Talking about the weather

I read a book recently ('Watching the English' by Kate Fox) that said English people talk about the weather in three particular ways. The first is as a test to see if further contact would be desirable:

person A 'nice day today'
person B 'yes it is'

And the ice has been broken and they will go on to have many happy children. Another time we employ the use of weather talk (as Ms Fox calls it) is as conversation opener- the equivalent of 'How are you?'.

The last main time we talk about the weather is everytime there is a lull in conversation. So that pretty much covers a lot of my time in the classroom.

Kate Fox does also point out that the weather in England is so variable that it is not by accident that we use this topic. And, crikey, it was spring one minute and then we have been plunged back in winter the last few days.

Unfortunately it was a spring day when I decided to take my students out for a two hour walk around Central London and a winter day when we actually went out of the classroom. Bless 'em, some of them even managed to smile for the camera

This term I have been cursed with a classroom with windows. Some people might prefer the natural light but I find the window too much of a distraction. No wonder really when you consider that this is the view from my room in the afternoon

It is all go! But noisy so I prefer to use the AC than have the window open. But this room, bless its little cotton ones, has the AC unit but no sign of the controls anywhere- and high staff turnover coupled with teachers moving between the three schools means that I have been unable to find anyone who worked in the room last year who can tell me how it is supposed to work.

As usual, it has been a busy week for me- too much time in the pub coupled with going over to Patrick and Heimi's for the weekend have left me little in the way of Helen-time. But I didn't work today- some of you will be vaguely aware that I left Korea a year ago tomorrow (12th April). I spend the morning getting back from my student's house where I appear to have retired after over indulging on the weekly one pint Monday event at the Walkabout on Charing Cross Road and the afternoon catching up on some much missed daytime telly.

Back to school tomorrow though only for a couple of days before the start of the long weekend. Which I am celebrating by bogging off to Barcelona on Friday night- something I planned way before I broke my glasses yesterday morning and shelled out £255 for replacements- and yes, that was the cheapest I could get them and I still have to wait more than two weeks for delivery. So no reading in bed for me for a while.

And if it feels like I am not updating often enough then consider that you would be equally disappointed by an endless list of pubs visited and pints drunk.