wet either - varying from 800-3000mm of rain a year related to topography (Source: the UK met office (http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate/uk/location/scotland/#rainfall) [metoffice.gov.uk]).

Ontario seems drier, but not *that* much drier then the east coast of Scotland. From: Education Canada (http://educationcanada.com/facts/index.phtml?sid=on&a=1&lang=eng) [educationcanada.com] Northern Ontario's annual precipitation varies from 508 mm along the Hudson Bay coast to 889 mm near North Bay. Southern Ontario averages about 762 mm per year. It would be nice to see somewhere that has rainfall broken down on a monthly basis.

I lived in Manchester for a couple of years. It only gets ~1300mm, the reason why everyone thinks it rains a lot there is because it seems to rain every day, for months on end. The fact that little rain fell doesn't really seem to matter. Scotland is similar in the there is no month where relatively little rain falls.

[yady.livejournal.com]

I cycled on packed snow (only a thin layer, but slippery) a few weeks ago and fell. I have learned from this to take the nonslippery alternative route when available. I have also driven on the stuff (or what little bit of it the Netherlands has sometimes), and found that it's not that hard if you actually pay attention to what you are doing and don't try to race or anything...