When it rains it pours

It's very quiet on the roads today, isn't it?

“...and that’s why this particular budgie won’t be dancing on the ceiling any time soon. And now it’s over to Simon for the weather.”

“Thanks, Kirsty. Your forecast for the weekend, then – Saturday will be cloudy, with sudden cataclysmic outbreaks of rain, whilst Sunday looks even worse, with a high chance of apocalyptic conditions throughout the day, and a light south easterly breeze. Temperatures around normal for the time of year. The outlook for next week? Well, in one word – Biblical. So, not looking great, Kirsty!”

“No indeed, Simon. Definitely not barbeque weather – unless you can strap it to a canoe. If you survive, see you on Monday. Goodnight!”

OK, so that might seem a tad far-fetched, but according to the Met Office, there’s a significantly increased risk of winter downpours, which they’re cheerily describing as “unprecedented”.

By chucking a large amount of data into a supercomputer and waiting for a bit, the Met Office officers were met with a report in their offices which wasn’t exactly super. A double-whammy of the numbers coughed-up by the jumped-up laptop are particularly alarming.

For England and Wales, there’s a 34% chance of an extreme event happening somewhere each year. Think extensive flooding and rainfall totals exceeding anything seen before. To compound that already scary thought, some of these events could bust existing records by as much as 30%.

Nearly a third more water dropping out of the skies than Cumbria copped over the winter of 2015-16? And it could happen sometime soon, rather than having been the once-in-a-lifetime event widely reported at the time?

I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty happy with where our World Heritage Site-worthy lakes are currently located. I’ve got used to them staying roughly the same size and not wandering around too much. The rivers are also rather lovely if they stick to their existing routes. It’s when they put a bit of weight on and make a break for it that things tend to turn decidedly unpleasant and dangerous.

I don’t want a lake in my living room – it won’t match the wallpaper, for starters. And anything that flows through your house is highly unlikely to be good, especially if your tea is on the other bank.

Let’s face it, the emergency services and Army have plenty to do as it is, without having to show up at your upstairs bedroom window in an inflatable boat to rescue you and the cat.

If insurance premiums went up sharply following the billions of pounds worth of damage caused by the most recent events, imagine what they’ll cost if flooding becomes as regular an occurrence as someone leaving Take That.

I’ve been secretly stashing old pallets in my cellar, and searching for “how to build your own ark” books on Amazon. I’ve got enough tins of custard stashed to last for several months at sea on whatever they call the new ocean that will soon engulf South Cumbria.

Care to join me? (Bring your own dessert topping.)

This post first appeared as my "Thank grumpy it's Friday" column, in The Mail, on the 28th of July 2017. You can view the web version on their site here The print edition ran it with the title "Rising tide of rain hysteria".

If some of the stormy downpours we've had here recently are anything to go by, I can easily see these predictions coming true - and it's (supposedly) summer at the moment. Scary...

(CD A-Z: Queen's "A Day At The Races". Maaaaaarvellous.)

Making an exhibition of yourself

Now and again, it’s good to reaffirm that you’re a (relatively) normal human being. One excellent way of doing this is to go to a business exhibition. Despite what you might have surmised from reading my previous columns, I am employable, and even capable of acting like a regular person most of the time, even joining in the Monday morning conversation about the weather over the weekend, and why (insert name of footyballs manager here) should be fired immediately. The mug! True, there are times, often involving a caffeine deficiency, where it is like having the distilled essence of ten moody teenagers in the room, but I try and get that out of the way when people I genuinely like aren’t around to see it. As part of my ongoing experiment with what others call ‘working’, my ‘job’ involves me occasionally needing to go and see what some of my colleagues get up to outside the office, and what our competitors do to try and make sure that they do whatever my colleagues do better than ...

Suffering from natural obsolescence

You know you’re getting old when it dawns on you that you’re outliving technological breakthroughs. You know the sort of thing – something revolutionary, that heralds a seismic shift it the way the modern world operates. Clever, time-saving, breathtaking and life-changing (and featuring a circuit board). It’s the future, baby! Until it isn’t any more. I got to pondering this when we laughed heartily in the office about someone asking if our camcorder used “tape”. Tape? Get with the times, Daddy-o! If it ain’t digital then for-get-it! I then attempted to explain to an impossibly young colleague that video tape in a camcorder was indeed once a “thing”, requiring the carrying of something the size of a briefcase around on your shoulder, containing batteries normally reserved for a bus, and a start-up time from pressing ‘Record’ so lengthy, couples were already getting divorced by the time it was ready to record them saying “I do”. After explaining what tape was, I realised I’d ...

A fisful of change at the shops

A recent day out reminded me how much the retail experience has altered during my lifetime – and it’s not all good. I could stop typing this, and buy a fridge, in a matter of seconds. The shops are shut and it’s 9pm, but I could still place the order and arrange delivery. I haven’t got to wander round a white-goods retail emporium trying to work out which slightly different version of something that keeps my cider cold is better. It’ll be cheaper, too. But in amongst the convenience, endless choice and bargains, we’ve lost some of the personal, human, touches that used to make a trip to the shops something more than just a daily chore. Last weekend, we visited a local coastal town. Amongst the shops selling over-priced imported home accessories (who doesn’t need another roughly-hewn wooden heart, poorly painted and a bargain at £10?) was one that looked different. It’s window allowed you to see in, rather than being plastered with stick-on graphics and special offers calling ...

grumpyf1

Search This Blog