Taken over by events

Can't quite remember a Christmas and New Year like this.

I do remember hard winters, and snow on the ground for prolonged periods of time. In January 1982 the Oxford Mail had the headline "Moscow -17, Oxford -21" and it stayed cold for a long time. In fact, our first winter in Morecambe has proved to be the longest cold snap for ages, and the most sustained snow certainly for 20-odd years and probably since the winter of '63.

However, it's been the knock-on effects that have made it all so eventful. A broken hip (mum just before Christmas - she's just out of hospital) and an elbow bone cracked (wife yesterday) are evidence of just how slippery it is. It can be deceptive that the traffic is flowing on the main roads, but the pavements [US: sidewalk -ed] are very treacherous.

My proposal is that we all get sumo suits and walk around heavily padded until it all melts.