(no subject)

[lethargic_man]

I don't know what everyone's complaining about: this is the kind of winter I remember having from when I was little.

Admittedly, Britain's got to have record-breaking low temperatures in order to get the same kind of effect for me as I used to get in a much smaller city 250 miles further to the north, but still...

Mind you, I don't think I've ever had the experience of walking on a frozen-over pond before.

Finally, a note to all the people I pointed at this blog at Limmud, saying I would put my session notes up here: That is going to happen, but I've been busier than normal, and haven't had the chance to start tidying them up and making them blog-ready yet; so continue to watch this space.

Comments

[rysmiel.livejournal.com]

The Gulf Stream switching to the west of Greenland has not happened since maybe 1715 or so, and I did not think you were that old.

[lethargic-man.livejournal.com]

*blink* Did I miss something?

[rysmiel.livejournal.com]

I'm not now finding the page about it I was looking at over the weekend but basically, it looks like this happened within the last couple of weeks.

[lethargic-man.livejournal.com]

A quick google revealed this (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/1/6/822520/-Freak-Current-Takes-Gulf-Stream-to-Greenland).

This is, of course, just a taster of what will happen if the North Atlantic thermoregulatory conveyor shuts down, but sadly it'll just do more to convince the 60% of the British public who don't believe in global warming. (I'd link to an recent example amongst my blog friends, but it's from someone you're not on speaking terms with.)

[iddewes]

My Russian coworker has just been moaning about how many staff here seem to be 'working from home due to the weather' and her comment was that 'It's not that bad, it's not that much snow'! I tend to agree with her. The newspaper headlines were daft today, shouting that the UK is as cold as the South Pole...erm, that cold temperature was in a part of Scotland that is ALWAYS really cold in the winter, AND it's summer in the South Pole...
Oh well...

[lethargic-man.livejournal.com]

I cycled to work my normal four days this week. (Though admittedly I had to use main streets as my normal side roads were iced over.) That's getting on with it!

[iddewes]

I walked as usual most of the week but did take the bus this morning. It just seemed easier as the pavements are so icy.

[hatam-soferet.livejournal.com]

Ha! I'm a Southern Pansy and I've walked over frozen ponds :P

Actually, been dragged over them by an enormous dog which was galloping over said frozen ponds, but ykwim :)

[curious-reader.livejournal.com]

I am only annoyed that whenever we have a real winter that noone is coming to repair stuff or whatever needs to be done. I still not a real plumber. They only sent a teenager who has no idea and has to ask his boss.

[snjstar.livejournal.com]

Manchester is a lot worse then London all the side streets still have snow covering the road.

[lethargic-man.livejournal.com]

So do many here, including my street.

[curious-reader.livejournal.com]

It seems to me that every other country even if it is a relatively warm area that has rarely snow can deal with the occacional snowy winter. The UK still has not learnt it yet. You will have a longer, colder winter in Berlin. When I lived with my parents in Berlin we had for some years a big garden and my father created an iceskating surface. I haven't ice skated for ages only a little girl. I can't do it anymore. Southern England is still too warm to have proper ice.

[lethargic-man.livejournal.com]

It seems to me that every other country even if it is a relatively warm area that has rarely snow can deal with the occacional snowy winter.

Rubbish. You've not seen Israel grind to a standstill in the snow as it did in 1992 when I was there. Buses spinning their wheels in the car park, villages unreachable, houses with no more heating than a furnace in one room and a single portable electric bar heater, no double glazing...

The UK still has not learnt it yet.

No, the UK does not cope with a severe winter because it's not worth spending the billions of pounds required for winter-proofing the infrastructure when you only need it for a day or two each year.

You will have a longer, colder winter in Berlin.

Yes, but, as you pointed out, in a city better able to deal with it.

When I lived with my parents in Berlin we had for some years a big garden and my father created an iceskating surface. I haven't ice skated for ages only a little girl. I can't do it anymore. Southern England is still too warm to have proper ice.

I went iceskating five years ago for the first time since I was twelve; I was surprised to discover that it took less than half an hour to get from complete beginner standard back to skating around at 10mph without falling over: It came back very fast.

[curious-reader.livejournal.com]

I lived the last 15 years or so before I moved to the UK in Bonn and in between Cologne. They rarely have winter, too, but they can cope with it like any other city in Germany. (I did not want to give Berlin here as an example. It was just an ice-skating memory.)
I don't expect a usually hot country like Israel being able to deal with it. It was the first time that Jerusalem was covered in snow.
Our climate is completely different. Snow is normal.

[lethargic-man.livejournal.com]

Rubbish; they have snow in Jerusalem every few years, not as often as here, but it certainly wasn't the first time. Jerusalem is high up in the hills, and not as warm as the coastal plain. Why do you think the Psalms 147:16, for example, or Psalms 148:8, both of which we read every Shabbos, talk about snow if they don't have it in Israel?