11 March 2013 (Monday) - Snow

On re-reading yesterday's rant it would seem I didn't have a good day of it. I think I've just about had enough of this winter. We had one good sunny warm day last week, and then it was back to freezing conditions.
I'm sick of my nose constantly running because of the cold, and of not being able to feel my extremities.

I had something of a late night last night - not turning in until midnight. I slept soundly, waking feeling fully refreshed. I looked at the clock. It was 1.20 am. Eighty minutes sleep! And I saw every hour of the night from then on, finally getting up (feeling like death warmed over) at 7am.

As I drove to work I listened to the radio. There is consternation about how bacteria are developing resistance to antibiotics. There is shock news that diseases which were once easily treatable may well soon be life threatening.
How is this "news"? This was certainly common knowledge back in the early 1980s. I can remember seeing posters about it before I moved away from Hastings; and that was in 1984. How can such an old story be treated so sensationally?


There was also uproar about the proposed bedroom tax in which council tax will be based on the amount of bedrooms a house has. Apparently there are plans to extend this tax to sting houses which have a dining room separate from a kitchen or lounge.
The radio presenter brought on some very silly people to discuss the matter. Apparently such a tax would be bad as it would discourage people from having formal family meals together. Again how is this news? Family meals were a thing of the past some fifteen years ago.
I found this out back when I was a cub scout leader. Before any camp we would have to tell the parents to actually have a sit-down family meal to teach the little brats table manners. And over the years I had quite a few mothers approach me to ask exactly what did I mean by "table manners" as they themselves had no idea of the concept. In my thirteen years experience as a cub scout leader having taken hundreds of children camping, not one child in twenty could actually sit at a table to eat with a knife and fork. Interestingly it was always my experience that (with very few exceptions) the more well-to-do the family, the more feral the child's eating habits. I distinctly remember one extremely well spoken boy named Guy (with millionaire parents) who was utterly incapable of eating any item of food which had not first been thrown through the air.

I stopped off at Pets at Home on my way to work today. Several of the tins in the last batch of dog food I'd got from them were dented - one tin was actually broken open. I took this burst tin to the lady on the till and whinged. This lady called the manager who was really helpful, and she gave me twenty per cent off of my next bulk load of dog food. I was pleased about that! So I squandered my saving on a rope tug o'war toy. He seems to like playing pulling on things. If I can get him on one end and Sid on the other then the two dogs will keep each other amused for hours.
And as I still had a few minutes free I then popped to the cheapo shop next door. They do five curly-wurlies for a quid. Five! That was me sorted for a bargain.

And so to work. I did my bit. I didn't like not being out and about today, but I did like not being cold. Yesterday was really cold. Today was worse. And it snowed today. I've heard that the closest parts of France are expecting a foot of snow.
I've had enough of this cold weather now. Thank heavens for my curly-wurly on the way home or I would have been seriously sulking...

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