Englishal
I am sort of with you but it is easy to get caught out early on in your flying "career" because you don't yet have the experience to realise what is happening (as perhaps this story demonstrates). I appreciate you should, and I appreciate you can almost always see the IMC coming, but as this story also demonstrates it is easy to become overloaded with other concerns (in this case the NOTAM) and before you know it you are further in than you would like,
and then when you have really racked up the hours the other scenario is the temptation to scud run because you think you have the skills to deal with it - more often than not you do, but sometimes .. .. ..
I quite enjoy a bit of scud running, it can be quite fun to stay low level working your way around the landscape but remaining visual - the trick I hope is to know when to bail, and that is when having an instrument rating is so useful. Actually you usually dont need to fall back on it, but it needs careful planning and a good awareness of the weather. I hasten to add I am not generally recommending this course of action.