Nice weather, strange times

[caddyman]

What a difference a month makes. On 28 July I was grumbling about the heat - we had just had a power cut the night before which left us at the mercy of midnight heat with no breeze. We had even acquired a new fan which saw several days sterling use before the temperatures fell to more palatable levels.

Tonight, for the first time in about five months, I am wearing a sweater. Yes, folks, it's officially chilly tonight, if not downright parky. I am loving every minute of it. The Tubes are still sweltering hell-holes to travel on, and the days can still be very warm, but the evenings are now beginning to become distinctly autumnal . And we keep getting rain, too. Not enough to break the drought as yet, but enough to make it feel like England again, rather than Whetstone-upon-Malaga. Fantastic. What with significant daylight not arriving until around five fifteen in the morning and these lower temperatures I am beginning at long last to get significant amounts of uninterrupted sleep at night. Oh, late summer, how I love ye. Enough daylight to do what I want, not so much as to keep me red-eyed and weary. All I need now is curtains in the computer room to keep the early morning sun off the PC so I can check the TFL web page of a morning without having to position myself and the monitor without astronomical precision...

Changing the subject, I found out tonight that my youngest niece, Sarah-Lou now has a mobile phone. She is still a month away from her 9th birthday. Is it just me who thinks that this might be just a little over indulgent? What does an 8 or 9 year old need with a telephone, or am I just displaying further evidence of 21st century dislocation? My nephew and God son, Tom also informs me that he has not made it into college (by which I assume he means 6th form college or similar since he is only 16). I swear he sounded pleased about that. He never had much academic ambition and wants to be a chippy, though I would prefer he trained up as a plumber if he is going to be a tradesman - I'm not so sure that wood working is steady enough work. Even so, I wouldn’t have thought that dismal GCSE results is a cause for celebration.

I'm getting old; I do not understand and it's not as if he is stupid or anything.

Poot. Ah well.

Comments

[november-girl.livejournal.com]

We put the fire on tonight. How weird is that?

[caddyman.livejournal.com]

It's not so cold here that I want the heating on, but yeah, definitely chilly and sweater weather. Seems rather early, don't it?

[fractalgeek.livejournal.com]

There's a lot of chippie-ing around, both fine and building-type (eg roofing, building concrete shuttering, etc). I suspect he'll have more work than he can handle.

[bluesman.livejournal.com]

I agree: I don't know why one would be pleased with a lack of academic achievement, especially if it ruins your chances in the job/college stakes, but I still tell my wife and stepdaughter with some ironic pride that I once scored 6% - yes, six - in a (Flash Newton) chemistry exam.

Maybe it's a combination of telling Karly how proud I am of her good grades when mine were average at best, and the fact that science was irrelevant to me, so the bad mark was cause for laughter rather than shame. If I'd performed as dismally in an exam for a subject at which I was otherwise competent or skillful, like art or English, that would, I'm sure, be a different matter.