It has been a particularly bad Autumn / Winter so far for wind and storms. Wind is the most annoying and stressful of the elements because there's absolutely nothing you can do combat it directly. I finally gave up and bought a car and became a fair weather biker in 2006 after a similar few months of being blown around like a rag doll. Aren't climatologists saying the weather is sensitive to sunspot activity which peaks on a roughly 10-11 year cycle ?