The Cold

Icy Fountains, The Regent's Park, originally uploaded by Mr Atrocity.

Well it's new year and we finally have a proper winter in London. For the last three or four years it's been overcast, not very cold and mostly rainy for months, and spring and autumn seemed so similar to winter. This year however we have an actual discernible winter. Now I know by the standards of those of you living in colder and more varied climes our winter here is nothing to write home about but to me it's been a delight. I

like a proper British Winter, where the weather hovers around the zero degrees Celsius mark for days on end. We have even had a few of my favourite sort of winter days, those where the sky is cloudless and the air crisp. The views over London Bridge as I do my long walk to work have often quite taken my breath. The photo above was taken in The Regent's Park. It had been below freezing for a few days by that point and it was possible to see the dominant wind direction as one side of the fountain urn was covered in ice whilst the far side was clear. The energy of the flowing fountain water was enough to keep it liquid but as it got blown about drops stuck to the sides of the fountain and froze. It was quite beautiful. The icicles dropping down from the lip were merely the icing on the cake.

Thank you all for the kind comments on the previous two posts, it was very sweet of you all. I'm going to try more regular blogging again as my real-world web site is up to date, though there is still work to be done, and I have negotiated my frantic last few weeks of 2008. Hope you all managed some kind of holiday and I'll try to write at least one a week for now. I'm working long hours and six days a week on The Wolf Man for now so I may be a little short on bloggable material. I'll transcribe it as it comes to me.