Graupel
This is graupel.
No, I am not still banging on about the pretentious words in the book I am reading, this is real stuff.
We had to have the air conditioner replaced.
Last year it had struggled to try to keep the house cool during the summer. We had been told that,
a, it was old.
b, it wasn't powerful enough.
This was true.
Although it is chuffing cold here for much of the year, in the summer it is chuffing hot.
The air con should come on and off automatically, keeping the place at a set temperature.
Last year it just kept going constantly as it could not keep the heat down to a comfortable level.
It must have cost us a fortune.
So, it had to be replaced.
On Tuesday, while the men were removing the old unit and installing the new one, it started snowing.
Well, I thought it started snowing.
Then it seemed to turn to hail.
Well, I thought it was hail.
But I was wrong.
On the evening news the weather man rather proudly told us all that it had been graupel...pronounced 'gropple'.
I thought he was having a laugh, but he wasn't. He really liked this word. Apparently, graupel consists of snow pellets.
Hail is ice, snow is snow and graupel is snow covered in a crisp candy shell.......no, I mean it is snow covered in a shell of ice.
The most marked difference is that where hail bounces around, graupel, when it hits the ground or, as I found out, someone walking to and from work, it sort of squishes.
It graupelled on Tuesday and again on Wednesday and it was perishing cold and blowing a gale.
Still, we are not into May yet.....so glad we paid an arm and a leg to get the air con fixed.
I went to the mall today.
My idiot magnet was in over drive. On the bus going there was a woman who talked non stop standing next to the driver.
She drove me nuts.
After a quick once round the mall I went to the food court for my customary coffee, to sit, relax and people watch.
Huh...some chance. A whole bunch of unruly kids came in and sat at tables either side of me.
They were getting up and down and knocking my table so that I had to hang on to my coffee for fear of wearing it.
The adult with them had little (no) control.
I tried to sit there for a bit ignoring them but it became impossible. This was not a relaxing experience at all. So, I had to move.
I then made my way to the bus stop for the journey home and sat on the bench.
There I was joined by two women.
The younger of the two asked me if I would mind if she squeezed in the middle. She explained that she was on the big side.
She then told me all about the other lady...."This is my aunt", she smiled, allowing the sun the glint off of her tooth.
Goodo thought I. She then asked me if I had seen the bus go by.
I refrained from remarking that as I was waiting at the bus stop, chances were that I was waiting for a bus and would not still be there had the poxy bus gone by.
No, not I. Polite to the point of ridiculousness, I just said no I hadn't seen it go by,
She tried several more times to engage me in conversation, mostly just to point out her aunt, of whom she seemed inordinately proud.
Maybe I was having a bad day but all this seemed to irritate me more than it used to.
Having said that........
We live in a corner house. This is a neighbour across from us....not Merv's side.
Ye gods, if he has to take out a pooper scooper, nay, two pooper scoopers that size, when he walks his dog then I consider his day worse than mine.
It must be like walking an elephant.
posted by Sue Banks @ 2:14 PM
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