Snow Day!

So, okay, for all of you living above the 53rd parallel, or in fact above say the 40th if you're west of the Gulf stream, we don't get snow here very often. Maybe once a year, for about an hour, fields and roofs look like they've been dusted with icing sugar. More than three flakes on top of each other, and the country grinds to a halt. We're just not set up for it. Anyone in Scandinavia or the northern part of the North American continent might laugh, but snow just ain't usual to us, and we don't know what to do with it. A few years ago my dad spent the night in his car on the A11, with a large dent in the car door, because an inch or two of snow had brought the country to a total standstill.

And when snow falls, it rarely settles in the southeast. Those selfish buggers in the north get it all. And now it's all fallen around London, and all the roads are closed, the trains aren't running (so no change there), and no one can get anywhere. Heaviest snowfalls in 18 years (when, as I recall, my family went on holiday to Center Parcs, which was a) empty and b) gloriously fun with a foot of snow all over it). So what does this mean?

Snow day!

I took this about 11.30 last night: that's about an inch and half, maybe two inches on the top of the chiminea (yes, it does look like a pot-bellied stove. We use it for barbecuing. If it gets colder, I might drag it inside...). There's easily twice that now.

According to my camera I took this at 8.11 this morning (Demon Puppy woke me up). It reminds me of the creaky old Narnia serials the BBC made when I was a kid: "Lamp-post, woods, hills, my house!"

A little later in the morning, snow having covered all the car tracks. Since then they've cleared a bit more, but there are people dragging kids around on sledges still.

Spike the Arctic Cat, demonstrating how he would be camouflaged if he went outside, but the snow would muss his pretty fur, so he's just going to practice hiding in the nice soft fluffy duvet instead.

Icicles over the front door. There were more, but Mum broke them off and gave them to the Demon Puppy (apparently now she gets lollipops!).

It's quite fun seeing all the headlines about it. No one I know has gone into work, and all the newsreaders look delighted to have something other than the recession to talk about. Earlier, I went into the loft and dug out my ski gear, and now I'm actually looking forward to walking the Demon Puppy!