Driving to the Conditions
Posted: Wed 8 July, 2009 Filed under: Driving, Thoughts, Weather Leave a comment »As regular readers will be all too aware, one of my regular driving bug-bears is about the idiots who put on their foglights, and then forget to turn them off when the weather clears.
Rather more dangerous though, as I was reminded last night on my way home, are the idiots who don’t use foglights when they’re actually necessary – even if that isn’t in fog.
Last night, just before leaving the M11 to go onto the A11, the clouds opened. Full-on thunderstorm, and the torrential rain that seems to be part and parcel at the moment. Within moment, visibility had rolled down to dogshit (the official terminology for “less than 20ft”) and I’d slowed to about 40, having seen one person in front aquaplane and spin the car through a full 180° onto the hard shoulder. (That was impressive in itself – the driver handled it fine, but just span into the hard shoulder, no damage at all, just spin to a stop) At the same time, my lights went on – as usual, to enable people to see me, not in order to be seen.
The entire drive along the A11 until the A14 was the same – exceptionally low visibility, and incredibly heavy rainfall. You couldn’t see cars at all 100 ft away – and why? Because hardly any of them even put lights on, let alone the foglights that actually should have been on.
In fact, in the entire 10-ish miles of A11, I saw exactly one other driver with his foglights on.
It boggles my mind, the number of people who use their foglights when they don’t need them, but then don’t use them at all when they actually do need to be in use.
More and more, I find myself supporting the idea of drivers having to pass a “refresher” driving test every five years. I know it would be a pig to administrate, but I think it would lead to some significant improvements in driving.
Bitten
Posted: Tue 30 June, 2009 Filed under: Animals, Domestic, Weather 2 Comments »Great – it’s that time of year where the horseflies come out again, which means I get a couple of viciously nasty bug bites.
I don’t know what the hell is in a horsefly’s bite (injection, whatever) but my body reacts badly to it – not an allergic reaction, anaphylactic shock, or anything like that – but the site of the bite swells significantly. It also itches like an absolute motherfucker, which doesn’t help.
Generally the swelling stays for about 48-72 hours, and there’s nothing I’ve yet found that’ll do anything at all to it – piriton, witch hazel, cold compress, anti-histamines in general, all has no effect whatsoever. It’s incredibly annoying.
At the moment I’ve got two of these bites, which have lasted from Sunday. They should be easing off by now – or at least by the end of today – just in time to get some more this coming weekend, I’m sure.
All told it’s just another reason to get a bit more annoyed by summer.
Hail
Posted: Tue 16 June, 2009 Filed under: Domestic, Green Garden, Weather Leave a comment »When I said we had epic hail yesterday, I really wasn’t kidding.
This was what remained around some of our flower pots two hours after it’d fallen – most of it stayed on the ground right through ’til at least half ten at night (having fallen at four or so in the afternoon) although it was gone this morning
Hailstones
Pretty impressive, really.
Of course, they hail has beaten the shit out of most of the plants outside – all the broad bean plants are bent over and have been beaten up, as have the strawberries, french beans, courgettes and pumpkins as well as the bamboo and lilac trees/bushes that we bought recently. But all of that should heal over time, so it could be a lot worse.
Meltdown
Posted: Mon 15 June, 2009 Filed under: Animals, Domestic, Weather Leave a comment »There are some times where I really do feel sorry for Hound. And today is one of those days.
As I’ve said before, Hound’s mental state really doesn’t hold up well when it comes to thunderstorms (or fireworks, the noise of jumbo jets, gales, and many other things – it’s a long list) and today has had one of the biggest/longest thunderstorms I’ve ever seen.
In this case, the thunder started rumbling at around 1pm – fortunately I was working at home – and Hound straight away came into the office to lie under the desk on my feet. She hasn’t really moved since then ’til now (it’s currently nearly 7pm, and there’s still the odd rumble of thunder going on) except for one mad fifteen minutes just before the Main Act of the storm some three and a half hours in, when I was dying for the loo and had to move. Cue utter meltdown.
The bit where the poor nutbag really lost it though was in the Main Act, where we had pretty much constant thunder/lightning, and an incredible dollop of hail that left ice on the ground maybe half an inch deep. During that time, Hound tried (as usual) to burrow out through the wall – she still hasn’t figured out that if she actually succeeded in burrowing out through the wall, she’d be outside, in the environment that so terrifies her. I know, she panics, and isn’t really capable of that kind of logic, but all the same you’d at least hope she’d figure that one out.
So we’ve got some gouges in the walls under the desk where she’s tried her burrow for freedom, and she’s now still sleeping (or at least lying) on my feet, so I can’t go anywhere.
So while she drives me potty, on occasion I do have some sympathy for the poor cow.
Still, at least we haven’t had floods etc., like some of the nearby towns/villages – it looks like our bit of Norfolk has been the worst hit by all this.