I know I said I didn't have anything further to say on the subject of snow...

[filthgoblin]

It seems that I do. A picture of the UK from the NASA Terra satellite on Thursday showed this scene:







Click for bigness



On Thursday I was in London and it my experience of travelling through the countryside certainly matched that of the satellite picture. There wasn't a snatch of land that wasn't covered in snow.

Some people might say "aw, pretty!" and I guess it kind of is. That doesn't stop it being dangerous and really fucking annoying. This country totally isn't geared up to deal with this sort of weather. The roads aren't properly gritted. I'm having to park my car a five minute walk away because our back lane is dangerous. We are expected, understandably, to get to work, but in my case the business park where I work has no ice on any of the roads or pavements. As a result, I fell over twice yesterday. Today I feel a bit like I've been in a car accident. My right arm from my wrist up into my armpit and all around my shoulder hurts a lot, my lower back aches and I am walking with a limp from my legs sliding out from under me and making me collapse ungracefully in a heap, twisting my ankle under my body and sitting on it at full downward force.

I'm caught in a complex relationship with the weather. I hate the cold, but the countryside looks so beautiful. The fact the nation is completely unable to cope with the coldness and keep running drives hell into me. But more than anything else, I am sick to the back teeth of ZOMG!SNOWNEWS on the TV. BBC News 24 currently goes a bit like this:

Newsreader: The headlines - it's really cold out. It's a nightmare. Now the weather...
Weather presenter: It's really cold out, and will be like it again tomorrow. Back to you...
Newsreader: Thanks to the weather centre. Now your pictures and messages. It seems like it's cold out...
Me: *beats head repeatedly against desk*

If we can just put it into context, there was a staged coup in the Labour party this week. Senior members of the governing party of the UK, one a former Chief Whip, one a former Secretary of State for Health, proposed that there should be a secret ballot to oust the Prime Minister and find an alternative. Six cabinet members were rumoured to have supported them in this move. However, this potential political crisis came second in the news pecking order next to the fact that there was snow in the South East. They even made a whole 30 minute news special on the snow that they showed on prime-time BBC1 on Wednesday!

So what I'm trying to say is Enough Already. I hurt and I'm bored and I want it to stop.

Comments

[samstjames.livejournal.com]

Yeah... snow, tell me about it.

My sister and me went sledding (although I'm still fighting not to cough my lungs out >.<) - which I haven't done in years. Guess I'll feel it tomorrow in my bones.

Luckily our roads are pretty much cleared and every hour or so a snow plough tries to make sure it stays this way.

It's still snowing rather heavily around here (it has snowed the whole day) - and it's a mass of snow. A lot more compared to other years. And tomorrow I'll have an 8 hour train ride ahead of me, to which I'm not really looking forward now (German Railways sucks at coping with snow & cold, although they have to do that every year...).

[filthgoblin.livejournal.com]

I'm actually rather jealous of you going sledding. Mr G and I were going to do that, but we don't have one and can't find one anywhere in the shops for love nor money.

I know that we don't usually get the weather this badly, but it's been very, very badly managed. It's ridiculously treacherous out there, and there's more snow forecast for the next four days or so. Hmph.

[samstjames.livejournal.com]

It was the sled that we already used when I was a child - guess it's a bit older than me :D. It's stored in the cellar, but not used often.
But they were selling them rather abundantly in the malls around here - but then again, we often do have at least a little snow during winter.