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Open me in another window...
Now read this post as fast as you can...
In a car. In a car driving north. In a car driving north, sat in traffic. Slow, slow progress. Must be an accident ahead. Stick with it, it gets better. For company in my vehicle I have a flat bottle of a semi-popular soft drink. It's not that the container has been squashed, but that the contents is no longer fizzy. It is disliked by lots of people that I know, despite selling well globally. I also have a playlist of songs which, played at a responsible volume, prevents me from closing my eyelids and having a road traffic accident. It does not prevent me from daydreaming. I have a flashback of playing cricket in my back garden as a child. We have to go inside because someone hit the ball over the fence. Normally we'd just jump over and retrieve it, but it's gone into the garden of a neighbour who has an unpredictable dog. Back to reality, and someone is trying to call me on my mobile phone. Despite the lack of forward momentum I decide to obey in-transit protocol and leave it unanswered, just incase I'm being filmed by camouflaged roadside police. The car number plate in front of me reads 'AR51 50D'. The owner has decided to put a sticker on the rear window that reads, hilariously, 'Horn Broken - Watch for Finger'. To my right is a chap singing along to music whilst drumming on his steering wheel. His frustrated partner sat alongside him appears to be contemplating suicide. To my left, a van pulls over onto the hard shoulder. A gentleman exits hurriedly. Someone from inside the van jeers and throws a lighter at him as he begins to urinate by a hillside bank. It hits him on the shoulder. He briefly misdirects his output onto his shoe as he glances over his shoulder at his attacker. I imagine he may have had difficulty concentrating during mathematics lessons at school, enjoys an above average amount of sugar in his tea, and regularly behaves poorly when inebriated. The traffic starts to move, and the punctuated female voice from my satellite navigation system informs me politely that my exit is approaching. I switch lanes and meander along. I've escaped the mass of irritable motorists and am now on a dual carriageway. I like dual carriageways. You know where you are with a dual carriageway. Two lanes. A slow lane - a fast lane. No pissing about. I decide to exert my authority by blitzing into the fast lane, past an elderly couple driving sensibly. I'm soon made to feel insufficient by a car vastly superior to mine. It's approaching my bumper at a speed I cannot match. It urges me back to the slow lane. Back in line with the cautious, the grey-haired, the wobbly caravans and the big trucks covered in road-spray grime. I humbly oblige. I feel like my position within the dual carriageway food chain has been neatly clarified. My Sat-Nav falls off the windscreen and lands in my lap. 'Shit', I say, realising that the two hands and necessary concentration required to sucker it back onto the windscreen are busy driving the car at pace. It's going to have to stay in my lap until I can pull over at a service station. "Well, this is awkward", says a voice, appearing to come from the Sat-Nav. I'm very confused. "Hello?", I mutter. "Yeah, can you remove me from your groin area, please? I can't see from down here". I look down at the Sat-Nav - "You might have to hold on...not literally, but...figuratively. I need to turn off soon to sort you out". Madness descends, like a lonely aubergine. "Well look, I'm no use to you down here, I can't see anything but belt and zip", said the 'Nav. "Don't get cheeky or I'll turn you off before I turn off", I said, as I looked for road signs indicating a place to turn off. "This situation is a turn off. I may be turned on, but I'm not turned on - and if you turn me off then you won't know when to turn off, so you'll have to turn me on again".
She (it) had a point.
TBC...
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