Thawing out here, markedly warmer today. See they have cleared the shelves up in Scotland with panic buying, you would have thought the supermarkets would show some common sense and put a limit on how many items of milk and bread you could buy during bad weather, but obviously too much to ask. When ...

I knew a lad who was a gunner on Challengers in the 1st Armoured Div stationed in Germany in the late 80's, apparently they used to knock down walls, smash cars and hit the odd house while they driving on the country roads there. I did a quick search and came up with this, one very lucky lady in the...

This is worth a watch, was on last night it was a documentary made at the time looking back at the big freeze of 1963.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b ... big-freeze

It's what the workers on the gas and oil pipelines in Alaska and Northern Canada wear, I got the chance to pick one up at 35% of it's retail price a few years ago. Was told at the time not to even think about working in it at anything more than -5 or I would be way too hot. Not very fashionable, it'...

Well it turns out I did make the right decision. Reasonable amount of snow here which has reduced traffic to a crawl. On the plus side I got out my pipeline coat for the first time today, first time I have bothered to use it in nearly ten years and I was warmer in it outside than I was inside with t...

Beyond the usual woodland animals, game birds etc I suppose our area is known for Red Kite and Glis Glis. The amount of Red Kite you see around these parts it's hard to believe they were ever an endangered species, I've even started to see the odd one that has come a cropper on the roads.

Thanks everyone for kind words re the Count, he'd had heart trouble for quite a while, his son Nitwit is if I'm being honest a far more impressive bird than he every was even in his prime. You need a category H license for tracked vehicles to drive one Mrs B, you can drive one on your provisional as...

No need for chains and winter tyres with one of these. Top speed of 50, the NCAP safety rating must be off the charts. If someone in front of you blocks the road theres a decent chance you could just go over the top of them. A snip at £15,000. If you are a bit more flash with the cash then you can p...

It was -5 here at 5.30pm yesterday when I went up to shut the chickens up so I presume -10 would have been about right overnight, drinkers frozen solid. The cold has (I think) claimed it's first casualty for us. No sign of Count Orloff this morning, only a pile of white feathers under the bushes, hi...

Today I cancelled my dentists appointment on Thursday, why?, because of a bit of snow and cold weather that hasn't even happened yet!. I feel like a right ninny for doing it. The problem for me is that my dentist is 30 miles away down the A41 which ended up being closed with 100 cars stranded last t...