I hate winter. I hate rainy days. I hate strong winds. Give me summer anytime; and day.
Therefore as you can image this weekend is not my type of weekend. Yesterday I broke my back trying to clean my roof. I had to remove anything which could have been a welcome playmate for the strong winds that we were promised would hit us – and did – with a vengeance.
During the night I woke up on two or three occasions to check whether everything was normal particularly on the roof. I dreamt of lids of water tanks flying around and about like alien flying saucers. Would the wind be strong enough to give us flying cars? Probably not, I thought. But I was not ready to take a chance so I garaged my car.
All the images of films I saw about hurricanes persecuted me no end.
This morning it was worse. At times it was raining cats and dogs. I always wondered why this image is used. Why don't we compare the level of rain falling with different animals of different sizes?
A light drizzle could be described as raining ants and beetles while moderate rainfall as raining mice and birds. (This would be a dream come true for hunters.) A moderate to strong rainfall could be called cats and dogs. But this morning's downpour has to be called something more robust. What about goats and horses? I hope animal lovers would not be offended.
Luckily enough this morning I could stay inside. I had a lot of emails to answer, several pieces of clothing to transfer from myriad chairs to the wardrobe, and other odds and bits of work.
My first unalterable appointment is 5.00p.m. Mass.
The weather affects mass attendance, work, business, leisure and probably even politics. Instead of a silent day, yesterday we had a very noisy one. We had the howling of the wind instead of the blaring of propaganda.
How will this weather affect the turnout? I think it will be less than what it usually is for local elections. Many people – probably most – do not give a lot of importance (probably not even a hoot) to the local council election and will consequently prefer to stay inside close to heaters. It may well turn out to be that the protagonist of these elections will be the weather and not the political parties.
In such an eventuality who will be declared the winner? Who will the weather side with it case a casting vote would be needed in a Local Council? We'll wait and see.