At last

I think Charles Dickens is to blame. Along with the a long conspiracy of English teachers.

In England we’re brought up to think that Christmas is cold and snowy, when cruel bosses get visited by ghosts and told to mend their ways. We’re forced to read A Christmas Carol by our English teachers, just to make the point (in fairness, we were also given My Friend Mr. Leakey). This implicitly extends to the rest of winter – in total contravention of British reality.
So, when I left England to move to Denmark, and then Finland, one thing I was looking forward to was seeing a ‘proper’ winter, with snow that last more than 2 days. Well, I sort of got it, and discovered that when snow lasts that long, it holds and later releases a record of why dogs are taken for walks. And then, alas, global warming caught up with me and the winters became English.
I have noticed something curious, though. It started a few years ago, when the summers seemed to expand into late September (in Finland they are considered to end about the middle of August). My thesis was that the seasons were precessing – getting later and later. The last couple of years this has been happening in the winters too.
Thus it is that I was overjoyed this morning to see this week’s forecast for Helsinki from the Finnish Meteorological Institute

We’ll actually be below zero for a whole 5 days! That’ll be about the only time this winter.
So, whilst the people of Woking are celebrating the coming of Spring, we’re celebrating the coming of Winter.
If this continues, we’ll be able to celebrate mid-summer with a 20km ski followed by a sauna and a dip in an ice-hole. And I still won’t be able to see snow at Christmas.