English weather is probably the most talked about thing in England.
After the necessary “Hi! How are you?” pleasantries when you bump into someone remotely familiar, if there is still more face time left (for example, when stuck in a lift) then the obvious thing to talk about is the weather:
I feel a bit nippy today. The winter is coming sooner this year methinks!
And of course, you agree.
You are right! My fingers froze cycling to work today. It’s time to get those gloves out from the attic.
But apart from the usual conversation starter, some things about the English weather make me go absolutely bonkers. Here’s one: In winter on those rare occasions when you have a clear sky, the sun shines like it has never shined before. It feels real warm when you stand behind a double glazed window and all of a sudden you are in such a great mood until…. you step outside your house to go to the lab and the cold wind slaps your face. On days when the sky is clear the temperature is a good few degrees lower and for no rational reason the winds stronger. At this time of the year, those few degrees combined with the wind can make your cycle ride an absolutely hellish experience.
That’s right! In the winters, you can never have your way. If you want to not be pierced by a hundred needles as you ride your bike then you better pray for it not to be a sunny cloudless day. England! Oh England!
Although I completely second you and had a rather nasty experience this Monday but surprisingly you write this on a day when people in Oxford were all out in the street saying, ‘Oh!let us enjoy spring’!
hahaha….Cambridge wasn’t as forgiving. But seriously, they said ‘enjoy spring’? The winter hasn’t even gotten that worse that people have stooped to these levels already!
i’m actually missing the nippy cold [but in small amounts]….
anyway, its going to give you ample opportunity to warm up…
if you know what i mean!
I am not complaining that it’s cold. I have a problem with it not being an intuitive weather (at least not for us Indians who think Sun = Hot).
‘intuitive weather’…Akshat please spare the poor weather of the efforts of interacting with human faculties!let it just be!