british street ambassadors learn to live with the rain. this one has an umbrella and rain coat. good plan.

it was a bit windy yesterday. i had a meeting in london and got blown along most of the southbank. i took this photo of the wobbly bridge as i was surprised it was so empty. in fact it was shut.

i was pleased with the photo though as it was just a grab shot, with a sideways gale wobbling me, but i still managed to get it vaguely level and centred ! i love the wide angle on my new compact camera.

it took me three and half hours to get home which was a bit of a shame. in fact i spent 5 and a half hours travelling today for a 3 hour meeting. just when you thought it couldn't get any worse i saw the colour scheme on this screen.

today, i'm off to glasgow for the day, so let's hope the wind calms down a bit !

and finally here's a bollard waving a streamer in the wind. i tried to take a video of it, but the wind stopped. so it looked a bit boring. which it was.

remember i posted a picture of my parents-in-law picnicing in the rain under a comedy poncho ?

well, we were huddling under my military poncho as can be seen here. there are four of us under there.

interestingly, at the time there was a lot of debate about who had the most cover in our family. you can view from the hood position that it was actually jane, not me, who had the most cover, despite the consensus at the time.

i took this photo backin june. it looked like a local snow shower after some rain

but it was actually a collection of paper holes

it's been stupid hot in london the last few days. i have physically melted a number of times.

here is the serpentine lido with swimmers in the twenty+ degrees warmth yesterday before 9am.

and here are people enjoying Diana's memory around her fountain thing

and in it

it's been very hot in london the last few days and yesterday was the hottest so far (in the low 30s i think). too hot for ttube travel anyway. but even hotter if your job involves you wearing coats and big hats. (although we all know they keep hot potatoes under there in winter and ice-packs in summer)

we've not had any snow where i live, but it has been quite frosty. here's some frosty holly leaves i passed on the way to work the other morning

we were promised huge amounts of snow, but we got none. luckily we were visiting friends yesterday who live a few miles east of us and they had had a small frosting of snow.

not quite enough to do anything useful with, like build an igloo (esther's usual request when snow is mentioned), but the girls did their best to extract as much fun as possible.

it was as hot as summer's day today, official the hottest day ever or something (for October i think). and london was packed. the BBC has some interesting weather news here

i had a meeting on the south bank and took my big camera to get some decent shots. unfortunately i'm clueless so most of my photos were rubbish (i need to go on a course ...)

anyway, it's also half-term holidays so london was full of tourists, especially just here.

i walked from paddington to brick lane yesterday morning to give a presentation. it started off very dark (because i left home just after 5.30) and was very foggy.

then, it got really nice and sunny:

but as soon as i passed the barbican it went foggy and really cold again:

and it was still foggy at lunchtime (note the lack of top of natwest tower)

i took this photo on a rainy june day, but only just thought of the title.

we've been so close to having a decent bit of snow for the last week, but it didn't materialise. or happen.

this was as good as it got in central london. oh well.

catcusy thing:

daffodilly things:

i'm really missing the fact that it's not snowing (despite snow in these parts being a rare thing).

i was a little heartened to see all these polystyrene bits over the street this morning. they even made a nice crunchy noise as i walked over them.

i tried sledging on them but just looked silly.

i walked across hyde park on the way to a conference yesterday morning and there were some mad clouds in the sky.

click for big

it doesn't snow much in the part of england where i live which is a shame. but there was a snowy flavour to a couple of emails i received yesterday.

so i feel it's snowing in blogland if not in my real world (but this IS my real world i hear you say)

anyroadupdown, here is regular reader sarah sitting in a pile of Minnesotan snow:

and here is a link to some snow graffiti sent by matt the weblandlord which is most excellent and should be replicated wherever possible.

i just love the low winter sunlight, it's yellow glow and misty rays.

here are jane and julie wrapped up warm with the sun behind them.

trees wrapped in cellophane and tied up with string. an excellent leaf detachment prevention device.

there some great clouds going by at the moment which reminded me that ages ago i said i was going to ask a geography teacher and a meteologist why it doesn't rain as much first thing in the morning (ie why i usuallly manage to avoid rain on the way to work).

the geography teacher didn't even believe my hypothesis. she lives in a rainy town in the west of town and hasn't done much teaching for a while as she's been making babies. so she's probably forgot.

but our friend the meteologist sent the following:

You are quite right that it is more likely to rain in the afternoon particularly in the summer with showery type rain. Showery type rain comes from convective clouds and for convection you need wamer surface so air near surface can warm up and go up (convect!) To warm surface need sun, longer sun been out warmer surface, more convection more likely to have rain. In some parts of the tropics you can set your watch by when the rain starts in the afternoon.

Non-showery type rain (due to "weather fronts") dont give a stuff about the time but thats the type which seems to rain all day (or more)

So now we know !

it's now darker than it is light in the UK which is a shame. it's dark when i leave the house and nearly dark when i get home. so that means i need to use flash for my photos which don't look as good as when lit by the sun.

and so seasonally adjusted misery has kicked in and i've got my first sore throat and head cold. the weather's too hot for a coat but too cold not to wear one.

enough of this uncharacteristic whingeing !

the leaves on the floor are starting to look nice.

it's often the case that you can find the source of weather whilst wandering the streets of london. i've found fridges on cold days, cookers and heaters on hot days, and here is a fan on a windy day.

yesterday it rained which appeared to be no surprise to the locals, but confused a few tourists. the site-seeing boats seemed well prepared and almost appeared to turn in to umbrella sail boats:

if you love rain then you'll just love london. come to london and enjoy our rainy rain days, when it simply rains rain. even our british london queen has been enjoying her long reign whilst enjoying the rain.

rain. it's what londoners love best.

holiday weather forecast: high chance of rainbows from sunday onwards.

a normally busy view:

it's drizzling this morning and i'm over the other side of town for meetings throughout today. i decided to shelter in a sculpture at one very wet bit. here was my view:

i walked past the shop where the owner kindly let me shelter last friday. it's called Nicola Donati and it was Nicola himself who i met.

if his fine tailoring is as good as his kindess to wet strangers then i'd highly recommend him. visit his website

on the way back to the station last night there were some incredible sudden rain showers. i sheltered under this shop canopy.

As if by magic, the shop keeper appeared and invited me to shelter in his shop. it was a really nice tailors shop and the owner was a very nice chap. it was obviously i was't going to buy anything (my trousers are beyond repair) so it was simply a matter of kindness !

hoorah for such things. (if i remember what his shop is called i'll let you know)

update: the shop is Nicola Donati. i took a photo of the shop on a dry morning here

the rain has emptied some trees of blossom. in some places this works well.

as a pedestrian, i find bikes a little annoying. they get up to all sorts of shenanigans with skant regard for passing walkers.

the worst of the worst has to be mobile phone using bike riders. here is one such girl, not quite managing to ride successfully the wrong way up a one way street.

hoorah. it's sunny again today. here is an abandoned brolly on a pub bench taking a well needed rest.

it's cold and i'm inappropriately dressed. so i went to the local charity shop and bought a long armed shirt for warmth (i have no meetings today so casual is ok).

john insisted on putting his hat on my head and taking this photo of me and my mug of hot water. i feel he may be making a mockery.

ho hum. raining and cold day today.

ideal conditions to spray water all over the street. note how the spray has created another Stars In Their Eyes moment.

it was hot (because of the radiator) and now it's cold