Many of us have been having weird weather lately. Heavy snow in Tokyo, searing heat in Sydney, freezing conditions in DC, drought in California - and rain, rain, rain in England. Yesterday I was bustling to and fro in SE London and the weather was beautifully sunny, for a change- till I noticed that the sky was starting to look ominous in Bermondsey Street, SE1 .....
By the time I reached London Bridge, the heavens had opened.
But the funny thing was, the sun was still shining brightly, and it illuminated the raindrops and brollies, and made quite a remarkable sight.
A lot of people seemed to be quite enjoying sheltering and watching the storm
and even finding it fun, despite being whipped by wind too.
and the rain became increasingly violent.
This lady below had a fancy bunch of flowers to deliver, but told me she didn't want them to be beaten down by the water
and only stepped out as the rain began to diminish
The sun continued the shine, and soon, it won the battle with the rain,
the umbrellas disappeared, and people set off again on their daily business.
I went back to Bermondsey Street, where the sun reflected on the rain sodden buildings in wonderful pastel colours, more like a painting than a photo - the image is not retouched
Soon everyone was out and about again as if nothing had happened ....
And the flowers under the big old tree in the park were happy - they love all this rain.
I hope your weather isn't causing you too many problems, and that you'll have a good week!
PS I didn't get around to posting on Valentine's as I have been rushing around like a headless chicken, as they say. I had intended to post this song, as it is special in our family. It was written for one of my daughters by her partner (who is NOT the singer, Lee Ryan). I'd like to say it came out on Valentines day but it didn't, he wrote it for her when they first met. They are still together and happy. I suppose I'm biased, even though it wasn't written for me, but it's one of my favourite love songs, so tender and melodious.
I am so sorry that I didn't get around to posting it on the correct day, but even though it's not Valentine's any more, I hope you can share it with a loved one, either in everyday life or in the heart!
Wonderful photo's of the rainstorm. The one of the lone person in front of the the buildings does indeed look like a painting. Enjoyed the music this morning.
ReplyDeleteDarla
I love the photos - isn't is wonderful what can survive, in spite of the weather (my snowdrops are flourishing even though the fence is now scattered all over the garden.
ReplyDeleteEvery once in a while, we'll have a "sunny rainstorm." It is always fascinating. Even if you've been busy, i hope you had a nice Valentine's Day!
ReplyDeleteWhat a beautiful song. How fabulous is it that your daughter had a song like that written for her.
ReplyDeleteWe get sun here every few days between all the constant snow storms. Your picture of the crocus was a delight to see. Under the two feet of snow, I know the seeds and bulbs of spring wait.
SNOW, SNOW, and more SNOW, that's the weather words around here. BUT tomorrow it will be ICE, ICE, and more ICE....and you have flowers blooming, I miss green............
ReplyDeleteEnjoyed your photos. I was up in London too, yesterday, walking by the very cold windy Thames and wondering round Limehouse Basin, a very interesting place and new to me. Unfortunately, no camera... Nice to meet you.
ReplyDeleteI love this post! I love your photos and how you captured the shiny, sunny, rainy mood. Lovely, and your first and last photos are especially lovely.
ReplyDeleteAm I understanding correctly - did you daughter's husband write that song for her, before Lee Ryan recorded it? Amazing!
What an eye you have. Stunning shots. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteWhat a beautiful song and so romantic to learn that it was especially written for your daughter.
ReplyDeleteI love, love, love these rain photos - beautifully captured, and revealing that within the awfulness of our weather at the moment there is also a magical side too.
P.S today is a wonderful sunny day - hope it is with you as well.
Loved the photos of the rain. Have never been to Camden Lock, may give it a look when we're in London this summer. Just read your blog piece about going to Japan. Our daughter is utterly fascinated with Japan, goes over there 3 or 4 times a year (she's there right now) and has been trying for years to get a job there. She finally managed to do that and will be moving there this spring, we've never been there, but I guess we'll be going.
ReplyDeleteWonderful photographs. How lovely to see such images in the midst of all the moaning!
ReplyDeleteWow, beautiful song.
ReplyDeleteYour pictures are wonderful, especially after the rain sunshine pictures. The crocus lift my thinking Spring heart. Thank you
Jenny - first of all, your post about the new twins didn't show up on my blog feed for some reason, so I only read about it today. They are an adorable addition to your family. Congratulations!
ReplyDeleteThe song "Army of Lovers" is wonderful - I really enjoyed it. Your daughter must feel very special to have had such a lovely song written for her! It's good to know they are still happily together (I love happy endings).
I haven't seen a sunshower in a long time. They are always a special weather phenomena and have an uncanny way of putting people in a good mood. We had one here in West Texas about two years ago, and afterwards there was a spectacular rainbow (actually, rain is so very rare here that even a few drops manage to put people in a good mood.....)
Every single one of these photos is worth framing!!
ReplyDeleteLoved this magical rainstorm .. thankyou for sharing.
ReplyDeletex
rain and sun together gives wonderful light.
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Wow, that's quite a big deal to have a song written for you. And you are right, it is a beautiful song!
ReplyDeleteLove all your pictures. The nursery rhyme "The itsy bitsy spider" came to mind as I was reading your post and looking at your pictures. :-)
What a wonderful set of photos, you have made me feel like I am back in London, never knowing when it will rain!
ReplyDeleteThat last photo makes me very much want to see England again, those flowers pushing up through that green grass, I remember seeing them from the buses and they were such a welcome sight!
Even by your standards Jenny those photos are superb. You have an ability to capture scenes and emotions and people in a way that I never can and I am rather envious (which, oddly, is the one sin of which I am not usually guilty).
ReplyDeleteMy mother's mother used to refer to rain and sun at the same time as monkeys' wedding weather.
ReplyDeleteGoodness only knows where that came from.
The weather up your way and elsewhere in the northern sphere certainly has been wicked lately. It must come to an end soon. The images we're getting here via TV are very worrying indeed.
ReplyDeleteWe'd love some rain here where I'm living and in other areas of Queensland; it keeps being promised but the promises are yet to be fulfilled. I pity our poor graziers who really are struggling at present and who are having to kill off their herds. I don't know how they continue to go on...it's heartbreaking for them.
I love rainstorms! As long as it's not dark and I'm having to drive long distances in it, such as from home to work.
ReplyDeleteNever heard of the song or the artist, but how cool the song was written for your daughter! At first, Lee's voice kind of reminded me of Michael Bolton.
I think England is one of the few places where you can have black skies with sunshine coming in at the sides! Amazing photos.
ReplyDeleteThere are a few pictures still sitting on my camera, waiting to be turned into a blog post, about such a sunny storm as well. So please don't think I'm being a copycat when(if at some stage you'll find a similar post on my blog, Jenny! Of course my pictures are nowhere near as great as yours; especially the third from the top and the one that looks like a painting are fantastic!
ReplyDeleteWhat a special song, and lucky daughter to have it written just for her!
ReplyDeleteYour photos of the storm are fascinating, so well-captured right in the moment: brilliant, Jenny.
Weather is crazy all over - here, much too hot (still) and we long for rain, and Autumn.
Thank you for the lovely comments. Crocuses are always inspiring. So glad your daughter finally got a job in Japan, Janet - how I like to hear about people trying and trying and finally achieving their goals!
ReplyDeleteMandy, he wrote the song for her and then it was chosen for the album. It was cool for her to hear it sung by someone else!
Thank you for commenting, Marianne, good to meet you.
The rain is becoming rather wearying. But we are luckier in London than those in the flood zones.
ReplyDeleteIt was brave of you to take so many photographs in the storm. We really have had a pelting this winter... but as yet no snow!
ReplyDeleteYes, it's strange how you can have bright sunshine and rain at the same time. The rain photos are wonderfully surreal, with what look like showers of feathers or sugar!
ReplyDeleteOh, my goodness- what weather! Truly amazing pictures, as well. Here in the deep south of Texas, we've actually been colder on some days this season than Alaska has. Strange weather patterns...
ReplyDeleteMy bestie is from Stoke and she said that her family has taken a beating. It was pretty bad there. Hell, it's been pretty bad here too. I'm near Chicago and we are supposed to get a violent storm. Oh look, it's snowing again. So it begins. We are used to bad weather in this area but it is even a bit too much for us to take. We have had some miserably cold weather, think -30s and it warms up just enough for it to snow then goes back to the freezing temps. Yuck.
ReplyDeleteI have a good friend in Chicago who has just had an operation on her leg - the poor woman is house bound because it keeps snowing and getting icy again every time anyone clears the sidewalks!
DeleteStunning photos, Jenny! I love crocuses under the big tree and snow flying across the photo, great!
ReplyDeleteThe song is lovely too.
Oh, I was wrong! There were rain drops on your photos but so large that I thought it was snow, ha, ha! I used to see snow here, Jenny. Hope we see the rain in spring.
DeleteYou have crocuses up!
ReplyDeleteYou live in such a beautiful city, less-than-perfect weather notwithstanding. :)
ReplyDeletePS: The snow in Tokyo was un-be-lieve-able. A third snowfall (surely impossible?) is predicted for this coming Thursday.
Brilliant!
ReplyDeleteALOHA from Honolulu
Comfort Spiral
=^..^= <3
I love this post and the narrative. Very story-book like :)
ReplyDeleteThe weather is kinda crazy here in my part of the world too. For a few weeks, we experienced cooler weather than usual then, it is super hot & sunny with no rain for the past couple of weeks.
What weather we have been experiencing! Great post.
ReplyDeleteThose are truly glorious photos and I love how they tell the story of the sudden heavy downpour.
ReplyDelete"Drip, drip, drop, little April showers..."
ReplyDeleteWell, February anyway. At least it stopped, even if only momentarily. Sometimes lately, it doesn't seem as if it ever will. xoxo
Great series of pictures which really told a story; I found myself quite concerned for that lady’s flowers! How romantc to have a song written for you and then hear it sung like that.
ReplyDeleteWhat superb pictures you take!
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely fabulous!
Lovely pictures. They make me want to come home! Stay safe there, Jenny. x
ReplyDeleteGreetings human, Jenny,
ReplyDeleteYour photos, as always, are superb. They capture the very essence of the changeable weather we have been experiencing. Okay, mostly raining cats and dogs. Watch out for the poodles :)
Pawsitive wishes,
Penny the Jack Russell dog and modest internet superstar!
Penny, thank you for your comment, it's the first one I have had on the blog from a dog! :)
ReplyDeleteYes, Nell, I was concerned for the flowers too in fact, as they looked like a big expensive bunch. I wish I had remembered to post the song on Valentines day, though. I really love it but I knew I'd forget to post next Valentines just like I've forgotten all the previous ones.
Lina, I didn't realise your weather was still weird. The forecasters have been saying the whole pattern of weird weather started in your part of the world last year, heck I hope that does not mean it is cycling around the world forever! :)
I think that after a while heavy snow stops being interesting and fun, doesn't it Rurousha? I was charmed at how pretty and interesting London was in early 2010, until I actually had to get on with my life in it. I hope Tokyo becomes more spring like soon.
Oh, and Shelly, Texas, too!
I'll post this and do another comment in a new box.
Lee, I too am very sorry for farmers - I seem to spend a lot of time being sorry for them lately because there have been so many weird weather situations. But some of them have land which will have been under water for months, here, and I just can't imagine how normal plants and crops can survive. Or indeed how they can even plant crops. I don't think I have the strength of nerve to be a farmer to be honest. I wish that nature would do her job of spreading out the water more evenly.
ReplyDeleteNick, I too love the surreal feathery look of it, the idea of sugar is quite Brothers Grimm isn't it! :)
Nadezda, I think actually it does look exactly like photos of snow, but in fact it was just very large raindrops I think because it was not cold at all. In fact, at one stage, when it had stopped raining, I even took my coat off because I was so warm!
Thank you to everyone who has left comments, each and every one of them is welcome. Oh, and I love the word "sunstorm" Not only descriptive but somewhat mysterious.
First of all, thanks for the clip. The song is beautiful. Secondly, your photos show what I love about Britain so much. No, it's not just the weather! (Notice the "just" :-D). It's the resilience, the "get on with it" attitude to life. Love it. It rains, it pours, the sun is still shining, it stopped raining, now, let's carry on, shall we? Love it, love it. Many thanks.
ReplyDelete(still raining where I live in London) :-)
The UK is taking a terrible battering this winter..
ReplyDeleteBut this storm was very unusual indeed!
Add our New England weather to the general nastiness. We have had snow, snow, ice, snow, then, just as a nice change of pace, freezing rain and more snow. As far as I'm concerned, winter can die and never come back.
ReplyDeleteLoved the photo-story from sunshine to rain and back again; excellent!! The song's not really my style, though a wonderful thing to do - of course! I'm thinking the singer had some hideous disfigurement, which meant he had to wear his suit in the pool...no wonder everyone was looking at him. I think that's an "Oh, dad!" moment. Thanks for following A Bit About Britain, and and your comments. All the best.
ReplyDeleteWonderful captures of the shifting weather. We've had an unusually mild winter where I live but not as extreme as in England. Not seen much of the sun either, though!
ReplyDeleteLove the rainy shots, you really did a great job capturing them so well.
ReplyDeleteThe weather is awful isn't it? Fortunately we haven't had any flooding, but the wind damage has been bad.
I do remember that song by Lee Ryan when it was first released.
I always like your photos. Those snow scenes are just wonderful! They are so vivid and expressive even though in the grey world. I see many stories in your photos.
ReplyDeleteThank you for your comment. Mitsudomoe of design has a long history as a roofing sign of shrines and family clan. It dates back almost one thousand years ago. I am sorry I did not mention about the history. I am a just short English leaner. I hope you will see them in Japan soon!!
Hope you are well. Take care.
I love these beautiful photos, especially the pictures of the snow!
ReplyDeleteI'm just catching up with blog reading after my trip to Oz. I know I've read and commented on this post but you know what? Those photos are so fabulous I've just been drooling over them again with envy and I just had to tell you.
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