V8Druid
do it as well as you can,but learn to do it better
absolutely bang on BobBack in 1982, when snow meant snow—proper, chest-high, lose-the-dog-and-the-Austin-Allegro snow—we didn’t panic. We didn’t refresh weather apps every 30 seconds waiting for a colour-coded warning to tell us how to feel. We simply looked out the window, muttered “bit nippy,” and got on with it.
Schools were open. Teachers arrived wrapped like Arctic explorers, children turned up soaked, frozen, and delighted. Trains? Yes, they stopped—but nobody expected an apology, compensation, or a counselling session. Cars still drove, largely because giving up wasn’t an option. Milkmen became local heroes, trudging through drifts like sherpas with pints instead of oxygen. Bread vanished from shops within minutes, not because of panic buying, but because half the street fancied toast after digging themselves out.
Fast-forward to today: one centimetre of snow and the nation collapses like a fainting goat. Schools shut “as a precaution,” councils issue 47 statements, and adults are advised not to leave the house without emotional support. Gritters are tracked like NASA missions. Someone on Facebook declares it “unprecedented,” despite photographic evidence from 1982 showing cars entirely swallowed by snowbanks.
Where did our gumption go? When did free will get replaced by a laminated risk assessment? We didn’t need a nanny state back then—just a shovel, a flask, and the quiet understanding that if you survived the walk to the shop, you’d earned your bread. Literally.
was living in Raglan back then and we had snow to the top of the doors and windows ... took me two days to dig the drive out by hand to get my SWB ser. iii out to the road to get to work in Aber. ... biggest issue was WTF to do with what you dug - only so much you could 'lob over the top' ....... there wasn't a lot moving for a week or more
'77 had been a bad one before that ... was in College in Redland, Bristol and living in Bishopston, 'bout 2+ miles away ... car was buried in 3 ft of snow in a side street for 3 or 4 weeks .. no one could get theirs out either, but we walked in and most ppl turned up daily for 'business as usual'