British blizzard costs billions of pounds

Over here we're talking about billions of stimulus bucks. Over there, they're talking about losing a billion pounds (or more) because of a snowstorm.

Snow may be billion-pound loss for British economy: experts

It was four inches of snow! Clearly they aren't set up to handle that.

"David Frost, director-general of the British Chambers of Commerce, said images of snowbound Britain were embarrassing abroad.

"All the European channels were showing images of London at a complete standstill, which was not a very positive image for the UK," he told BBC radio.

"I wonder whether we have become a bit too complacent... when something like this does happen, we are caught very much on the hop."

Well, they certainly interviewed the right guy. And I think some more hops (or at least their influence on the ales) would taste good right about now.