Thursday 13th February 2014

Still not in Sweden......

Yesterday, I did venture down from my sick bed to make a hot lemon, and so I sat on the sofa to watch the latest on stormageddon. Yes, stormageddon, the latest storm to sweep across the Atlantic and try to blow Britain off the map.

What I saw was an apparently endless series of reports from correspondents either standing, or trying to stand, on a windy beach or nearly ankle deep on some suburban street in the Thames Valley. Its almost as if they believe we, the viewers at home, cannot imagine what a stormy sea or some minor flooding looks like.

In fact I have seen a cloud before. And I have seen a flooded road before. Really.

There was one report where the reporter was standing in the lea of The Cobb at Lyme Regis, and waves were breaking over the Cobb and he was saying, look at that water! It stings like needles on my skin. Well, and whose fault is that? Did we really need you to stand there? Could you not stood up on the cliffs or in a beach shelter and use the telephoto lens?

This is not to take anything away from those affected by the stormy seas, high tides and flooding. Its just it all has ramped up now that Metroland has been affected along the Thames Valley. Its almost that people living in the Thames Valley, Staines-on-Thames (SIC) and their flooding is more newsworthy than the flooding in Somerset that has been going on for six weeks or more. And then old Moonface says at PMQs that ‘money is no object’ in the rescues. Only the whips office put out a clarification as to what ‘money is no object’ means, and is not really a blank cheque.

That will be a comfort to those with water lapping up to the light switches in their living rooms.