Tag: Rain

A motto?

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This statue stands behind the Bethesda Methodist Chapel in Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent. I think it is Mary and the Baby Jesus. But what do the words painted on the building mean.

Mercian

Rain God

Laughter

Mercia is the old name for the English Midlands, Stoke-on-Trent is in the North Midlands. Rain God? When you drive towards Stoke-on-Trent you realise it is higher than the surrounding area and rain clouds travelling over the Cheshire plain do sometimes dump their rain here… And Laughter? Maybe that’s about the place, the character of the people, or perhaps the writer was imagining the damp, wet people who had been rained on and was laughing at them. Who knows?

Tree fall?

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Trees leaning over a lake. Perhaps they will fall if the ground becomes too wet or the wind blows too strongly. With global warming making the weather worse you can see how damage can increase.

Some efforts are being made to reduce the damage. In a few places there has been a reintroduction of beavers to lakes and rivers. It seems strange that an animal that actually fells trees could reduce flooding. But by building lodges (dams woven from tree branches that they live in) beavers slow the flow of water in rivers. The water pools behind them and so less water is released downstream. This can reduce the speed of water rising and so stop flooding.

So in some ways it’s good that the trees have been felled. But I guess the reintroduction has to be in a controlled way.

Storm Eunice

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The storm hit today. We were on the northern edge and although its been windy with heavy rain I don’t think it was as bad as storm Desmond earlier in the week.

I’m staying at home as I have a sore throat and aches. I guess it might be the weather. It seems like you get different bugs depending on the temperature?

While I sit and watch the trees blowing about I believe that Britain generally gets a few named storms a year. Eunice is a bad one. It mainly hit down in the South of the country. A wind speed of 122 miles an hour was measured at the Needles, a series of cliffs on the Isle of Wight. Part of the canvas covering of the Millennium Dome was ripped off. Trains were cancelled throughout Wales. Major bridges were closed. Rooves were torn off and a church steeple blew down. I know Cornwall, Devon and Somerset have been affected and London Fire Brigade was inundated with calls.

There may be snow blizzards tonight in the North of England and in Scotland and Northern Ireland. They were saying 10 to 30 centimeters of snow may fall.

Meanwhile here… Its been a bit breezy. My city is about as far away from the coast as you can get, in the centre of the country. Our river is quite small here. It doesn’t create massive flooding, hopefully things will be OK. We may lose a few tiles, a chimney pot or two.

Pink sunset

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We walked round the lake and saw the sky turning pink. The glow spread across the surface of the lake but didn’t develop further. Ten minutes later as we drove home, the sun peeped out from undet the clouds. I couldn’t stop but saw the sky turning dark grey in front of me and the sun reflected in my rear view mirror. I hoped to drive towards a rainbow but as the rain started to fall the sun hid itself behind the clouds again. Went howm to a hot decaff coffee and a mince pie!

Seaside colours

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Just drawing in these colours gives me memories of sunny days at the seaside. If the colours were greys and turq, with some white added I would think of wild stormy days.

I remember a seaside holiday in the summer that was very grey and wet. The rain started as we arrived and took a taxi from the station to the chalet we were staying in. I was about eleven and I remember staring out of single glazed windows down a steep hill. I can’t remember a beach? I do remember mom having to put coins in a box on the back of a TV so we could watch it.w

Eventually the weather cleared up m I remember a harbour with lots of sailing boats. I think we went mackerel fishing but all my family got seasick except for me. The fishing lines kept catching fish and I pulled them in. When we got back the fisherman tried to give mom all the old fish but she insisted we got the ones I had caught. I don’t know what happened to them.

I also remember a hovercraft trip on a very choppy sea and eating egg and chips in a rough cafe. Funny what comes back when you see an image..

Wet

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I looked out this morning and the wind was whistling down the hill and rain was pouring down. But we had it lightly, about eighty miles and further north of here, rivers have flooded and a couple of footbridges have been swept away. Then later today there was news of someone possibly being swept away by a river.

When I think about the buildings collapsing into flooded rivers in South Asia recently it just underlines how much rain is being dropped on the land in some places. Because the atmosphere is getting hotter it can hold more water which consequently precipitates in greater amounts when it does rain. Flooding events that were once in a decade or a century are becoming more frequent. We have to act. I don’t know about political slogans like ‘levelling up’ but I think the heavy rains are ‘levelling down’ and washing the ground away from humanities feet!

Cold day

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Wet and cold today. The sort of day to wear layers to keep warm. Gas prices are at an all time high and the cost to consumers is ser to rise.

Last night I slept on the settee again because of my leg, and despite trying to keep warm with a housecoat and a dressing gown on, I ended up putting a pair of trousers on! I also used a bath sheet to go over the top of me. I miss my warm duvet. I’m not putting the heating on until we get temperatures below 0°. Celsius.