My Moan Of The Week
The Richard Bacon Show on BBC Radio 5 has a weekly moan-in, where people vent their moans.
My moan would be about the number of people who moan generally about the cost and problems of having a car. If it’s not fuel costs, it’s about traffic jams, congestion charging, insurance or finding somewhere to park.
I don’t have these problems any more, as since my stroke I haven’t driven and don’t have a licence any more And I reckon my bank account benefits by several thousand pounds a year. That would buy lots of taxis, if I wanted, but I prefer trains and buses, as you see more of life and don’t get the driver complaining about the sad state of the taxi industry.
Political Asylum Should Come With Responsibilities
This tragic tale of a young woman killed by a drunk driver illustrates one thing that is wrong with the political asylum system. Here’s an extract.
Wilfred Museka, 31, from Clayton, had previously pleaded guilty to causing death by dangerous driving at Manchester Minshull Street Crown Court.
He also admitted fraud by false representation, driving without insurance and driving other than in accordance with a driving licence.
The court heard that Museka, a Zimbabwean national who gained political asylum after arriving in the UK in 2000, had been to a family party in Manchester.
He drank so much alcohol that he could not recall how or why he had later travelled to the border of West Yorkshire, where the crash took place.
It turned out he’d had eleven previous motoring convictions including driving under excess alcohol.
He was just taking the Michael in a big way.
He should have been sent back to Zimbabwe, when it became obvious that he wasn’t a fit and proper person to claim asylum. As it is he’ll now be locked up for eight years before he is deported. So all the British justice system has done is delayed the inevitable and got a young woman killed.
Fuel And Energy Prices
I had a stroke two years ago and being unable to drive, I moved from my large house in deepest Suffolk to the centre of London. My new house is fully insulated and my fuel bills have gone through the floor.
Some of those moaning at costs, should look at their lifestyles. Why should I subsidise the 4×4’s and heat-inefficient houses of others?
What A Load Of Old Boulders!
My trip south of the Big Sewer today was to see Croydon’s latest attempt at art, parking control or bad taste at New Addington.
They are certainly not my idea of good design.
Islington Goes For 20 mph Speed Limit
This was voted on last night by Islington Council according to this article on the BBC.
I hope it sorts out the problems of accidents, but many seem to be caused by drivers not respecting lights. Try crossing the road outside Highbury and Islington station at busy times.
Islington’s real problem is that there is too much traffic, trying to drive down too few roads.
Car Insurance To Be Investigated
Does it bother me? Of course not! It wouldn’t have bothered me, if I had a car, as I didn’t ever make due to my own driving. It’s all here on the BBC.
But then the real problem about car insurance, is all the small time racketeers like accident claims solicitors, car repairers and other crooks, who ambulance chase any accident or incident.
It should be made a criminal offence to pay commission to any of these leeches.
Flash Cars Drive Me Crazy
This is the title of a piece by Nick Curtis in today’s Standard. Here’s an extract.
Why do people who own the most expensive cars not know how to drive? On the way to the Standard’s Kensington offices
I run the gauntlet of bankers’ wives in Chelsea tractors who make the morning commute feel like a video game as they mow down pedestrians, street furniture and small buildings.
This week I was on a bus that was held up three times by executive saloons performing kerb-crunching, bumper-nudging three-point turns.
I know the feeling. My bus today nearly had a serious altercation with a Mercedes 4×4 with the registration number, WF08 ATY. Let’s hope that when the driver wants to sell it, possible buyers see this and feel they don’t want to buy a car that’s been driven and possibly looked after badly.
Nick’s suggestion was a new wealth tax, whereby anybody seen driving badly in a big expensive car should have to buy a Smart or a Skoda and give the price difference to the Exchequer.
it might be a deterrent to bad driving though, if when you got say six points on your licence, you had to drive round in a car say yellow with purple stripes, so that other drivers would know the twats to avoid. You’d certainly see them when crossing the road.
Parking Sensors And Phone Apps
The BBC is reporting that Westminster Council is installing sensors in the road, so that drivers can use a smartphone app to go to the nearest free space.
How do you use the smartphone, whilst you are driving?
Why I Won’t Drive Again!
I now suspect that in a couple of years, my eyesight might be good enough to drive again.
But I’m pretty certain that I won’t!
Given my medical history, suppose I was to hit a child and kill them, when even the impeccable witnesses said it was not my fault, would I really want to have to go through any legal process, from perhaps vindictive parents. Especially, if it came out, I’d had a serious stroke and been stopped from driving for medical reasons.
What worries me, is that there are many out there with worse medical problems than me, who still drive. As it was I could be dead now, if this morning I’d gone by the pedestrian lights near me, as an idiot in a blue Nissan Micra went up the clear inside lane at about sixty with the lights on red to go straight over. What a wanker! His medical problem was in his head. Why I hadn’t stepped out I do not know! But who cares? I just didn’t! I suspect I heard him.
Thinking about it, he must have gone straight over the crossing seventy metres or so before the lights at speed. I just wish I’d got his number.
The Anonymous Widower 