It’s raining again today – actually it’s bucketing down and there’s a severe weather warning. We’ve had so much rain over the last couple of weeks that the ground is sodden and can’t absorb any more. I took the dogs for a walk on the common at 7.45am today and it was like paddling because there was so much water lying on top of the grass. Just like Sunday, my top half was dry under my waterproof jacket and my jeans were so wet all the way up that I had to change them as soon as I got in.

Britain is just not a fun place right now. Apart from the rain, pundits are forecasting we are heading for a recession in just a few months. I wonder what gives them that idea. Could it be the bottom falling out of the property market, people not being able to get mortgages, nobody’s got any money to spend so businesses are having a hard time, rising oil prices, more people going bankrupt, etc, etc?

I think that the problem isn’t really in the Government’s power to fix. It all started with the home loans problems in the USA and the fact that British banks got hit because they had been underwriting some of those mortgages. That led to a shortage of mortgage funds here, people couldn’t get mortgages which led to home owners not able to sell their property at the expected price (or at all, in some cases), and then a lot of personal loans and borrowings have dried up. Most people are nervous now and just not prepared to spend money the way they have been doing with easy credit available. All of this against the background of rising fuel and food prices.