It depends how cold!

How do you feel about cold weather?

Britain is a temperate but also a maritime country. It sits in a position where winds come from all directions and can get hot but also quite cold. That variation in weather means the British are always talking about the it!

As the world warms up we are getting less cold weather, but we don’t always have warm temperatures. Some years ago the country was covered in snow for a few weeks. Satellite pictures showed a totally white surface of the country, which was brilliant white with snow and ice.

So how do I feel about the cold? I have not really experienced very cold weather. But I have lived in cold houses. Huddling around a coal fire when I was a student, with not enough money to burn coal! I remember one day chopping up an old chair to keep warm. That was the year a crank on my then boyfriends bike snapped because it was so cold.

On another occasion we went cycle camping one Easter. The weather was fine on our travel to the camp site, then it snowed. We set up camp then found places in the town to keep warm. We sat in a warm pub till closing time, then had to go back. You know its cold when you put on two pairs of trousers and four tops to go to sleep in a sleeping bag inside a tent!

So on the whole I can cope with the cold. I don’t like not being able to heat our house as I get older, but I can put on more jumpers and a coat.

What I hate is too much heat….

April Showers?

Weather forecast.. Yellow warnings for severe weather. Gale force winds and heavy rain. Apparently we have a fast moving jet stream above us which is bringing rain and strong winds over the next couple of days. Hang on to your brolly! We went out in it and got soaked, but the blossom is starting to open on the pear and cherry trees, so spring is making itself known round here. The wind has blown a couple of slates off the roof. I don’t know if I can claim on the insurance? I will have to find out, I don’t hold out much hope.

The cats keep coming in like wet otters and curling up in warm places. I don’t know why they want to go out at all. I can tell the direction of the wind because the rain is lashing the back of the house and the gutter is overflowing and dripping down onto the back windowledge, you can hear the drips. It’s also due to get colder for a few days and there may be some small snow showers, heating will have to go on again….

Farewell feathery frost

I just found this photo and remembered the morning I sat in my car and saw these spectacular frosty fronds inside the windscreen. I think it was when the heater in the car was broken. It was a few years ago. I don’t think we have had such a cold spell in a few years. Yes it gets cold, but not this cold. It’s due to get cold again this weekend, a few snow showers, maybe some rain.

I remember when I was a child having frosts like this on the inside of our bedroom windows, Jack Frost really did visit in those days. We even had snow in June one year. We had been on the train and when the sky turned orange grey and the snow fell. But that was fifty years ago. Times change.

What I learned recently?

What is the last thing you learned?

I always wondered where all the water was when snow melts. There can be so much snow, but the sun comes out and there are no huge puddles. So where does it go to?

I was watching a TV show called QI, a comedy quiz show that comes up with ‘quite interesting’ facts. I’d never realised that snow is mainly air, I wrote about it a few days ago, and I learnt it from the show. Snow is crystaline and so its spiky structure traps air. So ten centimetres of snow only leaves about one centimetre of water. That’s why there aren’t huge floods after even very heavy snow fall. Rain is much more damaging and with climate change we are getting a months worth of rain in a few hours nowadays.

Yes I’m British and yes I talk about the weather a lot. Its what we do.

A sprinkling of snow

View out of the upstairs window. I woke up to a sprinkling of snow. Its only a thin dusting, but the clouds are grey. Hubby’s talking about going for a walk in it. I’ve come back to bed to snuggle rather than putting the heaters on. Had a nice hot cup of decaff coffee. The weather forecast is for it to blow over. Heading east. Other places have had it far worse. But last night we had freezing rain so I think it’s going to be slippy underfoot and I’ve seen posts on Facebook about it being hazardous to drive in. The trouble with the UK is we have all sorts of weather all the time, tomorrow might be warmer and dry, or thundery, or we might get saharan dust! We don’t get used to driving in snow, it’s like iceskating once a year. You can’t be an expert in such a short time.

Snow coming…

Beautiful photo by Aaron Burden from unsplash. I don’t normally use other people’s pictures but this is free to use on the Internet.

We have had snow warnings, for Thursday night and for Friday. We have had a lot of snow across the country over the last couple of days, but in the South and the North of the UK. But a low pressure zone is travelling up from the South, and an Arctic blast of cold air is coming from the North. The wet air from the south is due to turn into snow somewhere over the Midlands and Northern England (Staffordshire and Derbyshire). Lower levels are due to be 10 to 20 centimetres, but higher ground might get 40 centimeters. Not sure how much that is in inches but it sounds a lot? I think 12 centimeters is 4.7 inches? So today we got the shopping done. Made sense rather than getting caught out tomorrow or Friday.

Buds required

Come on rain, its been the driest February for years. The trees and bushes need a good sprinkling of rain. I can see tiny buds on our willow tree but they aren’t opening. The branches and twigs are bare. We may get some snow this week. But I didn’t know that ten centimetres of snow is equivalent to one centimetre of rain? That’s because fallen snow is mainly made up of air (think of how snow flakes are crystals that branch and leave gaps and air pockets). Let it rain, for a while, water the trees, please!

I forgot pancake day…

I was busy yesterday doing some paperwork and by the time I remembered it was really too late to cook. So for tea today I made pancakes. They are a traditional food for Shrove Tuesday. You can look up the meaning of Shrove Tuesday on the Internet, and part of the tradition is eating pancakes.

How do you make them? (this is how I do it, it’s very vague! 😂). Put a couple of large cups of flour in a bowl. Mix in two or three eggs to make a thick paste then add milk to thin the paste down to a thickish batter (I prefer that as too much makes it runny) not too thick though. Maybe a 1/3 of a pint of milk? Beat it up with a fork till its a smooth batter. I think you are supposed to let it rest, I don’t!

Memories flood back as I remember my mom cooking them. She used to use half milk and half water I think? As winter was colder then it often snowed, she would use snow water as she said it was fresher than tap water.

Now your batter has rested…. Heat a frying pan on a high heat and add oil so its hot. Make sure the pan is hot but not smoking. Pour some batter into the pan and tip it so it spreads out across the base. You can see the batter drying out on the top as the bottom of the pancake cooks. Flip it with a spatula. It might break up but that’s better than trying to toss it and it landing on the floor! When it’s cooked lift or slide it onto a plate.

This recipe will make six to eight large pancakes. Try and make them equal sizes and as you put them on a plate sprinkle sugar or powdered sweetner plus lemon juice on them and fold them in half or roll them up. The last one always ends up too small or too thick depending on how much the batter is shared out.

The results are like thin, eggy, floury omelettes! Delicious. You can basically use different toppings, maybe stewed apple or banana slices or ice cream? We enjoyed them a lot. Good for a cold day.

Two years ago…

The snow was heavier a couple of years ago. You can see the streaks of it falling on this photo. I love the quiet hush as it muffles sound.

But the heaviest snow was several years ago. I remember cycling on a tandem from Stoke to Stone (about eight miles). It was a least thirty years ago and me and my hubby had no car yet. We decided to visit some friends. It started to snow but we were warmly dressed so we got on the main road. But the snow came down thick and fast. I remember a friend who was with us decided to turn round and go home. But we continued along a dark country road through Barlaston and on to Stone. By the time we got there it was like being on a snow plough! We were starting to slide and slip because of the ice and catching the snow with our pedals! There was no other traffic and the snow was illuminated in orange patches by the street lamps. We met our friends and left the tandem at their house. I remember going to the pub and sitting in front of a roaring fire. When we came out there was about two foot of deep snow. We stayed overnight at our friend’s after falling off the tandem when we tried to ride off!