Strange Days

I never thought I'd find myself having a barbecue in February, at least not in Scotland. And yet, as of this afternoon, I have now done so.

On the one hand, the recent warm weather has been really nice - Scots tend to suffer, near-universally, from Vitamin D deficiencies; and the bright sunlight and warm weather just cheers everyone up.

On the other hand, this time last year we were house-bound due to being snowed in pretty thoroughly. And while I'm hesitant to immediately jump from the weather (which is transient) to climate change - if for no other reason than doing so gives succour to those who ask "what about global warming?" every time there's a cold snap - it is the case that average temperatures seem to go up year by year, the climate is most definitely changing, and that's a bad thing.

(On the wider topic of climate change, I still find myself in one of my very few agreements with George W. Bush - the solution to this is going to end up being technological. Either because we develop energy sources that are both greener and cheaper than those we're currently using; or because someone develops technologies that can directly counter some of the damage. If we're hoping instead to fix the issue with global changes of behaviour, I'm afraid I have bad news... people are just the worst.)

Anyway... the barbecue went well. I managed to get the amount of food estimated almost exactly, everyone had a good time, and the sun shone down on us. So that's a win, at least in my book.