Bah Humbug – Part 18

Day 18 – Snow

Though not entirely a Christmassy thing snow is one of those things that really irritate about the season. Well…maybe not the snow…But the British reaction to snow….that’s a different matter entirely.

A case in point was last night. All this week the news on the telly and radio has been “ZOMG TEH SNOWZ0RZ A COMING!”. You would think the world was preparing for a famine or a war or something. Not just a little dusting of snow.

Of course the vast majority of the snow landed and settled in the South East of England. For those unfamiliar with British Geography, the South East is where the busy parts of the country are. Mostly London and Kent and other associated areas.

Now if you were any right minded individual you would think “Oh in such a metropolitan area I should expect that a little bit of snow would pose no problem to infrastructure.” Well…yes…you would. But no. You would be foolishly wrong to suggest such a thing, and those that normally do not listen to your wise wise words would have perversely listened to every word and inflection you spoke and mock you for being incorrect. People would point at you in the street and old ladies would giggle childishly as you walked past. As they do.

Last night it snowed. The Breakfast news on BBC this morning (Today presented by Charlie “I need to go on a presenters course” Stayt and Susanna “Today I’m dressed up like a turkey in this silver top” Reid) had nothing but “ZOMG! SNOWZ0RZ” and “ZOMG TIS TEH END OF WORLD” and “ZOMG SNOW WE’RE ALL DO0M3D”.

Now, had I been a foolish person, which I assure you I am not, I might have thought that by going outside I would be putting my own life at risk and the lives of emergency services too. I should stay at home as the media suggest, barrage my doors and windows and survive on the 30 year old tin of self warming baked beans I have in my larder. But one glance out of the windows of Gnomepants Manor would have told any person of sense that the snow in this part of the world was “small potatoes” compared to previous years and one would have said “Bunch of southern poofs” in reaction to the fuss being made by the people on the telly.

To be fair though, the snow “down south” was fairly deep comparatively and yes, Tarquin Posh-Bastard would probably have been flapping at the prospect of getting snow on his brogues and disgusted that his pre-Christmas round of Golf with the board of directors would have to be cancelled. But with Tarquin’s woes aside, the fuss….well it was a bit too much. Considering.

Anyway, it is generally accepted that where there is Christmas there should be snow. Is this because we can gaze safely from the comfort of our centrally heated house comforted in the knowledge that nobody really goes out on Christmas day or is it something more traditional and sinister?

Who knows. I suspect there is something sinister behind it. Probably involving the secret government weather machine and insiduous enforced iconography of snow. But what ever it is, it’s nothing I am able to put my finger on at the moment….