Yet another disgusting weekend and this summer is now starting to feel as bad as 2007/12 in that it is becoming a real struggle to get up in the mornings.

Iron grey crap all weekend with the permacast setting up again. Yesterday was a joke with clear skies to the north all afternoon but zero sunshine here and today brings more horrific, depressing dross. Overcast and a putrid 11.8C at the moment. Another day of sub-arctic hell

This poor weekend weather is just beyond a joke. They have been constantly dire throughout 2014 and 2015 and just keep getting worse. Not one Sunday in this wretched month has managed more than 4 hours sun. In fact last Saturday was the only weekend day that did ,with 7.5 hours and a good proportion of that was evening. Truly one of the most dismal months for weekend weather on a par with June 2007 and July 2012.

This month also looks like failing to produce 2 consecutive dry days. Even the summer months of 2007 and 2012 never sunk this low. In fact last November, one of the wettest and dullest on record, is the only other month in my 10-year records not to manage 2 dry days in a row 

Not looking forward to August in the slightest. Don't think there has been a decent August after such a rotten June and July since 1938. 

Today and Friday have been the two days that stick in the memory as being very poor (rainy, overcast) since early June.  We've had a very good run of it here in SE Kent, close enough to France to get that continental influence for much of June and July.  The rain is desperately needed and is saving me having to use mains water to refill water butts and swimming pool.

The prognosis from me is that August will turn out to be good (dryish, fine,).  At the moment the 8/10 has slipped to 7/10 to reflect 2 poor days and what is to come Monday and Tuesday.  Beyond midweek I am optimistic of experiencing warm (ie 19C +) and sunny type weather.

Check out the anomaly maps for June 2015.  Daily max is interesting.

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/public/weather/climate-anomalies/#?tab=climateAnomalies    (cf 1961-1990)

This  map below  shows almost all of England and Wales sunnier than the LTA( cf 1981-2010)  in June 2015.  Perception is a very interesting thing....

That East Kent warmth anomoly is interesting Phil 

With regard to disappointing days this month I would add Sunday 5th July that delivered 20mm between 9am-2pm and the drizzle/hill fog fest on Sunday 12th July. 

My thoughts haven't changed since I posted half a month ago. We actually had a nice day yesterday. Coolish wind, but warm in the sun. Today's just a rainy write-off - and that's been the story of July, really: no sustained period of nice, settled weather.

The excellent summer on the south east coast continues with long periods of strong sun, warm winds and little rain.

July  (as was the case with June) warmer than the LTA locally but cooler for most:

Don't agree with the Met Office sunshine map for July which shows us with 90-110%. It was a dire month with only 134.9 hours which is 81% - nowhere near average. Only 2007 and 2012 have been worse in the 9 years I've had the sunshine recorder.

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/pub/data/weather/uk/climate/anomacts/2015/7/2015_7_Sunshine_Anomaly_1981-2010.gif

Looking (way) ahead, could the SST pattern that has troubled our summer bring any bounty this winter?

...maybe, but I also see the risk of west-based negative NAO setups at times which at best bring chilly NW winds.

Now for some technical words lifted from an American blog post comment:

"A very strong El Nino will actually cause the canonical & amplified Western Hemisphere standing Rossby wave train in an El Nino to shift eastward. An extremely extensive & very strong Pacific Jet that's associated with these powerful El Ninos causes the exit region of the Pacific Jet to also push unusually far to the east, thus leading to a dramatic southeastward displacement & amplification of the Aleutian Low into the Gulf of Alaska. Downstream, the +PNA ridge that's usually centered over the Rockies in an El Nino is now driven further to east towards the Hudson Bay & Maritime Canada, hence enticing the northern stream to buckle over Iceland (+NAO) instead of the eastern US."

I've no idea how reputable the person behind these words is, but it all seems very logical to me 

It's followed up with a composite for winters following significant El Nino events:

...which unsurprisingly looks very similar to the SST outlook.

That's all for now.

Pretty much sums up the summer so far on this side of the pond.

http://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/wind-rain-and-frost-met-eireann-confirms-one-of-the-worst-summers-ever-689709.html

Hi Tim, I can assure you that this summer is turning out really much better than "quite good".  If you like waking up to blue skies, getting pretty much uninterrupted sunshine without it getting overly hot then (apart from the 3 day wonder heat wave) this summer really is ticking my boxes.

It's now one month since the temperature here reached 20c, the average daily maximum in July and early August is 19.4c.

This illustrates just has poor high summer has been up north.

Added to the very cool weather of May and June we are now looking at the coldest summer for over 30 years unless things change drastically in mid-late August.

Looking at the MetO MRF this seems unlikely.

Andy

I won`t remember this summer for temperatures or rainfall, but for the wind. It seems to me to have been persistantly windy, usually from a cool NorthWesterly direction.

Even here in the South (Dorset) there has often been a nagging wind even early in the day. I like to go to the beach but this year I have not once been able to enjoy one of those calm breathtakingly beautiful mornings as you would get with the right kind of high pressure. It has been warm at times and we had a brief hot spell lasting a day or so but it is not a summer I would remember as a classic in the settled sense.

Nick

Overall pretty much darn near perfect after the foul hot spell in early July. Since then a lot of sun, warm but not hot, a cooling breeze often. A few days of rain but not a lot. Ideal summer weather for me.

Think things are finely poised as to how this summer terms out. June was OK, average ish, July cool and disappointing apart from the sensational high of 30.7c.
August is average summer weather so far, mostly dry with periods of sun and a few showers, average high,19.5c so far. If the rest of August is fair and the first half of September I would be  happy with the summer.

Just come back from a week away in the sun, with the weather I missed being crappy here I'm told, but today's lovely - sunny & warmish.

FFS and you are less than 100 miles away.

The MetO did say that most places would be warm and sunny today apart from the far north of England and SE Scotland, got that one right then.

Andy

It's clouded over a little this afternoon, but been mostly sunny - enough for it to be 'flying ant day'  The birds will be circling later for their feast