Schools close as we get first taste of winter!

[Haliotis]

Who are the prime movers in being so quick to shut schools?  Surely it isn’t the kids - don’t they love snow in the same way as we did?  Is it the parents - too lazy to clear snow in order to use the car?  Or is it the teachers - always ready for a freebie and an extra lie-in?   Whimps!  I remember getting up to snowdrifts half way up the doors.  And no heated house to get up to.  Morning wash was done at the kitchen sink, with the gas stove on and its door open to get some warmth.  Then there was some snow clearing to do before you could get away from the house.   Snow ploughs overnight, accompanied by workmen hand-shovelling a grit and salt mixture on the main roads in town.  And it took at lot more then to stop public transport drivers. Then we were off to school as usual.  After all that, at the start of early evening, there were we kids playing in the snow.  And finally going home with the “hot-aches” and wet clothing which was hung on a clothes horse in front of the fire to dry, and we went to bed with a hot water bottle.  Sleeping ready to start it all over the next day.

Tell you what!  I wouldn’t swap my time for what today’s kids call a life!

[AndyN01]

Absolutely.

Remember - in the current culture, it's always someone else's fault and they can be sued for lots and lots of ££££'s. Even better if it's tax payer's money paying the "compensation" as that's a bottomless pit. So it's no surprise that "officials" act to stop stuff before it gets to that point.

IMHO it's all part and parcel of the compensation/WOKE/pathetic wimpy view where nothing and no one can be hurt or offended and everyone has rights and entitlements and can have anything, be anything and have everything handed to them on a plate with bells and whistles.

The result is a skewed realty and the paralysis of the functioning of the country and society in general.

 

 

[Mjolinor]

And on that note I firmly believe that the Italians should pay me thousands of pounds and give me an apology because the Romans stole my ancestors land and made slaves of them.

 

[ToyotaFanDriver]

But dont ever dare take them out on holiday during term time, thats a crime...

 

schools can shut as much as they want, scum will truant loads but if YOU take the child out its a big no no

[Rhymes with Paris]

The 1962-3 winter was a tad chilly.

I can remember the junior school having thick ice in the playground for weeks.

One lad from one of the colder countries (East European, his parents moved here like so many during and post war) brought ice skates in with him, and was very good on the ice.

Strange family though,his sister used to eat the crayons.

This of course was long before all kids go on skiing and winter sports trips to the Alps, and summer in the family villa in Tuscany, before having a "gap yah" and going to "uni", presumably to learn how to spell "year" and " university".

My grandmother, born in 1887, and ran a market garden on her own for years after becoming widowed, told me it was important to be both literate and numerate, and know how to knock a nail in straight.

 

 

[Yugguy1970]

Like I tell my daughter, it's not been cold in this country since 1976. 🤣

[Hadrian1]

59 minutes ago, Rhymes with Paris said:

The 1962-3 winter was a tad chilly.

I can remember the junior school having thick ice in the playground for weeks.

I remember it well, especially with the outside toilets our school had.

The big difference then was, most of the teachers lived close to the school,

as few of them had cars.  Nowadays they all drive to their schools, living some

distance away.

[Rhymes with Paris]

3 hours ago, Hadrian1 said:

I remember it well, especially with the outside toilets our school had.

The big difference then was, most of the teachers lived close to the school,

as few of them had cars.  Nowadays they all drive to their schools, living some

distance away.

Oh aye I had forgotten about the outside toilets, I must have been blocking it out from the trauma 😱❄️.

I bet you remember the one third of a pint bottles of milk too, with the tops popped off as they had all frozen stacked in the playground.

None of those poncy fridges to make it drinkable back then 😄.

The maths teacher was a strange old chap, he had just bought a new triumph herald, and droned on for hours about it, to seven year olds for goodness sake.

How it had "power" brakes, whatever they were supposed to be, early example of servo assist I'm guessing.

He also used to punish the boys with the wooden side of the board rubber on the hand, and the girls with the soft side and covered them with chalk dust.

Us boys found that placing the recently whacked hand onto the cool brass inkwells eased the pain a little.

[Primus1]

We used to gather around a 50 watt lightbulb during the winter, if it was really cold, my dad would switch it on..

[Haliotis]

Oh yes, the outside toilet.  In the freezing weather my dad used to put a paraffin hurricane lamp close to the pipe work, and wrap the tank with an old thick blanket.

As kids, we used to make winter warmers, which we carried around with us  - this consisted of a tin which was punched with lots of holes and had a wire handle about 2-1/2 feet long.  We would get a fire going in it, then fill it up with small pieces of coal.  It would be kept going by swinging it around and the draught would fan the coals to keep them alight.  Every so often you would hold your hands close to the tin to warm them.

[Rhymes with Paris]

1 hour ago, Primus1 said:

We used to gather around a 50 watt lightbulb during the winter, if it was really cold, my dad would switch it on..

You obviously had a very privileged upbringing.

We had to be alert to when grandma got a tube of trebor mints from the corner shop once a month.

We used to sit round in a semi circle warming our hands from the heat in her tongue.

[Rhymes with Paris]

10 minutes ago, Haliotis said:

Oh yes, the outside toilet.  In the freezing weather my dad used to put a paraffin hurricane lamp close to the pipe work, and wrap the tank with an old thick blanket.

Oh blimey Albert, I remember that too.

We lived in a big old Victorian terraced house on three floors.

There was an inside toilet, and separate bathroom with just a bath and wash hand basin in it.

But the outside toilet was in among the outhouses,coal house, wash house etc, attached to the main house, but separate doors.

Paraffin lamp nightly ritual to prevent the pipework to the cistern freezing 🥶.

[Cyker]

@FROSTYBALLS - Please for the love of crunchy nut cornflakes, if they start talking about how, when travelling to and from a place of education, it was snowing both ways up hill for 30 miles through shark-infested swamp tundra in paper socks and cardboard boots in a crocodile-filled tornado, please lock the thread before it gets out of control...! 

[Rhymes with Paris]

3 minutes ago, Cyker said:

@FROSTYBALLS - Please for the love of crunchy nut cornflakes, if they start talking about how, when travelling to and from a place of education, it was snowing both ways up hill for 30 miles through shark-infested swamp tundra in paper socks and cardboard boots in a crocodile-filled tornado, please lock the thread before it's too late... 

If anyone has told you they experienced this Cyker, frankly, they had it pretty easy.

[FROSTYBALLS]

27 minutes ago, Cyker said:

Please for the love of crunchy nut cornflakes, if they start talking about how, when travelling to and from a place of education, it was snowing both ways up hill for 30 miles through shark-infested swamp tundra in paper socks and cardboard boots in a crocodile-filled tornado, please lock the thread before it gets out of control

You've been to Mumbles then as well !!

[Primus1]

It was so cold once when I was a kid that I came in followed by a huge speech bubble, when it defrosted it went..ppffffffffttttt