Tuesday, December 27, 2005

Not much happened

Today not much happened. Shop was buzzing with bargain hunters because we've got a 15% off offer across the store (if you spend £50 or more). Lots of people wanting to buy new kitchens, bathrooms and conservatories (these are our target areas because we make loads-a-money out of these). Came home feeling blugeoned to find Offspring Senior has communicated the fact that he's being dropped off home tomorrow at 8.30 am by the prospective in-laws. We've offered them breakfast before they travel on to visit relatives further south. It will be good to meet them - but that early? On my day off?
I see from the BBC news that Eastern England is "gripped in a freeze". What a surprise - it's winter and it's freezing! Oh my God, how strange. As usual even though the freezing weather and the snow was predicted the general motoring public panicked. They still went out in their cars even though they hadn't a clue how to use them in snow and icy conditions. We get real winter conditions so rarely here that no-one has ever bothered to learn how to use a car in these conditions and few know when not to use the car. The word STUPID comes to mind. Maybe they think they can handle it, maybe they just don't know, maybe they think they're immune from accidents. Still the silly buggers get behind the wheel and treat a car the same as they would on a dry summer's day. They still brake too hard and too late - and then wonder why the car is still moving so they brake even harder. Skid pan training and regular re-tests should be mandatory. Besides which, if they went on a skid pan with proper supervision, many drivers would want to go back again and again. It is a life-saving skill which is enjoyable and even fun to learn!
If you have to drive in snow or ice USE THE BRAKE SENSIBLY, YOU STUPID PEOPLE - and if you can't do that just keep off the roads so that those people whose journeys are really necessary will have less chance of some prat losing control and running into them.
I've been doing more of my late father-in-law's memoirs Number Four in the Rear Rank, which can be viewed by going to http://www.spitfireman.blogspot.com. Hopefully one day I will finish it - perhaps even finding the missing tape of further notes I feel sure is still knocking around somewhere in my possession. Do visit the site. Some people may find it quaint and old-fashioned, others may even find it boring but I still think it's worth doing for the insights it gives into life in the British forces in the 1920s.
Read it and let me know what you feel.

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