Everything has a purpose in life, even the
climate. We live in a nicely organised regular climate controlled area. We have
spring where the nature awakes and begins to shoot, accompanied with rain, wind
and clouds, sometimes grey in grey and now and again sprinkled with spots of
sun.
Then Summer arrives which we all long for: hot sun beating down, nature exploding, bees buzzing, stinging nettles stinging and the whole nature show. We clad sparely, sweat running down our brow and are often glad to escape into the shade with a cool drink or plunge into a swimming pool. One day in August we have had enough of this constant hot house and long for a cooling down period. If we are lucky it begins end of August with rose bushes losing their roses, mice hunting for a warm place to settle and when October arrives they are glad they found it.
The climate cools down, the leaf soldiers leave the trees (my felines call them leaf soldiers as they fight an eternal war with them when they drop to the earth sailing on the autumn winds) and gradually the luscious lawns transform themselves into muddy earth sludge, with some sparse tufts of grass poking through. This weather turmoil has not yet finished with us, Winter arrives with its cold icy breath, freezing rain into hanging icicles and eventually snowmight
will probably begin to fall. This is the year according to Switzerland and most
of Europe, give or take a few extreme situations. Now that was a poetic flowery
description – Pulitzer/Nobel are you reading me?
If you live in India or Africa, you will probably have hot sun, monsoons, and perhaps no rain. Not even having spent longer as a two week holiday on those continents, I will leave my brothers in blog to tell of their experiences.
Now we arrive at the tough part, does this affect your moods? Of course not, whether sun, rain, snow, hot or cold you adapt, at least I do. I can blog in any temperature. If it is a favourable day I sit outside on the porch. If it is winter, I sit inside shifting my computer to a favourable place, generally where I have peace and quiet and no jazz music in the background. Mr. Swiss and I are flexible and we change our direction according to whether we begin to annoy each other or not. I have absolutely no problem with the climate, sometimes I sweat and so I wear a t-shirt. If I am cold I wear a jacket, one of those old knitted memories of the days gone by where the woollen threads are frayed at the edge and smelling of kitchen memories, cosy and homely.
That is me, but now we have the Mr. Swiss case. He is weather-prone. We have a strong wind in Switzerland known as the “bise” which flows through the valleys, sweeps over the plains and even might err into the streets. It causes a nervous excitement so they say, at least for the people that are weather-prone. We should feel sorry for people that suffer under the “bise”. However, this is not a permanent condition. The next day the “bise” has disappeared and we are confronted with the “föhn”.
“Föhn” is another German word, which is also used for a hair dryer, so there we have it. A dry warm wind, which can, under circumstances for certain people, cause headaches, pains in the joints and a general “not feeling well” syndrome. Mr. Swiss suffers from this, as soon as the “bise” has disappeared, the “föhn” arrives and we are again steeped in gloom and doom. At least it is not my fault with my constant talking and loud voice; it is the “föhn”. I do my best to appease the suffering by perhaps trying to ignore the weather situation, although this is not easy. We hope for better days and an improvement in the weather.
Summer arrives and we have the so-called “dog-days”. I am now almost permanently on the porch with the shades down, still blogging and now and again taking a sip of water and wiping the sweat from my brow. Mr. Swiss is inside. The Swiss have discovered a super system for shielding the brain from these days of temperatures soaring to heights not suitable for weather sensitive people. The blinds are closed and you live in a nocturnal condition, an owl would be happy. Of course to accompany this, the windows are kept permanently shut, no waft of hot air is allowed to penetrate the human living quarters. As I have already fled to the porch, this is no problem for me. I would probably be in a claustrophobic state of mind if I did not have my porch. Mr. Swiss is happy; he is in his own darkened, airless world. Thank goodness for iPads, they have their own built in illumination.
Of course we have a daily weather forecast on the TV. This is followed closely in our home. Every word that the meteorologist utters is weighed in gold. Silence is observed during these precious fifteen minutes of the weather situation. If their prediction does not arrive the next day, it is obvious that they have chosen the wrong job, and are not suitable to be released on mankind. They tell us we will be having cirrostrata clouds and they develop into heavy headache causing storm clouds with strong gusts of wind. It is then clear that their calling in life is not meteorologist, but more a fortune teller: sometimes you guess right, but mostly you are mistaken. This is the Mr. Swiss verdict, and he is very rarely wrong.
In the meanwhile we have three felines. During the hot days, they are usually to be found curled up somewhere sleeping. When temperatures drop they will be relaxing on the stones on the porch, again sleeping. In Winter: we have floor heating, no problem. They are again sleeping each in their own area. Perhaps high on a cupboard, on a comfortable cushion or curled up on a bathroom carpet. They do not have moods, they adapt.
Mr. Swiss cannot adapt, so he bears the trials of the weather. Today we have sun, with a cool breeze. This seems to be the ideal Mr. Swiss climate. He has taken a walk along the county paths. This morning he was shopping but discovered that although the sun was shining it was colder than he thought and should have dressed warmer.
And me? I carry on despite the weather moods. Do not forget, I am originally British and we survive through everything. And if it really rains too much you might be lucky and a bloke with a long grey beard will begin building a large boat, known as ark, in your back yard. If this bloke resembles Russel Crowe and known as Noah, you have hit the jackpot. Just make sure that he lets you enter his boat and you no longer have weather problems.
Then Summer arrives which we all long for: hot sun beating down, nature exploding, bees buzzing, stinging nettles stinging and the whole nature show. We clad sparely, sweat running down our brow and are often glad to escape into the shade with a cool drink or plunge into a swimming pool. One day in August we have had enough of this constant hot house and long for a cooling down period. If we are lucky it begins end of August with rose bushes losing their roses, mice hunting for a warm place to settle and when October arrives they are glad they found it.
The climate cools down, the leaf soldiers leave the trees (my felines call them leaf soldiers as they fight an eternal war with them when they drop to the earth sailing on the autumn winds) and gradually the luscious lawns transform themselves into muddy earth sludge, with some sparse tufts of grass poking through. This weather turmoil has not yet finished with us, Winter arrives with its cold icy breath, freezing rain into hanging icicles and eventually snow
If you live in India or Africa, you will probably have hot sun, monsoons, and perhaps no rain. Not even having spent longer as a two week holiday on those continents, I will leave my brothers in blog to tell of their experiences.
Now we arrive at the tough part, does this affect your moods? Of course not, whether sun, rain, snow, hot or cold you adapt, at least I do. I can blog in any temperature. If it is a favourable day I sit outside on the porch. If it is winter, I sit inside shifting my computer to a favourable place, generally where I have peace and quiet and no jazz music in the background. Mr. Swiss and I are flexible and we change our direction according to whether we begin to annoy each other or not. I have absolutely no problem with the climate, sometimes I sweat and so I wear a t-shirt. If I am cold I wear a jacket, one of those old knitted memories of the days gone by where the woollen threads are frayed at the edge and smelling of kitchen memories, cosy and homely.
That is me, but now we have the Mr. Swiss case. He is weather-prone. We have a strong wind in Switzerland known as the “bise” which flows through the valleys, sweeps over the plains and even might err into the streets. It causes a nervous excitement so they say, at least for the people that are weather-prone. We should feel sorry for people that suffer under the “bise”. However, this is not a permanent condition. The next day the “bise” has disappeared and we are confronted with the “föhn”.
“Föhn” is another German word, which is also used for a hair dryer, so there we have it. A dry warm wind, which can, under circumstances for certain people, cause headaches, pains in the joints and a general “not feeling well” syndrome. Mr. Swiss suffers from this, as soon as the “bise” has disappeared, the “föhn” arrives and we are again steeped in gloom and doom. At least it is not my fault with my constant talking and loud voice; it is the “föhn”. I do my best to appease the suffering by perhaps trying to ignore the weather situation, although this is not easy. We hope for better days and an improvement in the weather.
Summer arrives and we have the so-called “dog-days”. I am now almost permanently on the porch with the shades down, still blogging and now and again taking a sip of water and wiping the sweat from my brow. Mr. Swiss is inside. The Swiss have discovered a super system for shielding the brain from these days of temperatures soaring to heights not suitable for weather sensitive people. The blinds are closed and you live in a nocturnal condition, an owl would be happy. Of course to accompany this, the windows are kept permanently shut, no waft of hot air is allowed to penetrate the human living quarters. As I have already fled to the porch, this is no problem for me. I would probably be in a claustrophobic state of mind if I did not have my porch. Mr. Swiss is happy; he is in his own darkened, airless world. Thank goodness for iPads, they have their own built in illumination.
Of course we have a daily weather forecast on the TV. This is followed closely in our home. Every word that the meteorologist utters is weighed in gold. Silence is observed during these precious fifteen minutes of the weather situation. If their prediction does not arrive the next day, it is obvious that they have chosen the wrong job, and are not suitable to be released on mankind. They tell us we will be having cirrostrata clouds and they develop into heavy headache causing storm clouds with strong gusts of wind. It is then clear that their calling in life is not meteorologist, but more a fortune teller: sometimes you guess right, but mostly you are mistaken. This is the Mr. Swiss verdict, and he is very rarely wrong.
In the meanwhile we have three felines. During the hot days, they are usually to be found curled up somewhere sleeping. When temperatures drop they will be relaxing on the stones on the porch, again sleeping. In Winter: we have floor heating, no problem. They are again sleeping each in their own area. Perhaps high on a cupboard, on a comfortable cushion or curled up on a bathroom carpet. They do not have moods, they adapt.
Mr. Swiss cannot adapt, so he bears the trials of the weather. Today we have sun, with a cool breeze. This seems to be the ideal Mr. Swiss climate. He has taken a walk along the county paths. This morning he was shopping but discovered that although the sun was shining it was colder than he thought and should have dressed warmer.
And me? I carry on despite the weather moods. Do not forget, I am originally British and we survive through everything. And if it really rains too much you might be lucky and a bloke with a long grey beard will begin building a large boat, known as ark, in your back yard. If this bloke resembles Russel Crowe and known as Noah, you have hit the jackpot. Just make sure that he lets you enter his boat and you no longer have weather problems.
I do get annoyed if there are prolonged periods of an extreme weather condition, for example the seemingly never-ending rains of last winter, that caused so much flooding in some parts of the UK. I didn't get any flooding myself. It was just the sheer monotony of it, day after day, week after week. Other than that though I am generally not too bothered by the weather. I, too, adapt what I am doing to fit the conditions.
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