The Nice People Thread, No.16: A Universe of Niceness.

PasturesNew

Just checking in. Heating's working, it's warm in here, but out there it's low level localised Armageddon

I could hear freezing rain hitting the patio doors all evening. This morning that side of the house (east facing) is entirely frozen solid. All the windows are thick, thick, thick with solid ice - it's like having bathroom obscured glazing on all the windows. There's a 15" snow drift against the bottom of the patio doors/back of the house, if they were the only doors to get out of the house I think I'd be stuck in here.

The snow breaks and crunches in huge "sheets" so as I step down it's not just footprints, each foot breaks through a large "sheet" of ice on top of 9-12" of snow.

I walked round to the back, very slowly and carefully - and as I stood outside looking around it suddenly occurred to me "get inside you idiot ... this is how old people die because one slip here and you're DOWN on that ice, probably stunned and with a broken arm and you'll lie there and die" .... so I'm back inside now

LydiaJ

I'm about to set off to attempt to drive to work...

Pyxis

Pastures, you are so right.

Because of my weak leg and my damaged wrists, I am very loth to venture forth. If my leg buckles or I slip, I stand a good chance of breaking a wrist, as they are already damaged, and/or setting off another major leg problem, and when you live alone, you just can't afford to be laid up with a non-functioning limb.

I do feel like a wimp, but it's not a matter of life and death to go out, so I won't.
Looks like my important AmDram practice tomorrow won't go ahead. Drat, as it was really important.......we have a competition in a week's time.

silvercar wrote: »

Anything you would like to tell us?

:rotfl::rotfl: :rotfl:
I didn't know GDB had a young family!

silvercar wrote: »

In the 30+ years I have been buying loo roll we have never run out. Even though my stock pile is usually under 15 rolls. Don't panic!

Just because you lot clearly have enough to supply the neighbourhood, my drains are safe.

I do hope you touched some wood! :eek:

Doozergirl wrote: »

Oh! TRAMPOLINE! :rotfl:

I have a feeling that the family weekend in Devon for my big birthday might be scuppered. Seem to be having quite a spectacular run of bad luck. At least it's only stuff/money.

What's with the "Oh! Trampoline!" :huh:

Plus, that's really rough about your big birthday, Doozer!

What a terrible shame.

When was it on for? If it's not this weekend, it might still be ok.

PasturesNew

There's been a broken down train all night full of people who left Waterloo at 5pm yesterday. Since midnight they've been sitting in a train with no power, no heating, no lights. They're still there.... they are trying to get another train alongside to rescue them.

Two other trains are stuck behind them at previous stations.

vivatifosi

Stay safe everyone. PN, sounds scarily spectacular.

Now that we have daylight, I can see what caused the noise in my garden. Fences still standing, but I have a wooden pallet in the garden. I have no idea where it has come from. #musthavebeenwindy

chris_m

No snow here and the temperature's risen, lowest last night was +0.5 C.
Flippin' windy all night, though - and that makes the present +1.1 C fell a darned sight colder.
Haven't looked at the local news yet to see how much white stuff has been dumped elsewhere but I saw a pic yesterday of a front door from the inside in Alston, IIRC. Well, the door was in the pic, open, but the main subject was the impression of the door in a wall of snow up to somewhere above the top of the door frame.

Pyxis

I don't understand how we can allow people to be stranded on a road for 8, 9, 10 hours, or all night.

I mean, 3, 4 or 5, maybe, but double that?


The worst experience I had was several years ago on the M25 in thick snow, on the approach to the Dartford Crossing. I was stuck there for 5 hours, but that was because a lorry had jack-knifed on the bridge, or broken down in the tunnel, can't remember which, and I couldn't come off the motorway as the Blackwall tunnel was also closed for some reason, and the traffic would have been awful. Plus I didn't know S.E. London well enough to start weaving my way through there.
That was bad enough, but it was day-time, and there was a teensy bit of movement along occasionally. I did have to come off at one point and find a petrol station so I could go to the loo, and then I rejoined the queue.
But that wasn't even due to the snow!




Siege mentality has set in:-

Well, I made an executive decision this morning. Having looked at the forecast for tomorrow and Sunday.........

Just in case the water gets cut off for some reason, I have filled the bath, a couple of buckets, and several jugs, bottles and saucepans with water.
And I shall not continue with the "If it's yellow" principle for the duration.

Got the dishwasher on, even though it's not completely full, and shall catch up with a clothes wash later, so everything's fresh.

If there's no problem, the water shan't be wasted, as I shall still use what's in the bath and buckets to flush the loo, and I shall rotate the water in the jugs,etc so it doesn't go stale.

Later, I shall batch wash a load of veg, so that at least it's clean and can be cooked.

Hopefully over-reacting, but again, without having anyone to help me with stuff, it might be best. Even getting to a stand-pipe, and carrying buckets of water back on the snow might be painful (wrists) and dangerous re. slipping possibility.


Oh SHIVERS! I am NOT a feeble little old lady! I know it sounds like it! :mad:
(Pyxis rails against the world!)

:D

PasturesNew

I've peeked out the front window from upstairs. Usually my road has a rush hour of people driving down to their places of work (it's a dead end full of units) .... it's usually a rumbling from 6am of the occasional lorry, then a steady stream of cars for an hour or so of rush hour.

This morning nothing, I've not been aware of a single car moving on the road past my house. I did see one chap walking along the path though -slowly/badly and slipping ....silly teet had his hands in his pockets though! That's a sure way to break both arms and a nose as if he suddenly goes he can't try to save that - and he should have his arms outstretched to help with wobbliness.

PasturesNew

Pyxis wrote: »

I don't understand how we can allow people to be stranded on a road for 8, 9, 10 hours, or all night.

I mean, 3, 4 or 5, maybe, but double that?

Because there's no way to get them off. You don't have the vehicles to get to them, tow trucks won't work, you need 4x4s, or tractors, so you'd need enough of those .... and then you'd need to know where you're taking them.

You can't plan ahead as any "rescue centre" needs to be 1-2 miles from where the people were .... and you don't know where it'll happen. Think of the hundreds of miles of roads it COULD happen on.

You then need stuff for them. Blankets, drinks, hot soup, seats, etc.

Too many, too unpredictable, too hard.

It's not like everything's "normal" and the rest of the world is sitting willing/able and available to just "pop out" and bring them in.

And....the Great British Public don't like to abandon their cars....they'll sit it out if they can.

Pyxis

Like you Sue, I do like to keep the freezer full.

I'm more concerned about the loo rolls, though, as I've enough 'glucose' reserves built-in to last me a couple of weeks, I reckon, if I run out of food! :rotfl:

I do use a lot of loo-roll, shan't go into details! :D:D, but there was a time a couple of years ago when I was ill with a chest infection for nearly a month, and I was down to my last loo-roll and the freezer was almost empty by the time I was well enough to go to the shop.

That was scary, even though I know that I could sign up to order stuff online, if the worst came to the worst.

However, in these snow/ice conditions, which are unprecedented in this area, delivery vans might not operate.

Best to be safe and keep stocked up.