Actually, I don’t remember much about the weather in November. This is mainly because I was glued to my computer writing my novel. Yes, I know you’re fed up with hearing about it and so is the SF, who had to live through it all, so I won’t mention it anymore. But for all I knew, it could have been a sweltering heatwave or the new ice age outside. In the event, it wasn’t either of those.
Carols
Before going on to the weather, let me plug our two forthcoming carol services for those of you who live in, or are visiting, the region. The choeur de Parisot, of which the SF and I are both members, will be singing Christmas carols in English, French, Latin and Dutch (!) under the direction of Peter Nowfel as follows:
- Sunday 9th December at the church of Saint-Etienne, Cajarc (Lot) at 16h00.
- Sunday 16th December at the church of Saint-Andéol, Parisot (Tarn-et-Garonne) at 17h00 (note the later time), followed by mulled wine and eats at the salle des fêtes.
There will also be readings of nine lessons. Number 5 is the one to look out for – I’ll be reading that one in French – where the shepherds visit the baby Jesus in Bethlehem. Better get practising, then.
Weather
Every month I post an update on how the weather has been in our corner of southwest France, based on the statistics we have kept since 1998. To see the other weather posts, please click on ‘Weather’ under the Topics tab in the right-hand sidebar.
Weather assessment for November
A quick reminder of our subjective weather assessment: we assign each day a plus if it’s fine, a minus if it’s bad and a zero if it’s indifferent or we can’t decide. In November, there were:
Pluses – 9
Zeros – 10
Minuses – 11
The graph shows the percentage of plus days each November for the past 15 years (the line is the trend). This was a pretty average November in terms of pluses. We’ve had 6 worse, 7 better and one the same.
Rainfall
Our rainfall stats go back to August 2004. The volume rainfall in November was a bit less than average at 62.5 mm compared with 69.1 mm but it rained on 10 days and the average is 10.2 days.
Winter is the time when it should rain a lot to fill up the aquifers. Ironically, if you look at the chart below, you’ll see that it has rained less than average in the winter months and more than average in the spring and summer. Overall we have had about 88% of the average annual rainfall so far (673 mm as opposed to 763 mm). So there’s a bit to catch up.
Frost nights
We had 4 frost nights, which is a bit less than the November average.
December has started cold, grey and damp. It’s forecast to get brighter but much colder. I must say, I prefer that, provided it doesn’t snow since we always get snowed in here. Here’s a dicton (saying) about December:
Décembre trop beau, été dans l’eau – If December’s too fine, summer will be wet.
Copyright © 2012 Life on La Lune, all rights reserved
Life on La Lune 
Dutch, Latin! Surely Swedish as well. Get the SF onto this for next year!! I’ve just come back from working in Saudi where it was 27 degrees so the -3 in UK is a shock!
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I don’t think they have a tradition of Christmas carols in Sweden, being a rather rigid Lutheran church. However, no reason why he couldn’t translate a verse or two of Silent Night, or another suitable candidate, into Swedish.
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Your weather report almost makes me look forward to a 40C day!! Enjoy the Carols and your Christmas 🙂
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I wouldn’t mind a 40 degrees C day right now. It’s grey with the occasional flurry of snow and 1 degree C! And this is the south of France…
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I so much wish I could come and listen to the carol conserts but that´ll have to be another year.
Let´s hope the SF´s voice will be back untill tomorrow. Looking forward to se and hear the coir on youtube!
Here in Stockholm vinter came surprisingly early. We had -16 on the 3rd already and now a
snowstorm later it´s as vinter as it can get, and more is to come in a couple of days apparantly.
Good luck with the reading Vanessa!
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It would be lovely if you could hear our concerts. But someone makes a DVD of it each time so we will send you a copy. I don’t think we will be on YouTube but you never know! I will blog about it so you can see how it went.
Minus 16 is horrible. We had that in February and that was bad enough. Now it’s forecast to get cold over the next few days. We might even get snow at the end of next week. I don’t know about global warming – the winters seem to get colder here. But maybe that’s one of the effects.
We’re really looking forward to seeing you and Bittan here next June – and you are already registered as waitresses for our fête!!
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Thank you very much for the shout out and for kindly avoiding to mention how much I have wielded the whip to get everything ship shape and Parisot fashion. It certainly promises to be a great event and here’s hoping that Reading Five goes viral on YouTube! X
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Avec plaisir. No, I was leaving it till next time to tell everyone what a swine you’ve been!
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Willie’s choir, Cantemus, is having a carol service here in Dhaka at the American School in a couple of hours – Willie is supposed to be doing a solo but is in bed sipping lemsip having had a eucalyptus-laced bath…winter had hit Dhaka in its own way! Enjoy your concerts, and send us the youTube link after!
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What a pity. A few of ours might have to miss tomorrow’s effort because of colds. And Per is struggling with a hoarse voice at the moment that he can’t seem to get rid of.
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I’m looking forward to hearing you sing and read!
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I hope you won’t hear me personally sing but I can’t hide when it comes to the reading!
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What’s the Dutch carol you’re going to sing? I’m very impressed that you’ll be giving a reading in French. There’s a Christmas carol service here at the C of E Christchurch, which I plan to go to. Carols definitely get you in the mood for Christmas! ‘God Rest You Merry Gentlemen’ is a particular favourite.
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It’s been drier than average here in November but making up for it now with nasty slushy snow. And have fun with the carol concerts. Ours is on the 14th. We had a reahearsal last night and it was really enjoyable. It’s time to start feeling Christmassy now I think!
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We had a light dusting of snow last Sunday but it had melted by lunchtime. But the weather is forecast to get much colder before a mega-dump of snow on Friday next. The winter weather has definitely changed since we moved here. But, yes, Christmas is stealing up on us!
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