Januaries over the past decade are the perfect illustration of the 'blandification' of the climate. Almost the same year in year out with an astonishing lack of variety. It's just unreal that the temperatures are coming in close to average year in year out yet there is almost no semblence of winter other than in 2010 and 2013. It is hard to distinguish one from another.

8 of the past 11 have come in with near average temperatures between 3.0C and 3.9C and as if that wasn't tedious enough an unbelievable 4 out of the past 7 have recorded the exact same value: 3.2C. Words fail me 

Here are the stats - a sleeping pill in table form 

Once again I am truly aghast at the complete lack of extremes and variety. What is the point of even recording weather when it is just the same predictable blandness all the time?

Those are rubbish snow reports for  place like Aberdeen.

I remember looking at the Daily Weather Reports in the 1970's and wondering what it was like in Aberdeen under the remarkable snowfall data coming from the airport (think it was Dyce?).

Any northerly wind would blast Aberdeen in blizzards while I sat under cold sunshine in Birmingham, now Aberdeen  joins the rest of the UK in winter borefests.

Does anyone remember what the code below would mean?

sosossfs ksksksoss

Them were the days.

Andy

And right on cue, the disappointment arrives!

Thursday 31st - rain and sleet (most of the models were completely wrong).

What an utter steaming pile of crap. At least next week when the milder air hits there won't be any risk of disappointment as you know there won't be any snow around - it's always worse when others get it and not you, especially when it's been forecast!

So now you’re complaining that the climate has been too normal?   

Nice, at least you've seen settling snow. Fancy swapping for a load of rain instead?

Haha, well when I say a slushy dusting. That’s on the shed roofs. I can still see most of the grass and certainly nothing on pavements. 

I suppose in some respect this risk was showing on the output. None the less I was hoping for something.

METO app has five heavy snow symbols for the next five hours. Ain’t happening lol

Lesson learned - when all the models aside from a minor one (ICON) are showing snow on the ground, go for the one that doesn't.

(I've arrived at work now, albeit I don't start for a while. The MetO page shows heavy snow here in Sittingbourne, but of course it was chucking it down with rain when I arrived. Now it's just overcast and dry!)

Not only do we have to put up with virtual winter this year, we've now had virtual radar as well

Also, one thing I have learnt from all this is the METO App is utterly useless.

Not sure what benefit it is of it shifting position almost every hour.

Had five double snowflakes for this morning from 05:00-10:00. Its now one. 

Similar story yesterday. Its awful and useless

Of course the real issue is that our weather can be unreliable and unpredictable and that’s just reflected in the app.

Nothing will ever give you an accurate forecast when everything is finely balanced.

Weather apps should be treated like SatNav: as a guide but use your own judgement.

It shouldn't be that difficult to get a proper snowstorm with widespread deep snow cover!

Yesterday was a complete fail as far as the West Midlands were concerned - we were originally the "sweet spot" even if the stuff did correct south, but the final correction south was massive and last minute.

As far as the long range forecasts and EC46 have been concerned this winter - utter horlicks.

ECM has fallen from grace this winter too, being as ridiculous as all the other models for our neck of the woods, even at short range.

Question - why did we get proper winters in the 1960s and 1980s, but find them so hard to achieve these days, even when the teleconnection boys are telling us that there is massive potential?

Well, I am sick of "potential" I want delivery! I want rubbish charts and to be buried in snow, instead of the reverse!

Thanks.

Good to see some snow in the places where all the moans usually come from but I seem to remember that some of these places in the Cotswolds got snow last year. The Met Office got it about right with their warnings but it was a massive disappointment for London, Kent, Easex and East Anglia who  didn't expect all this rain at such low temperatures. The high DP's did for us.

That's not quite true actually.

The EC46 had predicted this pattern for H2 Jan already from mid/late Dec. It didn't get it 100% right obviously, but it did get right the deep troughing to our south and the positive height anomalies in the Arctic and near Greenland.

I think sometimes people see moderate positive height anomalies there and they expect proper blocking highs.

Verification for Feb might be a different story though.

It got the forecast absolutely spot on for here - it forecast no snow,  and no snow is what we got.

That's not really correct. In the 80s many parts had some good spells across several - but not all - winters. But they were skewed towards easterly flows, so certain places (the SE/S/Mids) got the best conditions. And, of course, the memorable spells remain prominent in the memory.

We had a largely good run of wintry spells in the 2006-2013 period, but many of the spells had a better impact away from the SE/S/Mids.

Swings and roundabouts.

Anyway, moan time...

There's snow showers piling in off the North Sea and managing to get over the Pennines. 

But there's been a great big gap in the ppn throughout, covering Manchester and home.

Showers tracking a little bit further north now but nothing looks likely to reach me over here yet

* edit * Looking a bit DOA though as always