MY WIFE insisted I was
crazy because she’d been
keeping an eye on the weath-
er reports for the British
Isles in anticipation of our
summer vacation, and it had
“been dry, dry, dry.

But as far as I was concerned
_- you could only count on one thing |
_for sure in Old Blighty, and that
was the inevitability of rain.
- Global warming be damned,
thought L.'It’s going to rain.
I lived in London for a year
. back in the ‘60s and returned from
the experience permanently
mildewed.
So this time, we were going to
“be prepared.
- |... packed rain jackets, rain pants
and rubber boots. My wife grum--

‘bled that it looked more like a sail-

‘ing voyage than a camping trip, but
1] gave her a knowing Boy Scout”
_Kind of look... :

You'll be glad Jater, q assured
her. I even brought along extra
‘blankets to keep us warm during °
what I fully:expected to be the
-chil!, damp nights camped on the .
heather of Scotland and in the
English Lake District, our main
.. destinations: :

I was not dismayed i in the least

; “when we staggered out of the air-
port in Glasgow, burdened with
/ enough gear to keep us alive ina
“rainforest for a month, only to be
greeted by blindingly blue. skics
“and confirmation of my wife's cal-

cs culation that it hadn‘t rained for |
eight weeks.

>. As our 17-day holiday proceed-
ed, the papers reported that no rain
“was expected until' probably mid-
September. About the only survival

“equipment it turned out we needed
...,was sunblock, sunglasses, sandals,
“shorts, T-shirts, insect repellent,

and bottles of spring water.

~.. The nights were so hot we slept :
with the sleeping bags open. I'm:
not complaining, you understand,
Apart from the smug look on
s my beloved one’s face, it was no’
-- great horror to have absolutely.
“wonderful, almost tropical weather.
‘Although nagging at the back of -
omy mind, much as E tried to ignore
it, was the feeling that something
“was terribly amiss.

. As in Canada, I noticed while ,

: ‘scanning the pages of the papers. :

the mass media in Great Britain are. 'f
: still almost entirely in a state of flat

denial about the reality of global
warming:
“Galy, on our Ia day in the
sweltering heat of London did I

find one mass circulation daily that,
“was willing to devote an entire

»” page to the subject. quoting scien-
tists who pointed out the record-
- breaking drought gripping the isles
perfectly matched the profile drawn
by computer models which have
“been predicting climate change for

’ nearly a decade now, while policy- :

makers and the media have kept

> their heads in the sand, much to the.

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personal

delight of the oif and gas industry.

The British heat-wave, inciden-
tally, was taking its toll on more
than just sweat-stained lorry drivers
and commuters jammed into the
London Underground.

Hedgehogs, for instance, were
acting strangely, in one case break-
ing into a chicken coop in Louth
and attacking a full-grown hen.

The ground had been baked so
hard that the poor hedgehogs,
weakened by dehydration, didn’t
have the strength to dig their way
through to the slugs, snails and
beetles they normally munch on:

Hedgehogs weren't the only
mammals suffering.

Dogs and cats were being
attacked by an exploding flea popu-
lation. which had survived the pre-
vious mild winter without the usual
die-off, and were now. swarming
over virtually any domestic animal
they could, find.

According to The Independent
newspaper, “this year has seen the
rise of the mutant animal. On the
coast. there are giant jellyfish, and.

eat

“jaland, swarms of ladybirds and

wasps are plaguing householders.
Government wildlife advisers warn
of a ‘giant killer frog epidemic.’ *
Well, | didn’t see any giant
killer frogs, but there can be no
doubt about the wasp problem,
Chemists were reported to be
running out of wasp sting remedies
because of the enormous increase
in the number of gardeners and hol-
iday-makers who ure being stung.
The worker wasps normally feed
on a sugary solution secreted by
larvae in their nest, and because of
the heat the larvae hatched early
this year, leaving the hungry work-

_ ers (0 go look for food elsewhere,

putting them on collision courses
with people.

And people, of course. were
responding to the changing climate
in-their own peculiar fashion. :

By the time our holiday was:
over in mid-August, water rationing
had been imposed on some 18 mil-
tion people, about a third of
Britain's population.

One woman in Bramptonshire.
became so ticked off with her > ;
parched lawn that she painted it”
green.

She wasn’t entirely daft.

It was a protest against the huge

‘raises the privatized British water

companies’ bosses have been giv-
ing themselves, and the equally
huge profiis that have been passed
along to shareholders in recent

years, even though fully one-quar-

ter of the.treated water pumped into * §

the mains is being lost due to leak-

_age in old pipes which haven't been

repaired i in decades,

‘The climate may be changing.
but the British are obviously sui
the British.

rae
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Sunday, September 17, 1995 ~ North Shore News -?

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