It either will or it won’t. Rain, that is. It’s been the topic of conversation for the past couple of days, and the weather forecast wars have already begun.
‘We’re going to have a storm.’
‘Tuesday is going to be dreadful.’
‘My weather app doesn’t say anything about a storm.’
‘There’s the possibility of 0.03 mm of rain overnight!’
‘It smells like rain.’
‘Windfinder says there’ll be some cloud and a chance of a few drops. It’s usually accurate.’
‘These things change.’
‘I use Poseidon, it’s always right.’
‘Those look like rain clouds.’
‘It’s going to be a dreadful Autumn.’
‘Yes, I hear you are in for some nasty weather.’
‘I’m not going to the beach on Tuesday. My weather app says there’s going to be a hurricane.’
‘It was only storm force eight on my app, with a chance of snow. It’s always right.’
‘Better start building that ark.’
Get over it, people! We have a sky overhead. It is going to rain at some point. Surely there’s something of slightly more interest to discuss. (Currently, that appears to be the shocking news that the authorities have, after X number of years, decided to implement a legal requirement that’s been a requirement since it was legally required for the requirement of the first party to be required by the second party hereof to have the requirement in place and until it is, you can’t breach that required law, so there.)
The first rain since the last rain. It’s always the subject of great discussion and, surprisingly, not only among the British. Then again, the weather is a standard fallback discussion for anyone who’s not quite sure how to fill those long, three-second gaps in conversation that some nationalities can’t cope with at the café table. I’m more than happy to sit in companionable silence and watch the world turn, and don’t feel the need to constantly pump questions into a table mate as though I were a machine gun, and they the enemy. But, when these awkward (for some) pauses in what apparently needs to be a constant flow of conversation occur, the weather is often the choice of topic. Or the topic of choice.
The weather yesterday was exactly as my favourite weather station predicted. (https://poseidon.hcmr.gr in case you were wondering. It has moving pictures and everything!) Warm, some clouds, light breeze, sunlight, chance of rain… We get some kind of weather here every day. There were thunderstorms over Turkey last night, but this morning, it doesn’t look to me as though we had any rain. It’s kind of semi-predicted-perhaps for later this morning now, and we’ve been downgraded from a definite light showering to a potential spit. So, stand down people and relax.
I often wonder how the weather for the island is predicted, seeing as there is no weather station here (that I know of). I always assume these sites and places take their historical readings from nearby, like Rhodes airport (?) or Datca in Turkey which is closer to us, or… well, I don’t know, but I do know meteorologists know their job, and that’s fine, but it’s very rare that what’s predicted on Friday for next Monday happens without changing, so you have to wonder about the point of looking at the weather forecast. Unless it’s to give you an idea of how the seas might be when you sail out of port, or something, the best way to ‘I’ll just see what the weather is doing’ is to go out in it.
