A plea to all drivers, re: inertia

This weekend I drove up to East Yorkshire.

On the way, it occurred to me that there may be some driving instructors out there who are omitting a very simple piece of advice from their lessons, and depriving a nation of some essential car knowledge. 

Next time you're poodling along the road in your car and need to slow down (perhaps you have found yourself to be 1mph over the speed limit, or you are approaching a speed camera at 30mph, and know without doubt that you will get caught for a crime you are not committing, unless you drop to 25. Maybe a rogue leaf can be seen making its way towards the kerb and threatens to flutter into your path), just think: could this action be achieved by simply removing my foot from the accelerator? Do I really need to touch the brake pedal for absolutely no reason, repeatedly, and cause a wave of blinking red light panic to ripple through the cars behind me, thus slowing an entire lane of traffic?

Consider this, over braker: is your aim to frustrate the car behind you into yelling "WHY ARE YOU BRAKING? WHY? WHYY?", when you're on a long, straight, otherwise stress free road with no one in front of you? Or would you rather just slow up by, you know, withholding your foot from the pedal which causes speed to build, and saving the driver behind from giving herself a brain haemorrage from banging her head against a metaphorical brick wall?

The answer, of course, is "Why, yes that does sound better".


PS. London and the South East - I've seen the future. It's white, cold, falls from the sky in flakes, causes endless news reports, a plethora of boring Facebook photo albums and makes already shit drivers a lot worse. You have been warned.

Litter Bug

If you watch BBC Breakfast or GMTV, or enjoy Radio 1's blessed three minute news relief from the vacuous pus pit that is Chris Moyles every half hour, or caught a flash of the Daily Mail's skinnier, freebie sister The Metro on your way to work this morning, you may have noticed a royal PR drive from the Keep Britain Tidy camp. And I thought "AT BLOODY LAST", because they're right on the case about the one thing more likely to cause me road rage than some immensely incompetent idiot tailgating me on the middle lane of the motorway...and that is someone even more immensely incompetent throwing litter (that includes fag butts, you dutty smokers) out of their car window and onto the road / a grass verge.

It is - ipso facto - the one thing that winds me up so much that steam rises from my ears and out the sunroof, turning my car into some sort of novelty teapot; yet short of beeping my horn, ramming my car into the back of theirs or learning sign language for "pick it up, you dirty crackfiend", there's not a lot you can do about it. On Tuesday night, while I was busy three getting lost on my way to West Hampstead thanks to the North Circular's nightly crash closure messing up my AA route finder directions, I saw a paper cup being thrown from the van in front. A cup. Who the hell throws a cup out of their window, biodegradable or not? Since when was the road a bin?

Every time I drive on the motorway I'm glad not to be in the passenger seat, because when you're not busy DJing, what is there to look at? A glance out of the window reveals the grass verges of the British countryside absolutely strewn with litter. Crisp packets, clothing, chocolate wrappers, cups, plastic packaging and fag butts just thrown out of an open window by people too lazy, selfish and uncouth to take responsibility for their own waste.

I'm like look, it's not hard sweetheart - just do as I do. Scrunch your rubbish up and shove it in the glove compartment and side pockets of your car. When that's full, use the foot well of the passenger seat, then every 2/3/4/5 (delete as appropriate) weeks, grab a Sainsbury's bag and collect it all up. Then take it into your house, as you would a bag of shopping, and throw it in with your household waste. Simple. Better yet, your car will be in such a state that you won't have to give your friends lifts anywhere because they can't get in, and your hair won't get messed up on car journeys from opening the window every two minutes to dispose of your mess. Everyone's a winner.

Keep Britain Tidy basically want to change the law so you can get an on the spot fine and points on your licence for being a dirty, littering bugger (for that is where the term litter bug originates...and if that's not fact, it is now) and I personally am all for it. If you don't use the road as a waste disposal unit, why would anyone object?

And ironically, just as I was contemplating this news story at the traffic lights this morning, the well groomed, tidy looking woman in the sports car in front of me inhaled her final puff, and threw the cigarette out of the window where it lay smoking on the ground. Smokers, you choose to smoke - fair do's, go for it, fill yer boots. But keep the butts to yourself, that's what your car ashtray's for. So clear out the 10ps and pound coins, and start using it.

But for those of us - smokers and non - who don't impose our dirty ming mong disposables on everyone else, who sit behind those who do at the lights - what can we do? It seems recycling and keeping clean literally goes out the window as soon as people leave the house.

Keep Britain Tidy have got a monster on their hands.

Beanz Meanz Heinz.

You know where you are with a tin of beans. Comforting, reliable, versatile - baked beans are the answer to anything. Hungry for breakfast? Beans on toast. Hungry for lunch? Jacket potato with beans. Dinner time? Get me some toad in the hole, and draw for the beans.

If there was a rival, a stark opposite, an anti-bean if you will, it would be taxi cabs. With taxi cabs, there is no Heinz; no reputable brand where you know, no matter where you are you'll get the same product. Taxi cabs are that dodgy supermarket brand which might proclaim to be the real deal, but they sure as hell don't taste it.

At least once a week on breakfast news, after they've reported on yet another sex-crazed maniac who has finally been caught after molesting a cacophony of women whilst posing as a cab driver, we are warned about the dangers of illegal taxis. Go licenced, get home safe. I can run with that. I've got a selection of cab numbers stocked up in my phone for precisely that reason.

What fails me every single time is the pricing. The wildly different quotes you'll get for the same journey time and time again. This Thursday AND Friday night me and my friends were quoted a price, only for it to magically increase the minute the destination was reached. I wouldn't fuss, but I'm nearly always the last one to get dropped off, meaning I'm always the one who gets to end her night with a confrontation.

On Thursday, the cab office gave us a 'round about' estimation, but refused to write a price down for the journey. Meaning we spent the journey home bargaining with the driver, appealing to his better nature for a reasonable price. On Friday, given our experience the night before, we used a different local company. The £8.50 we were quoted on the phone somehow jumped to £11 when I was dropped at my house. I argued my point, then eventually rang the cab company and passed the phone over to the driver for them to sort it out. £8.50 it eventually was.

A few weeks ago, I got a cab home from the tube station. £4.50, he said as he pulled up outside my house. I handed over £5 and gathered my stuff while he got my change. Except, he wasn't getting my change. He was getting ready to drive off. "Sorry, did you say it was £4.50? Can I have my change please? Unemployed person here, every penny counts n that...". I felt embarrassed asking for my 50p, but sod it - if I want to tip, that's at my discretion...not his.

Surely - surely - it's not too much to ask that a legit taxi company has a legit, unchanging tariff. Otherwise all that separates them and the illegal ones is the fact they're less likely to harbour a fetish for drunk girls. Nor do I want to spend my journey home directing someone to my house, particularly when they have a sat nav wired up showing them the route. Is it too much to ask that they know their way around? I want to use local companies for local journeys, because although companies like Addison Lee are standardised, you pay more for the privilege.

Going home is getting to be the part of the night I dread - but without any other option to get home after 2am, it's enough to make a girl give up drinking and drive herself.

(ok perhaps not. But you catch my drift - I'm fed up with it)

I'm staying in tonight in protest. Yes, thats right, in protest against the anti-bean. Definitely not because my friends put the L in Lame and aren't going out (or inviting me. One or the other).

Bureaucracy

On Christmas Eve, you will definitely remember that I got fined £50 for inconveniencing millions of people, killing thousands more young children and puppies and oh, parking on the wrong side of the road outside the doctor's surgery.

Annoying, but ultimately a lesson learnt. You cannot beat the system very easily, and frankly I couldn't be arsed to argue with the charge. I went online within the discount period, paid the fine, and that was that.

Until 2 weeks ago, when through the letterbox another council headed envelope landed - telling me that yes, I'd paid £50....but I hadn't paid the £100 which was actually owed. There was no number to call except an automated payment line, just a slip for debit or credit cards, and a form to make a representation. In other words, to state your case, 'not guilty, you fockers'. I panicked a bit, thought what the hell? But double checked the e-receipt and found that I'd paid on time and that actually, there was no way I owed any more money.

Once again, irritation gripped me. This time I wasn't the culprit, it was their balls-up. I had the luxury of being able to quickly check my emails and find proof - but what about someone who didn't have the internet, or an old lady who would just panic and pay up?

I got angry. I got pissed off. I got a pen.



This morning another letter arrived.

Dear Miss surname [sic],

Thank you for your letter in which you made a representation regarding the above Penalty Charge Notice. Due to a processing error, it was only process [sic] after the discounted period had elapsed. However I have updated our records and this case is now closed.

I apologise for any inconvenience that this may have caused.

If you require any further information, please telephone our helpline on --------.

Yours sincerely,

Council Scumbag xx

Oh thank you, fair local council, for providing me with a helpline after my case has closed. Thank you for apologising...in a churned out letter laden with uncapitalised names and grammatical errors. You really do, sincerely, care about us little ones.

Bleeeeeeeeeeeeeeuuuuuuuuuuugrrrrhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

The following people DO NOT know it's christmas time:

Not that I was expecting to hear from him or anything, I totally wasn't - but it feels strange to be sans boyfriend this Christmas. Not that we spent Christmas together ever, or New Year come to think of it, it's just that weird feeling of no contact again. Getting a card from his parents was nice, although it highlighted the fact that I'd heard nothing from him. As they say..."that's probably a good thing", like everything else.

Oh, and Christmas cheer was definitely in the air on the road next to the doctor's surgery on the 24th, as I nipped in to pick up a prescription and, finding no space in the surgery's stamp sized car park, left my car on the adjacent road. There was indeed someone watching over me, a 21st century yonder star if you will, in the shape of a parking warden who slapped a £50 fine on my windscreen while I was gone. The timings noted on the slip? From 10:56 to: 10:58. Bastards.

My internet is not Christmas friendly. I know this because I've spent 6 hours over the last 2 days watching Gavin and Stacey from start to finish (actually, it's probably more like 10 hours given my internet connection up here. Have to watch it in 5 minute blasts, let it load up a bit, then press play...pause...load up, play etc). iPlayer is refusing to play ball 2 episodes short of the Christmas special - but anyway I think it's probably time I left the house before I start speaking welsh and greeting people with "Al-rite Stace, what's occurin?".

So I'm going to the pub, which will probably close at the thoroughly ungodly hour of 10:30, or something.

Toot toot!

Imaginary brakes

Today was spent trawling around not one, but two...NAY...three shopping centres, in two different towns, looking for...Ha...wait for it... travel scrabble. Not Original Scrabble, not Scamble Scrabble; mini, fit in your luggage (not the hand luggage, the £5 a bag hold luggage) travel scrabble.

And do you know where I found it? The most unlikely of places, you simply never will guess!

That's where I found travel scrabble. NOWHERE.

The boyfriend, stressed at work with a million and one things on his mind other than travel scrabble, was at his most unhelpful.

"I'm having a bit of a travel scrabble problem" said I, wondering through John Lewis.
"Have you tried Argos?"
"Yep. And WH Smith, and every other shop I can think of. It's nowhere."
"Well I can't exactly help you do anything from here, can I", he replied, helpfully.
"I'm not asking for you to help me look, I'm letting you know the situation and wondering if you have any other ideas"
"Try the airport"
"That's something I can do tomorrow, yes, when we are at the airport...but oh sod it, I'll ask someone here. Bye."

Now, on this trip to hell the shopping centres, mum had decided to come with me (as, in her own words, she 'can't turn down a trip to John Lewis'. This, 20-somethings, is what we have to look forward to). I was driving, which meant my mum was the front seat passenger. I'm not sure whether it escapes her notice that there are no brakes on her side of the car, but from the way she was stomping down on the floor everytime the car in front slowed to a halt, you 'd think not.

"Mum, those brakes don't work" I said, after a gasp and a stomp from the passenger side.
"Hmmm? Oh, sorry."
"Mum - I have eyes. I can see that the car in front is breaking. You stomping on the imaginary brakes doesn't do anything. It just makes me more nervy."
"I know. Sorry"

I can't tell you how many times we have had that exact same conversation.

Actually, I can.

LOADS.