h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I bow to the masters...

Nope, no compensation or money off the... oh, what was it called back then? The standing charge? The only benefit to my bill that quarter was the electricity I didn't use those three days.

Hurricanes... nuff said.

Ooo that reminds me, Scottish Hydro have told us they owe us money on our electricity account. Looks like we can cancel the direct debit for a couple of months

Yeah, we've had that recently. We got a letter from NPower telling us our bills were going to go up by 21% and then when they sent us the direct debit information it had gone down! Plus we got a 100 pound rebate.

Clearly they were robbing us before this though.

"Hurricanes... nuff said."

*AHEM* (And this is one time it'd be really handy to have rich text formatting on h2g2

Forties
Gale warning issued 3 January 09:49 UTC
Westerly violent storm force 11 increasing hurricane force 12 imminent

Wind: Cyclonic becoming west or northwest, severe gale 9 to violent storm 11, increasing hurricane force 12 for a time, decreasing 6 to gale 8 later.

Forth
Gale warning issued 3 January 09:49 UTC
Violent storm force 11 veering westerly and increasing hurricane force 12 imminent

Wind: Cyclonic becoming west or northwest, severe gale 9 to violent storm 11, increasing hurricane force 12 for a time, decreasing 6 to gale 8 later.

Dogger
Gale warning issued 3 January 09:49 UTC
Violent storm force 11 veering westerly and increasing hurricane force 12 imminent

Wind: Southwest veering west 7 to severe gale 9, increasing storm 10 or violent storm 11 at times, occasionally hurricane force 12.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/weather/coast_and_sea/shipping_forecast/

This is turning out to be a stormy winter in the UK. It's the third or fourth time since November I've seen multiple reports of 'hurricane force 12' in the shipping forecast. That normally happens only once, if at all. And there was that 165mph gust at the top of Cairngorm last month

Not much here in Essex. Windy today though, we had to keep away from the woods, just in case.

I have yet another opportunity to rebuild my increasingly battered greenhouse when the wind dies down and I can be home in daylight hours now

The Bristol Channel caught this quite stunningly today.

Now where was my brain when I decided to walk to town at lunctime to get the other half's birthday present?

Our garden is covered in recycling and wheelie bins but thankfully our roof and satellite dish are doing well. I'm thinking of investing in some bungees to keep the bins secure when it gets like this; the neighbours also know how much we drink thanks to the glass bottles scattered all over the grass