Ice Ice, Baby

First and fivemost, I'm sorry about the title but I'm too lazy on this particular post to bother with a decent title, and given this opening sentence has taken more effort to type than actually thinking about a decent title renders me a complete and utter cretin. Secondly, I would also like to apologise for my Facebook status recycling. Hey ho.

However, I would like to appeal against my cretin status as it would seem that I am less of a cretin than the cretins that I encountered on the road today. And henceforth I shall refrain from using the moniker of cretin and go for something less, well, cretinous.

Just what is it about this bloody country that makes people shake, cower, panic and just generally lose all trace of common sense as soon as the weather turns bad? Especially when you mention snow or ice or hail or sleet. Look - there's an avalanche! Oh, no, wait, no panic averted - it's a snowball! Now today I needed to do something trivial, which if you must know was drive to the shops. Today, however, it snowed and sleeted. To a Cornishman in November this is relatively unheard of. Any Russian person would laugh their socks, thermal underwear, coats and hats of at our nation panicking at what only can be described as a very minute amount of snow compared with their winters.

Not only do the Brits panic at the first sight of that white stuff, they lose all capacity for logical thought and suddenly forget how to drive. Now common sense would dictate that you shouldn't rev your car hard in the snow or ice as it just puts too much power to the driven wheels causing them to spin and lose traction. Many road users cannot see this fact thus making the road conditions worse for the next wanker that comes along to spin the wheels, lose traction thus making the road conditions worse for the next wanker that comes along ad infinitum.You should never slam your brakes on either as that will make you skid, lose traction, run over a spaniel, ruin Nigel and Priscilla's freshly treated fence, hit their house and die.

Anyway, back to the task in hand, which was a journey to the shops. Generally a stress-free journey of less than 2 miles from door to supermarket car park on any ordinary day. But as you've already figured out (one would hope) that today there was some white stuff on the ground. Now I won't say I'm the best driver in the world as I'm no where near good enough. I do, however, have bouts of common sense when needed. Today for example, starting off in second gear down my road I wondered how many arseholes I would encounter not expecting it to be half as many.

Near Miss number one - George and Mildred of indeterminate age and origin in their hearing-aid Beige Rover from 1990. Now normally George and Mildred do not drive over 5mph when the weather is fine, and today it was taken to extremes when they were travelling at the same figure as the outside temperature. Added to the fact that every snow drop that fell they decided to brake for, and not gentle braking either. Hard braking and you could see the car slither like a slithery thing. So I decided to pull over to give them a head start because I would have ended up either crashing or losing the will to live. Or both. So this gave me time to eat a three course meal, compose and record a classical symphony start to finish and to complete my qualifications for quantum physics.

Second Near miss - Kev always buys a horrid little car called a Citroen Paxo, and always has to spend the net income of a small country modifying it to make it uglier, heavier, slower and noisier. A set of phat (sic) wheels ensures that it handles like a terrier with no legs. However, Kev seems to think that you can drive it at 67mph on all roads in all conditions. As well he did today, hurtling around a corner at a speed he wouldn't be able to handle in fair conditions, obviously turning the wheel and going straight on then overcooking it on opposite lock and nearly careering into a bush. And not the kind of bush he really wanted to be in either.

Then just after this, encountering people who cannot do anything other than try to pull away in snow in first gear, engines revving to the maximum and wheel spinning all over the place not getting anywhere. What is wrong with you fucking retards????? Crisis averted and I finally managed to get to the shops and do what I needed to do, which surprisingly was shopping. Came back, car loaded and to travel the 2 miles back home.

There is a narrow, steep hill which I travel every day with no problems. However it is not a main road and never gets gritted. Earlier this year in the snow, my poxy little 1.4 Fiat Stilo managed to get all the way to the top overtaking a useless driver in a Land Rover Freelander and an equally useless driver in a Renault Megane. Today I did the same again, and the car again was a Land Rover Freelander. Bearing in mind the Land Rover is a purpose-built four wheel drive, and my car is a two wheel drive hatchback. The difference one of the drivers could read the conditions and drive appropriately.

So, what's the general message from this pile of inane drivel? Learn to fucking drive Britain! Or at least, use your common sense and drive as the conditions dictate. Stop trying to drive flat out and making the road more polished and as shiny as Kojak's head. The end.