A few inches of snow have fallen in the UK over the past few weeks. It's caused some inconvenience across the country, but according to all the 24 hour news channels, we're losing billions in lost hours and people are dropping like flies. We've been encouraged to stay indoors for fear of freezing to death in our cars. People haven't been going in to work, airports have been closed, entire towns have been cut off from the rest of the world. There was a report about some New Year's Eve (Ol' Year's Night, to thee and me) partygoers who were stranded in their hilltop pub for three days. Talk about the party that would never end! Not surprisingly, that pub landlord is now selling up. Bless him!
People have put the cost to the economy in the billions of pounds. A&Es around the country have been swamped with little old ladies with broken wrists sustained while taking their terriers for walkies, students with shattered ankles sustained after falling off of homemade snowboards and middle aged-men with torn tendons sustained while running through the snow to get make sure they really did lock the car before they came inside. Cost to the NHS? Who knows? All we know is that it's been an absolute TRAGEDY for the country. Disaster! Anarchy! Catastrophe!! Or so they'd have us believe. 24 Hour news channels (Sky, I'm looking at you!) are the bane of our modern-day existence. They take any little event and blow it up. So a few inches of snow have somehow morphed into "The Big Freeze".
It started snowing a few days before Christmas. It was interesting at first, nay even a bit exciting. I mean it very rarely snows in the UK. And when it does, it doesn't stick. So the fact that it was sticking made the place look all lovely and Christmassy. People were making snowmen, familes went sledding together, and every twat with a mobile phone camera became a wildlife photographer- as evidenced by the pictures being sent in to various news programmes.
Yeah, the roads were a bit icy, but you just drove more carefully. Yes the sidewalks were more slippery, but you just put on some sensible shoes and watched your step. Yes your car was covered in frost and snow in the mornings, but you factored that in and took the extra five minutes scraping it off and spraying on the de-icer. No big whup. But there is a tendency for people to go beserk and act like the four horsemen of the apocalypse are saddling up and punching co-ordinates into the sat-nav!
Schools were closed because teachers couldn't get in to teach the little darlings. This meant that parents had to be off work to stay home with their kids. This then meant that wherever the parents worked, had to do without them for a few days. Twas a vicious cycle. Sigh.
I myself had a snow-related adventure last week, when my car skidded into a curb when I turned the corner into my estate. Then I almost died when I went into town to go to the market and the butcher's. I swore my limbs were going to fall off. But I survived. Made it home to catch an episode of Judge Judy, slip into my Crocs and guzzle some tea.
However, in some parts, there have been reports of supermarkets running out of bread and milk as people stockpile supplies. Some stores have sold out of duvets, which begs the question, what were people sleeping with before? A nice thin cotton sheet? And when I did my shopping last week, I noticed that the shelves were completely bare of salt and all its derivatives- rock salt, sea salt, table salt. One store even reported running out of condoms! Well, if you're stuck indoors, might as well shag the hours away, eh? Generate heat and all that...
I guess I should count myself among the lucky ones though. I don't work and don't have any kids so I could afford to just sit on my window seat and watch the flakes fall. My sister wasn't so lucky last week though. She flew back from Trinidad for the start of the new term. She was supposed to land at Gatwick then fly up to Manchester, where I'd pick her up and drop her off at her place. But The Big Freeze showed no mercy. Gatwick airport was closed, so they were diverted to Stanstead, from where they were bussed to Gatwick. Of course there were no flights leaving there and there was no guarantee of a flight the next day or the day after, and nary a hotel room to be had. So she took a taxi to London Euston (cost £125!) and a train to Liverpool (cost £43!) and finally arrived at her flat nearly twelve hours after landing in London that morning. The poor lamb.
But at least it meant I didn't have to go out and pick her up. ;) Someone did ask the very important question though- is the NHS going to be able to cope with the inevitable increase in births nine months from now? I know I am waiting with bated breath. For now though, I shall sit here in fuzzy socks and dressing gown, sipping on tea and feeling smug.
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