A Grumpy Old Man’s Tale 56 What You See is Never What You Get

How calt will it get? Who knows. I can’t even hazard a guess because I’ve got nowt to base one on. We’ve never hit minus thirty [-22℉] before anywhere in Britain in recorded history, though it’s said that during the winter of sixteen eighty-three going into eighty-four the ice on the Thames was a foot thick [305mm]. I’ve never manage to find even an estimate of how calt it was, but it’s reputed to be the most severe frost recorded in England. It always seemed daft to me to use the expression worst recorded when there’s not even an indication of how calt it was, how is that recorded? Come to that what was it they were recording? Maybe we’ll hit minus forty [-40℉] this time. I wouldn’t rule it out, but like I said I’ve never bin here afore. Think on, it’s not that long since for the first time recorded the temperature in the UK went over forty Celsius. Forty point three [104·54℉] it was at Coningsby in Lincolnshire on the nineteenth of July twenty twenty-two. So owt’s possible.

"Aren't you hot, lying in there?" I asked.

"Sure," he said. "But it's good practice... eventually I'll be living in Hell,
so this... this is a tender prelude."

Dot and Sam 44