Leading article: Summertime blues

No barbecues were in sight in the Edgbaston area yesterday for the beginning of the third Ashes Test match. Nor, we have noticed, has there been much al fresco dining throughout Britain this summer, despite the optimistic forecasts for a "barbecue summer" from the Meteorological Office a few months ago. Blame the jet stream, say the forecasters. It has, apparently, become "stuck" above us, locking in a low pressure system and bringing the rain down in torrents on our collective cookout.

Call us naïve, but if something is stuck, isn't the obvious solution to dislodge it? Perhaps a mass, simultaneous Twittering (pace David Cameron) will generate enough energy to drive the low-pressure away.

And if that fails, how about catapulting some of our MPs up into the stratosphere with their redactor pens? Surely British ingenuity can come up with something. Don't give up on that barbecue summer just yet.