It Just Goes On...

The bad weather, plots against Gordon Brown, Cameron talking bollocks - you name it, it just goes on, and on. Thanks to our twenty-four hour news culture's insatiable need for content, all of these things are endlessly regurgitated. Yesterday the BBC even had the audacity to fill up some of the empty space in the schedules caused by the postponement of a League Cup Semi-Final, by giving us a half hour 'News Special' on the snowy weather. Curiously enough, I already knew that we were in the grip of freezing weather - I'd been out in it all day. I can't really imagine that there was anybody in the country who hadn't noticed the inclement weather and needed to be brought up to date on it. It occurred to me, in the midst of all this madness, that about the only people who would be welcoming this prolonged cold spell would be those World War Two re-enactment weirdos. The conditions are exactly right for them to re stage the Battle of the Bulge in Hampshire or Oxfordshire.

All of which just reinforced my opinion that we give in to this weather too easily. After all, in December 1944 the German army launched a massive counter-offensive in far worse weather conditions than those we are currently experiencing, and, during the afore-mentioned military action, very nearly succeeded in derailing the Allied advance out of France and into the low countries. I'm beginning to suspect that the Germans were so easily able to sweep past US forces early in the offensive because the Americans had paid too much attention to those severe weather warnings. No doubt they'd heeded police advice to stay off the icy roads unless their journeys were essential, and had parked their Sherman tanks up at the roadside. No wonder they were unable to mount a defence in the face of hundreds of German tanks which dared to drive on untreated roads! I suppose that what we can conclude from this historical lesson is that what I need to get through this bad weather is a Tiger tank.