Cold comfort

We used to say that St Andrews had three weathers: windy, cold and windy, or very cold and very windy. Sometimes we would add, "and indoors it was even worse." The flat I lived in certainly had all three, but cold dominated. There were two electric heaters, but they were very expensive to run, and a shilling in the slot of the electricity meter did not last long. We had a coal fire, but were often unable to afford coal. The house was cold.  My bed was cold to get into unless I had used an electric blanket to preheat it. It kept warm during the night, but I have woken up to find a glass of milk frozen on the bedside table. It required real effort in winter mornings to emerge from a warm bed into a cold house.

It was certainly unhealthy. I was described as "chronically susceptible to bronchitis." This was not the same as chronic bronchitis, nor as bad, but it plagued most winters. When I left Scotland to live in Washington DC, it left me within a week, and it has never returned. Looking back, I think I may have been allergic to Scotland.