116F today and the air conditioner shat itself 
Time to cool down.
Cheers Hoppy

Send some of that agua to California too please...

Fair dinkum, Linda, I wish youse blokes would learn to talk proper. Yonks is a long time and paddocks is fields.

Is that more betterer?

Well you lot, I still haven't got my 9 degrees that you promised me.  I'm sitting here watching telly in 2 thick jumpers, a blanket over my legs, drinking hot chocolate, and the heating on full blast, . Thick frost most mornings and my car battery has died. Hell isn't always hot.

Maz, I can remember those days growing up as a kid in the
UK, but we only had a coal fire in the lounge which was
worse than useless, Jack Frost was all around the house.
This is all the temps I could Russell up 

Hoppy.

maz wrote on Jan 5^th, 2015 at 5:06pm:

Can't offer you 9 degrees of heat, Maz, but would 50 shades of grey warm things up for you?

I'm with you Barbara, I prefer this to the cold any day, it
has cooled down a bit, 94 degrees today 

G'day Colin,
I was watching your weather,and Adelaide as of late
knowing when I wake up to those easterlies it won't
be long before we get hit with those high temperatures.
It looks like South Australia is doing it tough with lots
of homes lost in the fires, thankfully no lives lost as of
yet. I would imagine it gets very humid there in Victoria
so a good downpour would be most welcome, in Perth
we are lucky in that respect its just a dry heat, but hotter
than hell, and burns your arms as if touched by a hot iron,
but thankfully it has cooled down 34c for a little respite
until the next front hits, and hoping it doesn't bring any
bush fires with it as we've had our fair share of lives lost
over the years.

Wishing you and yours a Happy New Year.
Hoppy.

Similarly it has dropped from its highs to a more manageable 27C (81F) which means that the humidity has also dropped off a bit. We've even got a forecast of some rain, which would be welcome (time to do a rain dance, although with my dancing it'd scare off the rain).

The good news for us, and the whole top end of Oz, is that the wet season is now officially under way. A little late, but it's here.

Mum lives in Babinda, just 60km south of me (a 2 can journey) and she got 4.23 metres of rain last year. That's 13 foot 10 in the old money, or around 166 inches.

It amuses me that places like London are depicted as continually wet and rainy yet it gets only 28 inches in a year. We get that much on a good day.

Our rainforests have come alive and are a blaze of colour, smells and sound. Flowers and fruits everywhere, birds nesting, and wildlife abundant. You can all but hear the gardens growing and it won't be long before the cows will have to climb onto their hind legs so they can see their way home over the grass.

We always worry for our southern friend at this time, specially with those fires, but it's a happy day in the north when you've got to open an umbrella so you can light the barbecue!

Cheers and beers,

Brian in paradise.

Good morning downunder
It's warmed up a bit here this morning. It was a beautiful day yesterday  - cold and crisp, but sunny. Today we're up to about 9c, but it's dull and windy with rain coming down in buckets.

I think the reason England (not just London) is depicted as continually wet is because we don't have wet and dry seasons like you. We have rain winter and summer alike, (more in winter of course), so it means you can never plan a trip or holiday or event without the threat of it being spoiled by the weather.

I don't know if the news reached you last year, but did you see how parts of south west England was completely flooded last year. The Somerset levels were particularly bad and peoples homes were under water, much like pictures I've seen of northern Queensland. Cars were just washed away and livestock was drowning in the fields. They had to send out the army to rescue people in boats, and even our own two lovelly princes turned up in their wellies to help with the rescue effort.Some people have still not been able to go back home.

I live right in the middle of the south coast and it wasn't too bad here, not too much rain and temps regularly reaching 28 - 30c. Very humid though and our homes are not air conditioned and I for one find the heat and humidity just as hard to cope with as the cold.

Still, now new year is over, we can say spring is coming. It's probably our nicest season as long as it doesn't rain too much. I love to see the world springing back to life after a cold winter.