Thread 15 - TalkLair: “I Can't Lie To You About Your Chances, But... You Have My Sympathies.”

[Kucinghitam]

(Previous thread 14).

Autumn seems to have gone straight into winter. It's cold, wet and windy. In the TalkLair, the hearth is glowing, the walls covered in dubious artwork, books by non-approved authors line the shelves, rugs are down on the floors (and assorted pets curled up on them). The denizens of the lair are a welcoming bunch though, always eager for general chit-chat on all manner of topics.

We just won’t mention the gnawed bones of our prey over there in the corner of the cave…

It's snowing in west Oxfordshire!

As for the US election I'm observing it and boggling, whilst eating imaginary popcorn. This is a very strange time we're living in, isn't it.

I'm jealous! It's pouring with rain here. Bit confused why the BBC weather app is saying it's 12ºC on the main page, but in the hour by hour the max is 6 and the min is 2. Met Office is saying 5ºC and 'feels like' 1. Looks like it's going to be glorious tomorrow and Friday, but unfortunately I'll be stuck indoors at my desk.

Front garden early this morning. I believe there was a lot more snow to the south and west of us, but barely half an inch here.

DDs were mildly disappointed that school has valiantly remained open in the face of such snowy adversity.

It was forecast last night, 22:00 to 02:00, but not a sausage. It's a balmy 1° at the moment and my hands are burning cold. I'm sawing some pallets up for kindling.

It's pissing with rain here and I have to drag MrG off to the audiologist this afternoon. Then tomorrow (forecast high of a tropical 5C) the gas people are going to cut us off while they replace the supply pipes to the house. They've promised to provide an electric heater, but I may just go and sit in the library and sulk.

South Herts. Unsurprisingly, the chicken wasn't keen to come out for her usual morning patrol of the garden.

That's similar to here, Binturong.

Today's customer is in a village a few miles away, where they seem to have a climate different to round and about. He says there are 'a few inches' of snow, so it looks like it's a snow day. Before I realised that village often has different weather to elsewhere, the snow here had all melted so I set off and as I got closer the snow on the ground became gradually deeper. By the time I pulled up, it was about four inches thick.

There have been 3 brief flurries of sleet here, but now the sun's out and the roads are dry. That's probably in no small part due to the stiff breeze.

Unusual for you guys to have snow before us Mainers, and it's late in the year for us not to have had any yet. We've only had a couple of nights of temps as low as freezing so far I think.

Bint, you're not far from my offspring- DS1 in Watford and DD in Hemel.

No snow here (despite poorly named Accuweather getting my hopes up by telling me it was snowing when I looked to see how long it thought it would rain for).

It was snowing and settling here last night, and it was thick over the grass outside and on the roof of my car, but it's thawing now. Never seen much snow here since I've lived here.

Right round the corner from there! Or I was, I'm now between Chester and Liverpool - where it is also snowy.

Apart from a patch here and there our snow has melted and now it's just cold and damp.

Heading home now, Bint?

For a fee days. Will go back down for the funeral and try to catch you on the way back from that, if you're around.

It's been wet and cold here for a couple of days but the rest of the week is supposed to be bright and dry. If it turns out as well as forecast it will be the first truly blue skies and sun since before the clocks went back and most welcome.

I was in Bulgaria this morning where it was bright and sunny and 15 degrees. Now I'm back home and it's 0 degrees and I'm fretting about skiddy frozen leaves tomorrow. And to add insult to injury my electric blanket has stopped working, the bastard (I have immediately ordered another one - they only seem to last a couple of years but they aren't super pricey so I think fair enough).

As always with Bulgaria trips I have come back with quite a random assortment of things. I asked my wonderful sidekick there if he could get me some village honey (it's a big thing there) for my mum, and he gave me TWO one-kilo jars of some spectacularly posh stuff that has a DOP from the EU. I also have two enormous quinces (my UK supply has failed this year and I love the smell of them), a pomegranate about the size of my head, a wooden tray thing that looks very nice on my bookshelves, some dodgy-looking herbal medicine for a friend who swears by it, and some cherry jam (the sloppy Greek spoon jam kind made with morello cherries). To be fair, I did go out there with 6 tins of M&S Belgian chocolate biscuits for my team, and a bottle of Oban whisky for H, the sidekick, who is 50 tomorrow, so the luggage weights were roughly equal.

Top swag, Squeaky!

That sounds like an excellent haul, Squeaky! Sorry you’ve come home to chilly weather. Ice and autumn leaves aren’t a great combination.

From the pictures I've seen the snowfall you had was what we call nuisance snow - doesn't look pretty for long, is slippery and too small to plough so you end up either scraping it off with a shovel or waiting for it to melt.

We had snow last night, just a short shower of it, at about 10:30. My daughter and our refugee girl ran outside and ran up and down the street, squealing with delight. Not sure if they disturbed the neighbours. ...

It's quite cold here, but we're still snow-free - the night sky is absolutely clear and bright.

In acupuncturist follow-up news, the chap recommended what I would consider to be a "woo" product, namely berberine & grapefruit seed extract. But I thought "Hey, why not give it a try?" and ordered some. Then I remembered that my BP meds leaflets (and my GP) say to avoid grapefruit, so I looked up "berberine" (whatever that may be) and frankly, given the dose the lunatic suggested, I would potentially be in serious danger of going into minus BP figures! It is also pushed for weight-loss: I have a BMI of 21 (not unhealthy, just hereditary) and so very probably don't need to lose weight!

He had even asked what meds I was on, so I shall not be going back to him. I suspect he may be the Harold Shipman of acupuncturists.

Top swag indeed @SqueakyDinosaur, I'd be happy with any and all of that.

I've been wanting an electric blanket for years but couldn't because I had a memory foam mattress. Now I have a lovely wool mattress I'm on the lookout for one, but I'm holding off in the hope the one I want will turn up in a black Friday deal.

@SinnerBoy My daughter and our refugee girl ran outside and ran up and down the street, squealing with delight.

That's so sweet!

I like the cold but having to factor in time to de-mist the windscreen or, worse, scrape ice off it, is such a pain. My car a/c hasn't worked for a couple of years now (it's a £600 repair) so it takes ages. I've noticed that my auto-dimming mirrors have also stopped working so I've been getting blinded by cars behind me, although it did seem to start working again tonight after some jiggling.

@Gonners oh dear, that's a shame, but perhaps a lucky escape. I have a friend who swears by a huge range of woo products and occasionally tries to give me some. I have to shut my ears when she tells me how many multiplications of the recommended dose she takes.

This is shaping up to be great fun.

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5212932-could-dragons-really-exist?