I think my age is making me more susceptible to feeling the cold because although temps peaked at 10c here today, it felt chilly when out walking the dog.

Now that another Xmas has passed without Dickensian conditions, I'm in that post-xmas lull where I'm not really that arsed about what goes on weather-wise. 

In fact, on the few frosts we've had this autumn/winter, I've found myself thinking 'there's something to be said for mild conditions'.

I don't mind the benign, calm, mild weather, but I am sick of the constant dampness and high humidity.  I think the ground and foliage outside have dried out only once or twice since the beginning of November when the dry autumn ended, and there are a few jobs that need to be done in the garden when it is dry enough.

I feel the same. The lack of snow hasn't bothered me much at all. In fact, I have hardly noticed the weather at all. It just blends into the background. If anything I actually appreciate the benign conditions.

Of course, I would appreciate a good snowfall as much as most on here, but for the time being the current conditions can persist. 

90s winters were far superior to anything we have got this century.

No 90s winter here was anywhere near as good as 2009/10, 2010/11 or even 2012/13. The 2010s have proved to be a much better decade for snow than either the 2000s or 1990s.

I was thinking more in terms of actual active weather! 

Oh, well in that case.. I don't really know.  Maybe. Thunder has definitely decreased over time. Not sure about windstorms. I'm only 31 myself so was just a child in the 90s.

This extreme mildness is just beyond a joke. We were long overdue for a cold and snowy second half of December and what do we get? A festive period that is on a par with 1988

Temperatures have been akin to a mild spell in late March. Each of the last five days has recorded a max between 9.5C and 12.1C and today makes it six in that range as it's already 9.7C. It hasn't dropped below 3C since Christmas morning which is just unreal. Even during late December 2015 we had several nights colder than that.

All we have had in terms of wintry weather are two frosty mornings and one of those was back on 31st October with the other on 5th December. I cannot ever remember anything this bad and indeed the stats show you would have to go all the way back to 1953 to find so little sign of winter prior to the New Year. Of course back then it occurred as part of a varied bag of weather whereas nowadays it's just part of the relentless 'blandification' of the climate.

2018 is another year I'm glad to see the back of. Utterly tedious bar the late Spring/early summer drought and an appalling year for snow even by post 2013 standards. 2nd worst after 2014 in fact and here are the shameful stats, bearing in mind a long term average should be about 40 days falling and 20 lying:

Snow days falling/ days lying:

2014: 7/0 

2015: 25/17 

2016: 24/9

2017: 29/18

2018: 23/9

The ridiculous snow drought which has now got to almost six years without a depth of 10cm shows no sign of abating 

I can go with some of the pessimism about December and especially now but don't agree about 2018 as a whole. It was an excellent surprise to get the cold blast late February early March with some "proper" snow and some drifting in the dry wind. It was followed by the second best summer in my living memory which is a lot of summers I can tell you! 

I fear this is shaping up to be one of those winters where we will see any cold promise slipping to our east and us having to watch Greece and the Eastern Med having a snow fest. I doubt there are many there who are climate change skeptics !

It's fascinating reading all about the teleconnections, some of which I understand and some of which I don't.

What strikes me year on year is the extraordinary set of factors that we apparently need to appear to come together in order to get cold snaps/spells. One fly in the ointment and it bursts the whole balloon it seems.

We must have been extremely lucky all those years ago. 

Spot fecking on Richarchabdn. 

Consider yourself relatively lucky though. The average minima here since Christmas day is 8.3c, which is over 6.0c above normal for the period, while the average maxima stands at 11.2c, which is akin to a figure normally seen in a typical April, and not a even a glimpse of sun for as long as I can remember. Must be well before Christmas sometime. 

I know that these threads wouldn't be quite the same without its famous richardabdn rants, but I think that he makes quite a good point here because there has been quite a few occasions during the last few nights where the temperatures wouldn't even have looked all that much out of place in the middle of summer, let alone in some time like April.

Furthermore if you take this year's hot summer out of the equation, there has been quite a few days during other recent summers where the maximum daytime times have been virtually only on a par with what we are getting just now in the middle of our so-called "winter".

So it’s almost a new year but will it bring new weather?  Winter frosts maybe?  Or no change from this mild greyness?  

I’ve made my usual prediction in the CET competition for January, a guess as always, but it’s a fun thread with friendly banter!  We’ve got it all on TWO really  A place for serious stuff, a place for showing off and having fun and this thread for sounding off!  Happy New Year to you all!

Don’t forget to have a go at predicting the January CET.  The thread is now open for all to have a go!  There’s a link in my signature!  

Just when I thought this stinking car crash of a season couldn't get any worse along comes this rancid anticyclonic gloom 

This truly has to be the least fulfilling place on earth for a weather enthusiast. It just hurtles from one pile of mind-numbing tedium to another.

Today is my last day off work and what a dismal pile of unseasonable rot it's been. It's been four weeks since I woke up to a frosty morning and for the past eight days it has not even fallen below 2C.

This is a ridiculously awful winter like nothing I have ever experienced. Even 2013/14 brought more signs of winter than this catastrophic horror show. I'm really starting to wonder if there will even be a single flake of snow falling all winter.