First a reference to yesterday’s blog, it appears
that the forecasters got it wrong, the snowfall on the North East of the US was
not as bad as was anticipated. I think that is all relative though. The amount
of snow was still several inches not the snowmaggedon that was anticipated. Of
course with the benefit of hindsight the politicians and administrators are all
being criticised for too quickly closing roads, public transportation and
schools. This gives in to human natures need to blame somebody and a failure to
realise that some things are not absolutely predictable. I believe that some of
the world’s most powerful computer systems are used to predict and track
weather systems. This because there are so many variables all of which
interact, and this is for weather forecasters who are trying to predict
snowfalls in individual locations. As for the precipitate closures, this is a
case where if politicians get it wrong there is chaos and worse still deaths. I
would rather that there is caution here rather than a gung-ho attitude.
When there are cold weather warnings they always say
to watch out for the elderly. While that is certainly true in respect of making
sure that the elderly stay warm, but actually the people more at risk in cold
weather are the fit and healthy, the reason is that they are more likely to go
outside and have accidents, and therefore are more likely to have to attend
hospital emergency centres. Well as they say you learn something every day, my
daughter-in-law may tell me otherwise.
Ok enough of looking back; I must give praise to
Scarborough Hospital. I was due a CT scan, yesterday the hospital rang to ask
me if I would change my appointment bringing it forward a couple of days. It
was not a problem though I had a little bit of a tight schedule, so it was
great that I was seen promptly on time, and it took almost exactly the time
that was predicted. Excellent service, all I now have to hope is that those
pesky kidney stones have disappeared.
We had to go to York today, and we returned via the
rural roads. For those of you who are familiar with the landscape paintings of
David Hockney, this is the countryside that he paints so beautifully. The light
captured the steel grey of rural North Yorkshire perfectly. It was not a
classic beauty but a type of presence that imprinted the landscape on my
memory. The dull green of the winter crops, the starkness of the bare trees,
the great vistas. It is simply beautiful and redolent of this part of the
world. A question for my readers, I observed a crop that at first sight looked
like wheat, however it could not be at this time of the year. It looked like a
straw type crop, slightly taller than wheat. I wondered if it was some sort of
biomass crop to be burnt in power stations. Any suggestions gratefully
received.
Here is another take on weather, Nigel. I am not one to generally be interested in the weather, aside from how it might affect my driving or recreation plans. However, yesterday I came across two questions which I thought were interesting. One: what was it like to be in a real blizzard? In 1970s rural Vermont, we had storms frequently. Always the power went out (Vermont rural infrastructure lagged the nation by about twenty years), but we had the wood stove for heat and cooking, candles and oil lamp for light. We melted snow for water and used the brackish water from an old well in the basement for flushing. In one word, though, it was restful. Cut off from the cares of the world, it was a respite, a time to slow down, read, talk and take care of the necessities. Today, we still have the wood stove but have to go to the lake for water, assuming it is not frozen over! Thankfully, the power goes out less now. Still, it feels like a vacation, as we are fortunate to be able to fend for ourselves. The second question: metaphorically speaking, what has it been like to experience a blizzard in your life? I haven't finished noodling that one, but interestingly, restful and respite are not the first words that come to mind. Maybe the weather has more to teach me than I thnk...!
ReplyDeleteKarin, you comments about rural Vermont are interesting and put into perspective our current obsession with instance response. Only yesterday I was reading of the disaster that was an outage for one hour at Facebook. How would people cope with life in where they were left to their own devices. It might be be beneficial to stop and think for a while.
ReplyDeleteI hope I'm not old yet (!) but I do worry that technology has interfered with just that, the space to stop and think, especially for young people. Of course technology encourages a lot of thinking too - like that sparked by your blog! - but a regular sitting with silence in nature might be good thing too.
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