Emz by the Thames

Refreshing to wake up to single figure temps this morning (9.7.c). Closing the allotment down for winter this weekend. Pumpkins have harvested themselves. There's nothing like digging up your last spuds and throwing them in the end-of-season bonfire to cook...although I was planning to do that on Sunday night but it's see what's occurring with these thundery showers first!! Autumn raspberries and cucumbers are still producing, the recent heatwave has made the cucumber plants start to flower again, so cucumbers till October at least!

From memory, not stats, but... My birthday is July the 18th and I seem to have many birthday evenings sat outside somewhere listening to encroaching thunderstorms while coating myself in aftersun. 18/19 July just always seem hot and stormy (apart from this year!!) Second week in October is often calm and sunny.

Quick question, my friend was on a hill watching a a very large and active thunder storm in the distance to the north west of High Wycombe at about 7.30/8pm last night. Which storm would that have been? Thank you!! Would it have been the same one seen from the Salisbury are..i.e the mid Wales one?

Pumpkins on my allotment are nearly ripe, a little earlier than usual. About 3 weeks to go I reckon. I love autumn regardless of what the summer has been like. I'm selfishly hoping it's not cold because at some point in the coming months the windows and boiler will be replaced!

Muggy, sluggy, fuggy, murky, manky, danky (careful now). What horrible weather. And watching those storms on the continental coast... I long for some weather now, I'll take any weather. It's all just so meh.

Sunshine...so rare I ran outside and stood in it!!

The dreary weather is starting to make me feel a bit glum. I even put a hot water bottle in my bed last night as it was as cool and damp as a miserable night in spring. Rowan berries appear to be ripe, you've gone into autumn mode it seems.

Well that was odd...sudden very heavy rain with hail and sound like high up cardboard ripping thunder...nothing on the lightning maps.

Half way through meto-summer. June was glorious, I got very tanned but also got a bit of heat exhaustion doing physical work which was really unpleasant. I'm living between 3 places at the moment as we renovate, so I'm glad July is cool so at least the weather is usable, I realise how selfish that is! Having said that, I'm longing for days without the autumn feel. I miss balmy evenings, especially as I now live near the river. My allotment has really suffered in recent summer due to heatwaves but this year, everything is abundant. Pumpkin and squash plants really benefitted from warm June and the changeable July - but the amount of rain showers now means mildew is running riot and everything feels like it needs a bit of warm sun now. Runners were abandoned last year as they couldn't hope with the heat but they are abundant and deliciously tender this year.

Frequent thunder 15 minutes ago but the storm moved on very quickly.

I hear ya. Yesterday, I parked on a hill and watched a magnificent storm with half an hour of big, convective raindrops falling as far as the eye could see. But then I drove home, I stopped by my allotment only to find massive puddles at one end of the road...and halfway up the road it was almost completely bone dry...and my allotment had no rain at all! I couldn't believe it! I'd even ran from my allotment to my car 40 minutes earlier because I could hear approaching thunder! Typical.

Under that Marlow storm half an hour ago, watching it build from underneath from my allotment, it had it all, thunder, massive convective drops, biblical skies and a rainbow.

How lovely to be woken up by thunder, even better the 45 minutes of steady heavy rain which is good for gardeners and growers. My allotment has been a dustbowl recently, glad I've got a break from watering today.

The storm currently in the Maidenhead/Marlow area is a corker - lilac lightning and really loud thunder. consistent rain, no hail.

I'm near Marlow and I'm amazed how much of the storms near Luton/MK I can hear...

Amber warning.

10,c drop since the storm came though, it's now a damp 19.c afternoon!!

Constant, constant rumbling , no let up at all, very little lightning seen, moderate rain slowed to light rain. Petrichor amazing.

Constant rumbling now from north, west and south of me.

Lost the sun here in Bourne end, looking in the direction of south Oxfordshire.

It was my first summer in the south of England and I can remember asking my schoolfriends if the weather is always this wild in the south. The song Gold by Spandau Ballet reminds me of this time as a violent storm blew our electricity for the second time and my sisters and I listened to Radio 1 on a little pocket radio in sweltering humidity.

Hard to say other than looking at a calendar. Put it this way, I wish I hadn't swapped over to my summer duvet at the weekend.

Quite surprised to find wet ground here this morning. The strong breeze of the last few days has made a lot of seedlings unhappy at my allotment and I lost 2 sunflowers. Meh Weather not Net Weather.

6.c here just before 5am, that's a pretty chilly night considering the heating has been off for a few weeks now and we sleep with the windows open.

My birthday is July the 18th and I'm pretty lucky in that there have been some cracking storms in the UK on my birthday over the years. I grew up in Jeddah and although it doesn't rain much - when it storms...it storms, strobe lightning, flash floods, the lot. People just used to watch the storm clouds build in the distance in anticipation of what will happen next, like it was a social event. We had a corker one day - never known a storm like it. Exciting for the first hour for a 7 year old that's not seen rain for a year, then pretty frightening when it won't stop, or move on after a while like storms seem to do here. We lived in pre-fabs and part of the roof caved in an the whole place flooded, generator failed. We lived near a storm drain but things have got worse for Jeddah as these powerful storms and been fatal in recent years, mostly due to flash floods.