Oh winter, where have you gone? This morning's forecast is the most depressing (as a cold fan) that I can imagine for this magical week between Christmas and New Year's Day...

Click for full size, screengrab from the Met Office site.

(And so far this winter - starting 1st Dec, of course, there has been one measly frost here. Whoopee!)

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BBC forecast last night talking about the chance of 17C over the coming days.

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Not a bad start to winter here in the Massif Central. Early December brought snowfall, particularly above 600 metres, but not exclusively. This was then followed by a glorious period of sunny days and cold frosty mornings. Some decent overnight lows of -7 to -9. Virtually no wind. Quite a bit of the snow persisted and in shady areas a permafrost built up over about 10 days of seriously cold nights. 

The run up to Christmas Day saw a rapid deterioration in the weather and now we are stuck for a least a week with rain, gloom and mild temperatures (7 to 10 degrees centigrade). It's pretty grim when it is this mild at this time of year, but at least we have alredy had snow and over 10 days of proper cold. New years day is forecast to be 16 degrees and full sun here...bonkers for January!

 

Here's some lying snow which fell about two weeks ago which we saw on a walk at about 850 metres asl on 20th December.

 

https://photos.app.goo.gl/xtF7EmzPVLyxUpSG7

 

 

Every year you think there can't be yet another rotten December with yet another putrid festive week of weather and all it does, in defiance of any reasonable expectation, is get worse and worse 

What an utterly revolting run of Decembers since 2013. It beggars belief. Complete lack of variety and variation. Year in year out of the same hideous mind-numbing rot. Only 2014 and 2017 provided anything like the normal amount of snow/frost. 

Almost all of them back-to-front with what little wintry weather there is coming at the start and the final week consisting of sickening, repugnant, frost-free, snowless dross on an annual basis when it should be one of the coldest weeks of the year 

2013, 2015 and 2019 were the worst festive periods, all being utterly vile, but 2021 is so far eclipsing them all with it's unrelenting rank, murky, sunless grey horror. Can't do anything I enjoy in my time off with this incessantly poor garbage 

Just bleak depressing unfestive Scrooge weather day in day out. The last 8 days had 4 hours of sun in total and today is another day of soul destroying grey filth with diabolical temperatures. Pretty much the entire time it's stuck between 2 and 6C with no concept of normal diurnal variation. 25mm of stinking cold rain since Wednesday evening 

It's a toss-up between this year and 2011 as to which produced the worst second half. Both years almost incessantly vile rubbish with barely anything acceptable. 2011 probably just shades it because of July but if just looking at the last 5 months then August to December 2021 has to be the most dismal and appalling without any near rivals 

When the hell are we going to get some sort of break from this ludicrous rubbish? 

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Rotten, putrid, revolting, hideous, mind-numbing rot, sickening, repugnant, murky, garbage, soul destroying grey filth, stinking vile rubbish mixed into the rank remains of a badger I ran over earlier, covers the range of bleak superlatives found in this part of Dorset today.

It must be bad up North when it's like that 24/365.

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Every year you think there can't be yet another rotten December with yet another putrid festive week of weather and all it does, in defiance of any reasonable expectation, is get worse and worse 

What an utterly revolting run of Decembers since 2013. It beggars belief. Complete lack of variety and variation. Year in year out of the same hideous mind-numbing rot. Only 2014 and 2017 provided anything like the normal amount of snow/frost. 

Almost all of them back-to-front with what little wintry weather there is coming at the start and the final week consisting of sickening, repugnant, frost-free, snowless dross on an annual basis when it should be one of the coldest weeks of the year 

2013, 2015 and 2019 were the worst festive periods, all being utterly vile, but 2021 is so far eclipsing them all with it's unrelenting rank, murky, sunless grey horror. Can't do anything I enjoy in my time off with this incessantly poor garbage 

Just bleak depressing unfestive Scrooge weather day in day out. The last 8 days had 4 hours of sun in total and today is another day of soul destroying grey filth with diabolical temperatures. Pretty much the entire time it's stuck between 2 and 6C with no concept of normal diurnal variation. 25mm of stinking cold rain since Wednesday evening 

It's a toss-up between this year and 2011 as to which produced the worst second half. Both years almost incessantly vile rubbish with barely anything acceptable. 2011 probably just shades it because of July but if just looking at the last 5 months then August to December 2021 has to be the most dismal and appalling without any near rivals 

When the hell are we going to get some sort of break from this ludicrous rubbish? 

 

Is yours a spoof account Richard? You are soooo angry all the time? I can't work out if you are really that angry and unhappy with the weather or if your posts are done for the entertainment of others on TWO? Have you ever thought of moving? Just a thought?

A very forgettable month overall, to be honest. Lots of grey nothingness and not much else is how I'd summarise it. I can't say down the line I'll ever really remember it, unless the end of this week records some exceptionally mild temperatures.

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I find myself day dreaming into a Walter Mitty world of how I would like the weather to be if I had the chance.

A kind of Jan 87 blended with the Beast of 2018 but lasting 2 weeks.

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A change in the weather here. Gone from easterly cloudy, drizzly and miserable to westerly cloudy, drizzly and miserable. Just two hours of sunshine in the last 18 days and 16 sunless days !!!! If you call a sunny day one with more than 50% sunshine there have been just 4 in the last month.

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This is the worst 2nd half of December I have ever experienced without a doubt. Just wrist-slittingly awful day in day out. Completely devoid of festive cheer 

Even 2002 was leagues above this utterly catastrophic garbage due to the three day frosty spell. Can't even get anything like that now. Can't even get one frosty morning.

Sick to death of reading about heavy snowfalls in the Pacific North West, California, Nevada, Japan when all this repulsive little island gets is smothered by a sickening grey blanket day after mind-numbing day 

After yet another horrifically dull and gloomy day yesterday the muck shifted after sunset to give clear skies and the temperature dropped to -1C but what do I wake up to this morning? Sunshine and sparkling frost? Of course not. The wind is coming from the SE yet again meaning yet another day of dismal, dark, grey stinking rot scraped from the bowels of hell 

This godawful month has already recorded the lowest weekend sunshine average of any since my records began 15 years ago and now it looks like recording the most sunless Christmas Week as well. This following on from months of dismal grey depressing weekends like nothing I have ever had to endure in my lifetime 

I'm struggling to remember the last decent sunny day here when I wasn't working. Must have been September just after I returned from my holiday 

Winter has never been my favourite season but there were always seasonable days to enjoy but not any more. I despise every minute of it. A worthless and torturous ordeal of a season 

I've never thought of going abroad over Christmas but  I'd rather be in the Caribbean enjoying unseasonable warmth and sun than enduring the unseasonable grot that has completely ruined the festive period since 2011 

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Is yours a spoof account Richard? You are soooo angry all the time? I can't work out if you are really that angry and unhappy with the weather or if your posts are done for the entertainment of others on TWO? Have you ever thought of moving? Just a thought?

He's been at this for years now. He used to be quite funny but now it's just boring. Goodess knows what he gets out of it.

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Is yours a spoof account Richard? You are soooo angry all the time? I can't work out if you are really that angry and unhappy with the weather or if your posts are done for the entertainment of others on TWO? Have you ever thought of moving? Just a thought?

Surely no spoof. Just doing the "winter moaning thread" complete justice !

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I’m sick of this warmth. It’s beyond disgusting. What’s worse is I’ve barely seen the sun for weeks.

No significant cold in the forecast either.

We have the worst climate in the world. It really is awful.

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It was a lovely mild and quite sunny day here today. Perfect winter walking weather.

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I have decided I prefer mild, or even very mild weather, to cold but not quite cold enough to snow weather.

There’s my glass half full perspective. 😂😂

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This isn't a dig at any seasonal forecast but I will never ever get sucked into by a seasonal forecast that is favouring cold.

It just shows how difficult our weather is to get right , Even the Met were forecasting Easterly winds and below average temps and look what happened to that.

BUT in saying that we still have Jan , Feb and March to turn our fortunes around.

so far 0/10 for me ..............................I'm still looking back at November and thinking about that sludge and muck 

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This isn't a dig at any seasonal forecast but I will never ever get sucked into by a seasonal forecast that is favouring cold.

It just shows how difficult our weather is to get right , Even the Met were forecasting Easterly winds and below average temps and look what happened to that.

BUT in saying that we still have Jan , Feb and March to turn our fortunes around.

so far 0/10 for me ..............................I'm still looking back at November and thinking about that sludge and muck 

It did look promising with the MJO in a helpful phase, Easterly based QBO (which statistically leads to colder conditions and very rare if ever warmer than average winters(as tweeted by Marco P)), the ECM 46 day showed northern blocking and traditional medium range model output all looked good.  Then something went wrong , the ECM 46 flipped along with all the medium range models.  So yes I agree it's fickle and things can change so quickly...both ways . 

 

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I’m sick of this warmth. It’s beyond disgusting. What’s worse is I’ve barely seen the sun for weeks.

 

 

I don't mind (in fact I quite like) grey and dank in December - as long as it's cold with it.

 

Like you say, this mild crap is horrible.

 

 

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I don't mind (in fact I quite like) grey and dank in December - as long as it's cold with it.

 

Like you say, this mild crap is horrible.

 

 

You make a great point actually, slate grey and freezing cold is actually lovely in December. 

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It did look promising with the MJO in a helpful phase, Easterly based QBO (which statistically leads to colder conditions and very rare if ever warmer than average winters(as tweeted by Marco P)), the ECM 46 day showed northern blocking and traditional medium range model output all looked good.  Then something went wrong , the ECM 46 flipped along with all the medium range models.  So yes I agree it's fickle and things can change so quickly...both ways . 

 

Yes and La Nina favouring colder winters esp earlier on not to mention the rapid increase In siberian snow-cover as well as Arctic sea ice. Also we have had a rapid cooling of the SSTs in the NE Pacific. Yet we still get exceptionally mild weather and this isn't a one or two day affair it's 2 or so  weeks of above average temperatures which could be potentially record breaking. 

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