It's A Bit Chilly Here.

 as low as 7° C some nights recently. Yes, I can hear the snorts of laughter from those of you in colder climes. I know by your standards this isn't all that cold but for Perth, Western Australia, it's exceptionally nippy for this time of the year. It's supposedly still autumn - a time when things start to cool down and we have some rain but not usually such low temperatures. 

The thing is the cooling down isn't usually so early or so dramatic and we're not set up for it yet. Well, truth be told, we never are quite ready for it. Winter always seems to catch Perth folk a bit by surprise. It's probably down to the fact that we have pleasantly warm temperatures for most of the year. That said, while average maximum temperatures are mostly low thirties in summer, we do get heatwave spikes of 38-39° C not infrequently these days so not always so pleasant. Then winter arrives and we're suddenly forced into digging out woolies, track pants and boots - and in my case fingerless gloves so I can type - plus change over from lightweight summer blankets to winter ready quilts and doonas. 

It's not as if we don't know this is going to happen at some point but when the maximum day time temperature was 30° C only a week ago a drop to an overnight low to around 7 or 8° C is a bit of a shock to the system. We've actually had the heater on in the evening, something I can't remember ever doing before earlier than mid June.

Then just when things had got a little warmer - the overnight temperatures having reached the teens - last night we had a succession of storms - lightning and thunder that made the house shake as well as heavy rain - the last has continued all morning. Sigh. I don't think we can delude ourselves any longer. Winter is here albeit a little early.

Winter

We're well into autumn here now because in the temperate areas of Australia we use the European pattern of four seasons. That means winter starts at the beginning of June which in turn means it's only a few weeks away. You wouldn't have thought it from the weather until the last couple of days. It's been glorious - sunny days with temperatures averaging in the low to mid twenties and nights ranging from around 10-16C and it usually continues on like this for all of May. As a result it has been quite dry as well with the garden needing to be watered.

But there's been a change - and a very sudden one. On Sunday we were deluged with blessed rain - and, almost magically it seemed, the garden changed. Now everything is fresh again. The leaves look greener than they've been for months and, once the flowers had shaken the rain off their petals, they were reinvigorated. These are just a few of my pot plants.

As if that wasn't enough, it was followed by a plunge in temperature with the nights dropping to 4C and even lower in the hills area behind the city. The shock to our systems! Wardrobes were raided for warm clothes, winter quilts replaced summer blankets and heating was turned on for the first time. Pisces and I scurried around closing air conditioner vents (we have an evaporative system with vents linked to a roof top unit so cold air can seep in) and dusted off the gas wall furnace. It's warmed a little since then but we've been reminded that winter is close and that we need to prepare. At the shops this morning I stood behind a woman at a department store checkout. She was loaded up with an armful of winter pyjamas and thick bed socks. I'm a little better organised but I will still need to fill a few gaps in my winter wardrobe. 

Those who live in colder places might think we're being a little precious but relativity is important. Our summer temperatures of high thirties and low forties mean that when the temperature dips this low, even in mid winter, we tend to be somewhat surprised. Even then it's a fairly rare occurrence, so you can see why we react as we do.