Eat drink and be merry for tomorrow we dry

 

I didn’t drown taking this photograph on Tuesday, but I should have done.  In normal times the water would have been over my head at the point where I am standing.

It’s Startops reservoir at Marsworth.  The water ought to reach at least to the foot of the steps.

Every day on the Beeb for months it seems, we watch a band of rain sweeping in from the south west and every time it seems to fizzle out just as it reaches the midlands, leaving the east and south dry as a bone.  I got a letter from an old friend who lives in West Wales and they have had quite a wet year.  Quite a few people I have told about the water shortage seem surprised.  Well, here’s the evidence.When the new Canals and Rivers Trust takes over in April it looks like they are going to run smack into an emergency on day one.  Off hand I can’t think of much they can do about it.  Come on Rainman, now’s the time to earn your credentials. Get out there and walk up and down the canal a bit.

P.S. True story:  I once met a genuine hillbilly from the Appalachian mountains.  He told me they got their water pumped up from a deep well, sealed with a concrete cap. “A bit of a problem when we gets a power cut” he told me.  When I asked him how they coped he said “Well we just has to drink whiskey”.