The summer that never was

As the days get colder and the nights draw in, I can't help but feel a little envious of my relatives in Israel who get to swim outdoors every day. It has been yet another ghastly summer, and predictably there are claims that this is all due to man made global warming. Except that Britain doesn't appear to be getting any warmer! I can sympathise with the millions of expats who have fled to Spain and Australia.

It seems that Britain now has a three season calendar: Spring seems to come sometime around March, lasts till about July when we have about a week of sunshine and then we go straight into Autumn in early August. How depressing!

The way I feel is pretty much summed up in this Telegraph editorial:

It seems only yesterday that we were shopping for summer clothes, yet now we are only a fortnight from that most depressing of autumnal events, the Liberal Democrat annual conference. No doubt the Lib Dems will try to blame our disappearing sunshine on global warming. That makes about as much sense as blaming the Prime Minister. Come to think of it, though, we do not remember summers being quite so short under Tony Blair. Maybe the nights are not drawing in faster under Gordon Brown, but it certainly feels that way.