Bate is becoming a boring weather bore, according to her colleagues

After such a dismal summer, Britain could face one of the worst winters in living memory.

Yep. According to clever meteorologists a super-strength El Nino could dislodge the jetstream, leading to more unstable weather in the UK this autumn.

And probably for the foreseeable future, knowing our luck.

I mean our summer has been particularly bad with our one hour of sunshine last month.

El Niño is the irregular weather phenomenon caused by fluctuations in the temperature of oceans, which arrives every two to seven years.

The last substantial El Niño was five years ago, leading to drought in Australia, blizzards and flooding in the US and a freezing winter in the UK.

Climate scientists warned temperatures in the Pacific have increased by 3F in recent weeks.

And the Weather Channel accurately predicted that our summer would be cool and wet, with more storms and more rainfall.

So this El Nino business could be true.

Now, I don’t know where I have been for the past six months, but it seems that this Giant Haystacks El Nino is old news.

And EVERYONE knew about it. Apart from me and ahem, my colleague, who thought El Nino was a soap opera based in Spain aired on Channel Five at 4am.

I think he means El Dorado.

He’s peering over my shoulder as I write.

“For God’s sake Bate, why can’t you write about the former LOML or the Farmer or something. I can’t believe your column is about the weather.

“I don’t want to turn to page 4 of the Forest Journal and find out that you have turned into a middle aged weather girl telling us its going to be a cold winter.

“Its September now and I’m freezing. See, I’ve already lost interest. Bah”

Actually, I like winter, I like the snow and the storms too.

I find weather exciting. When I was little, my Dad used to wake me from my slumber and we’d walk down the little path to the cliff top and watch the lightning strike the sea.

“If you watch the lightning Dora and then count slowly until you hear the thunder, that is how many miles away the eye is.”

And under night skies usually in a rain storm and on top of a cliff, we would count slowly together until the crack of thunder deafened us.

It was the 70s so the social services weren’t interested.

Dad could always be relied upon for his host of weather predicting rhymes and tools.

Red sky in the morning, shepherds warning, Red sky at night shepherds delight.

And if it rains on St Swithun’s day, it will rain for 40 days and 40 nighs.

Hmmm. I wonder if those clever meteorologists use the same science for spotting El Nino.

Readers who submit articles must agree to our terms of use. The content is the sole responsibility of the contributor and is unmoderated. But we will react if anything that breaks the rules comes to our attention. If you wish to complain about this article, contact us here