Amateur Brain Surgery

If The Nurse stands on a chair, she can just about catch a glimpse of sky through her prison cell window. Today it is grey and rainy outside. 

She’d bet her last quid that everyone’s moaning about it. Dissing the UK’s weather is a national pastime. But The Nurse thinks there’s a lot to be said for four higgledy piggledy seasons. Even though they rarely do what they say on the tin.

Here’s The Nurse’s top five reasons for appreciating the British weather.  

• Cardigans:  How many other nations have cardigans at their disposal 365, 24/7? In spring you can chuck on a light wool cardi to protect you against those sharp little winds that otherwise find their way between your cracks. In summer cotton cardigans trimmed with lace bedeck our town centres and beaches, many slung casually across sunburned shoulders or knotted at the waist against weather related emergencies. During the autumn we drag thick wool cardigans out of mothballs. Perfect for crisp leaf-kicking, conker-knocking walks in the countryside. And in winter we bundle ourselves in our warmest cardis whenever we venture outdoors. An Englishman’s home isn’t his castle. It’s his cardi.     
• Four fashion seasons:  Ladies… imagine how bored you’d be if you only had one set of clothes to wear all year round. Eternally stuck in strappy sandals, you’d never experience the joys of a kinky boot. 
• Saving money: Bouncing Poms are what Aussies call Brits who emigrate to avoid the UK’s weather, but miss it too much and bounce back home a couple of years later. Learn to love the British weather and you’ll potentially save a fortune boomeranging around the planet and back just to avoid a bit of drizzle.
• Great gardening: The Nurse was a keen gardener before she was caught and imprisoned. Throughout the spring, summer and autumn she’d enjoy countless different flowers and plants coming into leaf and flower then dying off. In winter she’d eagerly await the first green shoots, usually around the end of January. If we had a climate, rather than weather, we’d be stuck with the same plants all year round. You’d never experience the thrill of seeing the first snowdrop.  
• Balmy summer evenings:  You know those rare summer evenings when the air is sweet with flowers and the breeze is warm even after sundown?  When sound is muffled and softened by the heat? Everyone’s smiling. People sit outside pubs and cafes chattering, mellow and chilled. The pavements give off the day’s warmth all evening. Birds sing sleepily long after dark. Lovely. The Nurse doesn’t think she’d appreciate perfect summer evenings half as much if she had them all year round. As it is they’re completely magical.  

OK, the weather’s shite today. But - as the saying goes - there’s no such thing as bad weather. Just the wrong clothes. The Nurse recommends we apply British stiff upper leg, delve deep for our favourite autumn cardigans and head out into the rain with big, foolish smiles on our faces. In a few short months, it’ll be spring!