Weather Alert!

It's Sherlock Holmes weather! A thick mist has settled over the canals and if this were London in times past it would be a good day for a murder...

These days weather seems so 'global'. Maybe it's just that we are more aware of what is going on in other places. Huge weather systems develop and sometimes the whole continent seems enveloped by the same weather - whether it's drought, storms, or torrential rain and flooding. The weather is a wild card these days and even more unpredictable than ever.

I watch the weather's progress on TV. 'Exiled' in the Netherlands, I still like to watch the good old BBC 'back home'. Carol, in her latest outfit, with her never-failing neat hairdo, tells us that a depression is sweeping westwards across Britain. It will cause heavy rain and maybe some flash flooding - there are flood alerts out in many areas - but it will move away eastwards by tonight, so a better day tomorrow. 'Thanks for that, Carol!' I think. Where will it move to? Oh, just into northern Europe, France, the Netherlands - somewhere far away! In Britain they are looking forward to a fine weekend, but we shall be wearing their cast-offs.

Is our weather always someone else's cast-off? Rain today there means rain here tomorrow. Strong winds there are repeated here tomorrow, but hopefully a bit weaker, some of their initial fury gone. Somewhere, surely, the weather must be brand new! Like pristine, crisp, sparkling snow falls, with not a footprint to be seen, somewhere there must be shiny new weather - sparkling new raindrops, bright, shiny sunshine, pure, clean, soft rain that has never before touched the ground or glistened on the first rose of summer.

I imagine some kind of cauldron, or maybe a furnace, with weather elves, dressed in green, a bit like Santa's little helpers. They are busy creating weather. They hold pressure gauges and test their very own new recipes for high and low weather pressure systems. There are grumpy elves, down in the Doldrums, creating low pressure and gloom; bright, chirpy elves making bright, sunny days and happiness. Fresh off the peg!

There are dark, gloomy days, hurricanes, each with their own name, ready to roll and spread abroad chaos and destruction. In another place, there is a small store of perfect summer days, ready to be let loose sporadically, just when the inhabitants of earth have started to despair - the perfect blue sky, perfectly shaped, fluffy white clouds and soft gentle breezes. They are all new. Somewhere, high above earth's atmosphere, or in a deep, dark cavern far below us, this is for real! I know it. Just like the red sweater, I remember from my childhood, with its cuffs rolled up three times over, everyone's cast-offs were new once upon a time.