Dear The Rest of the World
Hello. My name is Becky. I live in England.
Someone’s got to.
I am writing on behalf of my country. This is not a begging letter as such; it’s more of polite request from one nation to another at a time of crisis.
You see, we in England – you know, that poor sod of a country that looks like a toddler has been sick on the world – have just been informed by our Weather Lords (otherwise known as the Met Office) that we, to put it bluntly, can shove our summers up our flabby English arses.
Apparently, due to the fact that the Atlantic is going through a ‘warm spell’, we are going to get rained on. For a decade. Possibly two. One of our wonderful newspapers – ironically called The Sun (oh, such vicious irony) – reports it here.
Now, clearly we are not thrilled by this news. We love summer. We haven’t had a proper one since 2006. There are 5, 6, 7 year-olds in this country who don’t know what summer is. In fact, if we were to suddenly have a summer, it may cause them psychological damage.
To understand our plight, here are some useful statistics:
- English families own an average of 49.6 umbrellas per household.
- More English people die on the one sunny day of the year in the stampede for BBQ coals and sausages than in the rest of the 364 days of the year put together.
- In England, yearly sales of an expensive perfume made from scrapings of goat’s bladder and guinea pig mucus are higher than sales of sun cream.
- The average 6 year-old thinks a ‘bucket and spade’ is the name of a level on Mario Kart.
- The average English person cannot watch an episode of Baywatch without crying. Not at David Hasselhoff’s beauty, but at the weather.
(Statistics provided by beckymakesupstatistics.com.)
But we are a nation of triers. We stoically stand around in mud at our music festivals (curative trench foot measures really have improved). We like to keep our gardens looking nice even though we can only spend three days a year sitting in them. We love a BBQ. Boy, we just love a BBQ.
But you know what?
It’s rubbish.
We have lived in a damp, dark cave for too long. And it’s only going to get worse.
So please. This is a plea to the rest of the world to HELP US. For the love of God.
HELP US.
Australia: you have heaps of sun. I mean, do you really need it all? Don’t you get tired of it? Constantly feeling sweaty, always having to take cool-down showers? It must be really, really irritating. And you don’t even have enough people to appreciate it! 23 million people! In a country 31 times the size of England.
Come on. Does that sound fair? I’m sure all that dirt and rock is really making the best of your endlessly sunny days.
And Greece. Your weather is lovely. I was on your sunny shores just recently, and I got more Vitamin D in 10 days than I’ve had in the last 10 years. Yeah, I know you’re a bit strapped for cash at the moment, and things aren’t great, so why not ship over some of your sun to us! Think what you’d save on the air conditioning! The woolly jumper industry would go through the roof!
Our chums in America. Or buddies, if you will. Hi there. You remember us. We’re like you’re cute little sister who keeps falling over and hurting her knee. You like us. Will you help us out? I know you’ve got loads of sun because I’ve been to lots of your states. It took me a mere 20 minutes to get sunstroke in Death Valley. Is that necessary? Can’t you turn the heat down a bit? Give us a few degrees? And what about Utah? I saw nothing but blue skies in Utah, and there is a lot of empty space in that state. Florida? Fed up with us pasty English folk descending on you every month of the year and eating all your doughnuts and talking loudly about how nice the weather is in the queues at Disneyworld? Well give us some sun to take home with us and we’ll stay in our country a bit more and won’t bother you.
I don’t know how you’re going to do it. I don’t know which airline offers the best rates on transporting sun. I don’t know whether you can take it as hand luggage or whether you’d have to check it in. I just don’t know. I’m just asking you to help us. Please. Send us some sun. Don’t keep it all to yourselves. Share and share alike.
And as I wrote that sentence, the sun came out. Whoever sent that over: THANK YOU.
It’s gone back in again. STOP PLAYING MIND GAMES WITH US. WE ARE FRAGILE AND PRONE TO WEATHER-INDUCED HYSTERIA.
Thank you for listening
Kind regards
Becky (on behalf of England) xx
BECKY SAYS THINGS 
Sorry. We wanted our sun back after 7 straight months of winter in Minnesota. Would you like a couple of mosquitoes?
We have 7 straight months of winter as well. And we just have pigeons. But they don’t care whether it’s summer or winter. They’ll still shit on your head. So no, we’re okay for mosquitoes thanks. I hope you emerge from your winter soon. Godspeed.
There are many parts of the US of A that can and should accommodate our friends in the Mother Country. I mean, all of the southwest United States is A DESERT. I’d gladly oblige you by sharing some of our NYC hot, but it’s also really humid and disgusting, so I’m not sure that would be doing you any favors.
One of my fondest memories is a day out at the beach in Sussex, many years ago. It was July, and everyone was bundled up on the sand, drinking tea. It was a good day.
Meanwhile I hope you notice an uptick in traffic today—I mentioned your blog as one of the funniest ones I read, in today’s WordPress Daily Post:
http://dailypost.wordpress.com/2013/06/20/humor-bloggers/
Oh, Weebles, mate. You are a star from the Heavens. Thank you SO much for giving me a mention on the Daily Post. As a reward I shall not only not steal sunshine from you, but I shall spend 10 minutes worshipping you every day before bed. This will take the form of a small interpretive dance, some humming, and maybe some cake, but I haven’t decided on that bit yet. THANK YOU 🙂
I’ll need to see a YouTube video of the interpretive dance bit.
I’m not sure YouTube would moderate it.
OMG! I laughed, I cried, I snorted coffee out my nose. I will see about giving you some of our 90 F degree heat coming this weekend. I have relatives who work at FedEx. WE CAN DO THIS!
90 DEGREE???? Look at our weather forecast for the weekend. JUST LOOK AT IT: http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather.
If your relatives can get on the case I would be tremendously grateful, as would the other 63 million people who live here.
Thank you for reading 🙂
Hahaha! It was 113 last weekend. As soon as I can find a Deloreon (sp?) I will go back in time & send you that. Until then, you know, Keep Calm and Try Not to Mildew.
113???? Oh, that’s just silly. You can lend us AT LEAST 20 degrees. On second thoughts, don’t. We’ll just complain about it. There was a postcard going round on Facebook a few weeks ago that said ‘Anyone who complains about it being ‘too hot’ this summer is going to get a PUNCH IN THE FACE’.
P.S. ‘Keep Calm and Try Not to Mildew’ needs to be made into a t-shirt. I’d buy it. Hell, I’d buy two.
Genius. That is all.
Thank you. That is all.
🙂
I’m not there just now, but oh how I hear you! Brilliant, made me laugh out loud at my desk, whoops! 🙂
Good. Laughing out loud at desks is what makes the world go round. 🙂
So funny. I would like to use my garden. Hope it works!
I would just like to go outside and not get blown up a tree or have a tonne of water chucked over me. Not much to ask is it?
Thanks for reading 🙂
On the plus side we look younger than we are as we don’t get so many sun induced wrinkles. However, we’re all going to get rickets instead. I think I prefer the wrinkles….
Definitely prefer wrinkles. I ain’t got no time for no rickets.
Not that you’d know anything about wrinkles yet Becky 😉
Trench foot…brilliant. Being born and raised in Southern California, this makes me really sad…sending some sun your way!
THANK YOU!! And it’s working, because, in an unprecedented miracle, THE SUN IS OUT!!
I would gladly send you some prime, grade-A, Texas sun…but you’ll have to take the humidity and mosquitoes, too.
I’m afraid this is going to be me during my first winter spend in the North Eastern United States this year…
Texas sun would be amazing. But try and keep the mosquitoes. They’re evil and foul and we don’t like them. So please keep them. Thanks.
Well, if I must. But please send some scones and tea sandwiches if we must keep the pests.
But of course! We’d gladly send some scones over to you! Would you like some fruit cake and a spot of Battenburg as well? (Don’t take the Battenburg, it’s disgusting.)
I think just the scones…and some jam. I’d ask for clotted cream, but I doubt it travels well.
The jam goes without saying. But you’ll have to source your own clotted cream. I dread to think the state it’d be in by the time it reached you. It would look like cottage cheese.
Perhaps a tea cozy instead?
OBVIOUSLY! How are you supposed to keep your tea warm without one?
Apparently we just use the heat rising from the baked ground in Texas. Barbaric, I know.
Well, that’s because you live somewhere HOT. We have to make very thick hats for our tea because our country is so FRIKKIN cold.
I actually had to look up what a tea cozy looks like since I picture one on Dobby the House Elf more easily than on a pot of tea. I’m moving to Boston, where a tea cozy might come in handy for my tea and possibly MY head.
fantastic, Becky. For sure I’d send you sun IF I COULD. I would because I’m nice like that and want others to be happy. Your statistics (that were awesome) do show a dire need for sunshine.
All I can do though is offer (virtual) food. When it’s cold and drizzly, you can keep drinking those British teas. Alongside Mrs. whoever’s lamingtons. (damn those looked good) And making chocolate chip cookies is totally a rainy day activity. Coffee with a shot or two of a favorite booze is nice, too. With whipped cream on top. And you know I can offer all manner of banana breads, fresh from the oven.
Really, your best bet is probably to just keep traveling. And drawing pictures of Stickman and writing brilliant posts.
Here’s an irony–sun was out when I started reading your post (from my living room in Minnesota) and now that I finish, there’s a crack of thunder and promise of rain. ha!
Lamingtons are amazing. I strongly recommend you bake them almost immediately – http://allrecipes.co.uk/recipe/4673/lamingtons.aspx
I am making a chocolate cake tomorrow so that will give me something lovely to do when it’s pissing it down outside, as it promises.
Sorry I made the rain happen in Minnesota – by another stroke of irony, as soon as I posted, the sun came out here! WEIRD!!
Greetings from hot, HUMID, sunny Florida, Becky,
As the sole representative from the entire State, I have a proposition for you that we may both find mutually beneficial.
It is simple, really.
Why don’t we take both of our weather conditions, add in the extremes, especially our hurricanes and your 80 months of winter, and come up with an “average.” The resulting weather may not be as “interesting,” but I think we will both be much happier with the results.
Let me know. Quickly. I’m melting.
Your friend, in HUMID Florida,
Michelle
P.S. Did I mention the HUMIDITY? It’s somewhere around 4000%. Some would describe it as “sultry.” I would seek cover in an air conditioned building – for the next seven months.
I’m down with that. Hopefully, the ‘average’ we come up with will just be a moderately calm, warm, slightly humid weather system in which we can all exist in peace and harmony. Or, if it goes wrong, cold, soggy, and bloody windy. It’s a risk we may not be willing to take.
I’ve been to Florida. I swear my knickers melted off.
Since we will control the weather, we can throw in a few dreary, stormy, humid or wintry days. Just to be “democratic.” Otherwise, the weather will be categorized as “delightful,” “glorious,” “beautiful,” and “perfect.” 🙂
I’m from Australia and you are correct – we have too much sun and don’t need it all.
I am personally happy to donate my share to your worthy cause.
THANK YOU! I’d really appreciate that. And please do it quickly because this weekend it is going to RAIN. CONST.ANT.LY.
Thanks for reading 🙂
Becky, really? So whenever I watch Peter Fry in “Kingdom” and marvel at how it’s always sunny and bright in Marketshipborough (sp?), you’re all just having me on? Imagine!
That being said, you probably don’t want to hear it’s been lovely here in Atlantic Canada this week, and I’m just heading out to the deck to BBQ some sausages.
In any case, glad you’re making progress on the trench foot front. I guess that’s a start…
And, of course, that would actually be Stephen Fry playing Peter Kingdom (NOT Peter Fry). Art imitating life? Sorry for the confusion. (Though perhaps I was the only one who was confused in the first place.) That’s what I get for teasing you about my BBQ!
Yep, I’m afraid that those sunny days in ‘Kingdom’ are a myth. Except that they’re not. It’s filmed in Norfolk, and I went to university in Norfolk, and I REMEMBER bright sunny days. Not a lot of them, but I REMEMBER the sun. I’m starting to doubt my own sanity. Has my whole life been a lie? See what this grey weather is doing to us? I’ve just been outside – bearing in mind it is nearly July – and I had to wear my scarf. My SCARF, I tell you. The only thing that would cheer me up right now is a BBQ burger. 🙂
And here I was wishing it would be Fall again…
Oh, how I long for the day when I wish for Autumn!
Is swimming compulsory in schools yet? Haha! I can’t bloody go back to sleep now for laughing so much! Cheers mate! 😉
Oh hah bloody hah. It should be compulsory, as we seem to do more of that than actual walking.
Glad I made you laugh, sorry I disturbed your sleep! Thanks for reading 🙂
Coming home in September. To Norwich for holiday. Two weeks worth of playing in the sand dunes/marshes with other sand dune/marsh people. I have been warned: long-johns would not only be chic…but necessary. Mine are packed but I’ll get you a pair for your very own. Just so you know: sunshine is so over rated…..
I went to university in Norwich! And yes, long-johns definitely required. And anoraks. And Wellies. Just bring a large sheet of tarpaulin to be on the safe side.
I will gladly send some of our 85f and up days this summer. In return, I’d like some proper fish and chips, scotch whisky, boddington, and, well, just send whisky. I was over in Scotland recently, and they had one of the freakiest “nice” days they had seen in, well, ever. So. Maybe you could just bring me back over?
That’s a very fair deal. I’ll ship over a case of whiskey for just 5 degrees of your 85. PLEASE. PLEASE LET US DO THIS DEAL.
I’ll work on it!
It’s currently 5 degrees here in Melbourne, but it IS sunny. I’m not sure you’d appreciate cold sunshine though… And I’m not sure you’d really appreciate Australia’s summer sunshine – it has a tendency to come with ten year droughts that make half the nation spontaneously combust…
My younger brother is about to move to London for work and has a large shipping container to fill with stuff. I’ll ask him to add some sunshine to it for you!
Cold sunshine is absolutely fine! ANYTHING BUT THIS!!
And yes, please get your brother to bring over some sunshine – I would make sure he was knighted for his efforts.
Eff summer. I’d take winter all year long.
You know what, so would I. Because at least then the weather can be justifiably crap. This is not justifiable. This is heinous.
You shouldn’t have put your country on an island in the North Atlantic. Absolutely no foresight.
Yes yes yes, I KNOW. I have written a very strongly-worded letter to God expressing those sentiments exactly, but have had no reply. RUDE.
You’ve just explained why the Brits who come here end up looking like crispy critters after one or two days. They don’t know what that yellow ball in the sky is! I feel your summer pain, but then that’s why we moved here and although it’s wet season: http://www.accuweather.com/en/pa/pedasi/258531/weather-forecast/258531 Live vicariously. 🙂
Ah. You’ve got a lot of thunderstorms heading your way. Please don’t send us any of that. I fear it would tip us over the edge. And yes, Brits who go anywhere sunny end up looking like dried leaves.
Miss Becky, you poor lass. You can have barrels of California sun if you like!! Sending it right over!! We need some raindrops here. We’ve already had a heat wave and it wasn’t even summer when that happened. Feel for me, feel for me…somehow, I don’t think you are…poor Becky.
Oh I’m sorry, can you not feel my sympathy coming your way? No? Well that’s because there ISN’T ANY. We would sell our Royal Family for a heatwave. AND Colin Firth. That’s how much we want a heat wave.
I would take Colin Firth…hmm, anyway, Miss Becky, I just want you to know that it RAINED ALL DAY here in CALIFORNIA and that’s NOT supposed to happen. Umph…I’m blaming all this on you. I know you’re behind this…
The Western side of Canada echoes your plea… two inches of rain yesterday. Where’s summer and why has it forsaken us?
Ah, so The Weather hates you as well, does it? Well at least we’re lot alone. Maybe if we join forces we could burgle another country and steal their sunshine? I say we tell the South of France to look the other way, and while it is, we run off with all its sun. They’ll never know it’s us. IT’S THE PERFECT CRIME!!
This is HILARIOUS! I can offer some South African sun as long as you take it with a few illegal Nigerians immigrants.
We’ve got quite a few of those ourselves, so if it’s okay with you, we’ll just take the sunshine..?
Thanks for reading 🙂
Sorry then the deals off…;-)
Bugger.
Unfortunately San Diego has a little summer problem of it’s own called June Gloom. My daily ritual is to see if I can see Cowles (pronounced coals) Mountain, the highest point in San Diego) in the morning or not. It is usually covered in clouds from head to foot during June. Our winters are much sunnier, ring back then!
It’s in the diary, I’ll call back in November. If you don’t answer my call, I’m coming over. With an army.
I think Great Britain tried all that before. Now we welcome our best friends with open arms. Also check out Sea World, Legoland, and the happiest place on earth while you’re here! Have some Coca-cola and eat and Micky D’s too.
Great. Now all my roommates are pissed off, because I laughed them awake. It’s all your fault. I demand unhilarious posts about things I can’t relate to! Write about politicians I’ve never heard of and fusion bonded epoxy coating. Ugh, but you’ll probably manage to make that hilarious, too. D’uh. Go away.
I’m really sorry. Please pass on my apologies to your housemates. And do you know what, it’s funny you should mention fusion bonded epoxy coating, because that’s the very subject I was going to write my next post about! It was a toss-up between that and cathodic protection systems, but the old epoxy coatings won hands down.
right now it’s freezing and grey here in Oz. Canberra, the capital, that is. But as soon as the sun shows its little head, I’ll tell it to pop over your way (won’t you all be surprised in the middle of the night!).
Oh God I hadn’t thought of that. We’ll all be woken at 2am by sunshine blaring through our windows. And do you know what we’ll do? RUSH OUTSIDE AND GET THE BBQ ON, OF COURSE!!!
You can take all my sunshine away. I absolutely can’t stand the heat and the sun and actually look forward to winter. Maybe we need to switch places.
YES. PLEASE LET’S SWAP. PLEASE.
I’m really looking forward to summer this year, I hear its on a Thursday. Visit Ireland for the day sure!
u forgot India, honey! take as much heat n sun as u please dear! and pls pass on some cool..hehehehehe…loved ur article 🙂 ironically, i hav written about how v love d rains. If u wish to read, its at http://smitasalins.wordpress.com/2013/06/26/on-a-rainy-day/
Clearly you are barking mad – fabulous! You gave me a good giggle, thank you! I don’t mind mentioning I live in South Africa – it’s raining at the moment…..really!
Glad you giggled 🙂
And I don’t believe it’s raining in South Africa… I have a very good friend from Cape Town who informs me it’s ALWAYS hot and sunny…
horrid liar, she’ll have to be re-programmed – it’s bloody freezing here aaand yes, we even get snow!