As we are in storm season, here is a weather warning!
I have just travelled back to the North of England with my daughter and her various offspring. The journey was uneventful but very wet. Visibility on the motorway was very poor with huge lorries sensing up spray constantly. So it goes!
Oddly enough the weather was better in the North than in the South but still nothing to write home about. I have been able to put our dustbins out for emptying tomorrow without being blown away or getting soaked.
But here’s a picture of what the storms are capable of. This is Newhaven Harbour.
And it is reported that about 90,000 properties across northern parts of the UK are still without power after a weekend of stormy weather, with forecasters warning of more strong winds to come.
Two men were killed by falling trees after two named storms, Austen and Boelo, bringing widespread travel disruption, flooding, power cuts and event cancellations. On the whole, we got off lightly.
Here are the last two pictures from our Hallowe’en craft sessions. Pumpkins were carved.
And later, candles were lit inside them.
So that’s that! And a good time was had by all!
In the wider world, chaos continues and elections have been going on or are about to go on here and there. This is from the Guardian:
“Hebron, the biggest city in the West Bank, had paid little attention to Israel’s looming elections until it found itself suddenly in the midst of them, a proving ground for Benjamin Netanyahu’s security credentials in the run-up to Tuesday’s vote.
A gun attack on an Israeli military checkpoint on Friday in which two soldiers were killed brought immediate televised visits from Netanyahu and his finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, whose ruling coalition is narrowly trailing with two days of campaigning left.
They vowed abrupt and sweeping retribution, and the prime minister warned of imminent military operations on a scale the West Bank has not seen in nearly 60 years of occupation.
Within hours, the whole city of 250,000 people had been sealed off and the neighbourhood of Farsh al-Hawa, closest to the site of Friday’s attack, had been flattened. By Sunday morning, there was nothing left but rubble of an industrial area that had been full of car workshops, a big ceramics plant and other enterprises.
As the bulldozers were at work there, another district a few kilometres away was being systematically emptied. Ein Deir Baha was allegedly home to at least one of the two men involved in the attack (both of whom were killed on the spot), and on Friday its residents paid the price.
The imam from the local mosque, Fahed Ahmaro, was woken at about midnight by the loudspeakers from military vehicles patrolling the street, telling homeowners to vacate their homes immediately for their own safety.”
Rather more optimistic election news comes from Brazil. Again from the Guardian therevis this:
“Luis Inácio Lula da Silva, the Brazilian president, has staged a dramatic election fightback, defeating his far-right opponent, Flavio Bolsanaro, to claim a historic fourth term in power.
With 100% of votes counted the 80-year-old leftist received 4.4m votes more than Bolsonaro, with a 51.79% share to his 45-year-old rival’s 48.21%. However, soon after Brazil’s electoral authority confirmed Lula’s victory, Bolsonaro refused to concede defeat and asked for the results to be annulled.
Lula narrowly lost the first round of the election to Bolsonaro in early October, casting his political future into doubt and plunging progressive Brazilians into three weeks of despair. Never, since the return of democracy in the 1980s, has the first round runner-up won the second vote.
But Lula did precisely that on Sunday, prompting joyous scenes on the streets of São Paulo, where he had been following events, and at the hotel where he was watching the count.}
And in London they have been pedestrianising Oxford Street, including banning cycles, but apparently cyclists have been ignoring the ban today! Oops! Bicycle anarchy!
Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!
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