jethro

It's been the best day in quite a while here, definitely chilly but sunny for most of the day. Shame it's turning dung again tomorrow.

Morning all, lovely sunrise this cold and frosty morning, feeling wintry out there.

What a Happy Christmas that would be. Dear Santa, I promise I've been very, very good..... Fellow excited weather watchers, if you thought Santa was watching and would put you on his naughty list for getting irritated with each other, would it make you shrug your shoulders and think 'never mind, it's just an opinion that's different from my own'?

Afternoon, actually saw the sun here today which made such a nice change, now back to cloudy again. Feeling noticeably colder and quite breezy too.

You do realise that when you post pics like that, the background of the page glows green over here with the collective envy?

Morning, not felling particularly chilly here but it is dry Still grey with 100% cloud though.

It's stayed dry here but clouded over to greyness AGAIN. Tree's all down, having seen the amount of rot at the base, I'm feeling less guilty and more relieved that it's down before it fell down. Wonder if we'll ever see another dry SUNNY day here again before next summer, feels like an eternity since the last proper one that lasted all day. So bored with this greyness.

Morning, a lovely dry start to the day here and what promises to be a dry day too Tinged with sadness for me, perfect tree felling weather which is just as well as they're coming to fell my huge Sycamore today Don't want it to go, will miss it, but it's been condemned as dangerous so has to go. It's what shelters me from the worst of the weather so when it's gone and the blizzards come, there'll be nothing to stop the snow burying my house According to Facebook memories, we had snow a year ago today, not a lot, just an inch or so.

Time to start being Orthodox and revert to the Julian calendar, January 7th seems like a much better idea for a white Christmas.

Morning, currently dry here with glimmer of blue sky between the clouds, very breezy. Hoping it stays dry, not confident it will though.

If that was accompanied by heavy snow, I'd be a happy bunny. Had more than enough of all this mild, wet muck.

Morning, and what a hideous morning it is too, absolutely piddling down here and so mild. @jy @Dorsetbred Oh the joy of getting into Bath. Don't think BANES council do much in the way of joined up thinking, the logic of putting on a big event, attracting 1000's of people and not putting on extra transport is beyond me. Doesn't however surprise me. Their latest 'great idea' is they're going to introduce a congestion charge of £9 a day to come into the city, fine in principle but the Park & Ride and rail systems can't cope as it is, goodness knows what will happen when the charge comes in. I live 14 miles away, hubby works in Bath, journey to and from work at usual commute time, never less than an hour and 15 mins. Getting into Bristol is even worse.

Yes and no. Looking at past weather during Grand Minimums the overall impression is one of erratic weather, periods of long 'locked in' weather patterns seemed to be common - hot, cold, dry, wet. Globally, I really doubt even a deep, prolonged minimum would have much affect on global temperatures, but locally, it could have a huge impact on a seasonal basis. The NH seems to have been the most dramatically affected by past minimums, if the same follows this time (if it happens) it's likely to be the same. If it causes longer, colder winters, later, colder springs then that will have an impact upon growing seasons. Ditto if it causes long, hot summers and droughts. The temperature changes seen so far due to climate change will be irrelevant and wiped out (seasonally) by arctic plunges to lower than usual latitudes. Putting it into perspective, in this country the 'Beast from the East' earlier this year had a dramatic impact upon crops, they were very late to grow due to the cold. The long, hot, dry summer that followed had a further large negative impact to the extent that there wasn't enough grass to feed livestock and their diet had to be supplemented with hay/silage that normally would be used for winter feed. Currently our farmers face going into winter with dwindled stores of feed to over winter the cattle (most cattle in this country are housed during the winter months as they don't cope well with the cold and wet) plus there's no new grass to eat. If we have a cold winter this year, followed by another cold, late spring it will have serious ramifications for farmers, they will run out of feed for their animals. Profit margins are so tight in agriculture that it wouldn't take more than a year or two to put large numbers of farmers out of business if they have to buy in winter feed. We'll then have to import even more of our meat and milk, problematic when lots of what we already import comes from areas of the globe also likely to suffer consequences from a Grand Minimum. When it comes to us and what we eat, leaving aside meat, the vast majority of our food is imported, most of our fruit and veg is grown elsewhere. Quite a lot of it comes from Africa but an even larger proportion comes from countries like Spain and Holland, both of which were also badly affected by past Grand Minimums. The likelihood is that our supply chain from those countries would be compromised too - if there's less food available, there's less food to export. This summer alone led to some crops such as lettuce failing completely in Spain. As a whole, we import around 50% of our food and the figure is rising, most of it is imported from other NH countries who are likely to see their weather shortening the growing season or long spells of cold & wet/hot & dry weather too. Post Brexit, I cannot see the EU rushing to help a compromised food supply chain in this country if the drop in production is producing problems in their own countries.

???

Agreed, it may cause large problems but I think it would be more a case of changing what we eat, rather than not having enough.

I've read a lot about previous Grand Minimums and the impact here, not always a snowy nirvana outcome, but the prospect of an increased potential for proper winters again fills me with utter joy

Anyone else find this chart and prediction exciting? If it happens, how lucky are we to live through a Grand Minimum, potentially interesting times ahead in our part of the world.

Morning, horrible here, grey, dark and raining. Such a contrast to yesterday, bring back the frost asap please.

To be honest, going on a wet day is probably worthwhile, certainly thins the crowds out a bit. If you can manage it, the best time for Bath market is late afternoon, that's when it's quietest. Personally I quite like the buzz of lots of people, it adds to the atmosphere of the place.

Apparently they did the same two years ago and it was just as bad. Shocking.

You forgot the most important thing.....sharpened elbows. Vital for crowd breaking if you want to get near the stalls.

Oh look.... https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/7895938/christmas-village-bath-west-showground-complaints/

Morning, everything white and crispy here. Stunning sunrise this morning.

Evening. cool and drizzly here today. Just in case any of you didn't see my advice not to go to the Santa village at the Bath&West, seems I'm not alone in my condemnation, lots posted on Facebook.

I don't care. If you don't know something I'd rather be thought a fool and find out by asking, than not learn.