brrr and boom

So this last weekend it was bonfire night.

This year I didn't actually go to a display.  There were a couple of reasons for that.

Firstly I made a right mess of my timings, so I was running very late and so would have struggled to get to one in time.

The second reason is kinda related in that I'd had some sleep issues, waking up after only about 5 hours sleep on Saturday morning and so feeling really tired by Saturday evening.

The last was that it was stunningly cold.  I mean I've experienced colder weather, but it's not normally quite so sharp early in November.  I had thought the last couple of weeks in October had been a bit chilly, but this weekend the temperature really nose-dived.

As such, staying in actually seemed appealing.

It was a bit of a weird experience, though, because I could still hear the displays.  Where I live I'm basically in between Aldershot and Farnham, both of which hold quite big displays in parks that aren't too far away from me.

Now I don't know the exact start times, but I'm pretty sure both must have overlapped at the least, because you could have been mistaken for thinking world war three was happening - the cacophony of bangs between the two was quite extraordinary.

Speaking of the weather I believe it's going to get even colder next week, with temperatures down into the freezing zone.  I hope it's not a sign of another cold winter - I could really do with a mild one for a change, not least of all because it costs me a fortune.

My heating (well, the heating I have control of) is electric.  Now electric heating is not the most efficient anyway, but my flat is actually quite chilly & drafty anyway.  It also doesn't help that in the last few years the electric company have really ramped up the prices.  Why they privatised power I'll never know.

Anyway, there's also some heating I don't really have control of - there's basically a spur off my landlord heating and I have a radiator in my bedsit area.  This is really good when it's on - I can leave the door open and basically heat the whole flat - but when it's on is not in my control.

This leads to some weird situations where they turn the heating on but I don't need it (I can turn the radiator off) and I end up wondering why they've turned it on.  In particular, late at night, after the evening where they've not turned it on, suddenly the radiator will be blazingly hot.  And the opposite is true as well - I'm sat there chilly, having to turn my own radiator on, but there heating is apparently completely off.

It's a particular problem this time of year when it wobbles between just being a bit chilly and properly cold - it's a bit better in winter proper as they obviously need to have it on themselves.

The other annoying side to it is that I actually pay some money in my rent specifically to cover the heating, so when I'm shivering I can get a bit annoyed as it feels Iike I'm not getting what I'm paying for.