The Direction of Traffic.

Being at the Christian hub of Empire- sanitised and rehashed- the UK would fight 'tooth and nail' to defend its colonial right to drive on the left. Blue passports unto death! and all that sort of guff. 'Royal Blue,' blue as blue as Great Britannia's ruled and wavy oceans- excepting the rather murkier coastal bits. Taking back control!

In all other regards, the nation's traffic has been herded rabid-dogmatically ever rightwards. So much so, that it rather risks disappearing up its own Royal opening- perhaps it all begins with being able to lick one's own.

On a more practical level- that where 'left' or 'right' is merely a matter of convenience- it has been noticed that more elderly city pedestrians are increasingly shunning such distinctions, increasingly opting for the shortest, straightest route, shunning imposed 'rules. Could it be argued that there is actually an unspoken 'underground' trend away from more authoritarian diktat and towards the tiniest smidgen of- whisper it- liberty? Taking back control!

To hone it down more specifically, take 'liberty' here to equate to freedom. That is 'liberty' as fundamentally opposed to 'libertarian,' which is entirely a different, most objectionable kettle of reactionary fish! Discredited in the Truss-Kwarteng manner, crash and burn! Both of whom are still raking in the full MP salary, plus perks!

Those of certain age may recall- 'halcyon' days prior to alternating gambling cartels with sleeping bags in empty-shop doorways- that much of the city centre was securely trussed up behind anti-pedestrian rails. Councils would have it that they were erected for the purpose of safety, valuing the welfare of the spending pedestrian against the consequences of vehicular mishap! Her Majesty's officers were known to veer towards tetchy should one chance one's arm and 'hurdle.' Jolly frustrating it was too, very sheep dog trials-ish, ensuring intimate proximity betwixt pedestrian and commercialism.

I cannot recall which came first, the removal of rails or the straightening and shortening of lines. Perhaps it is but a minor readjustment, but perhaps it is also evidence of a greater thirst for liberty. Or more, the reclaiming of tiny freedoms? Thatcher's rancid drips of 'trickle-down' arriving thirty years too late.

Notice, or don't- either way- that many of the older generations no longer bother with pedestrian controls- excepting always that metal in transit is still best avoided. Maybe there is an age, or state of body and mind, whereupon it becomes even more tiresome to bother with the ritualistic 'pressing of buttons,' excepting where there are children on hand to witness.

There are 'rules' and there are issues of timing:
1. At pedestrian-moderated crossroads pressing the button will not interfere with the flow of taxed traffic, it merely lights up the pressed button. Pedestrians cross when counter-traffic flow is prioritised. Pedestrians may scuttle back and forth whilst adjacent traffic is stationary.
2. Buses do not stop immediately a red stoplight shows, routinely snatching a second or so before the green pedestrian lights up. Stepping out under the auspices of a red stop sign could, and will at some point, prove injurious or fatal (thus the child consideration).
3. Pedestrian crossings upon straight roads without junction are often timed (seemingly) to test pedestrian resolve. Press the button by all means but do not feel obligated to await 'permission,' unless one enjoys counting vehicles (or there are children present).
4. The Direction of (taxed) Traffic (flow) will undergo minimal, or no, modification.
5. Traffic drives on the left, policy drives to the right.

Where 'furniture' has been retained at crossing points- a kind of zigzag corralling affair- there is a growing counter-trend for older pedestrians to cut out the railings, instead to cut the straightest line, more so where layout is familiar. Public view favours greater pedestrianisation but then they're not nestled in the pockets of petro-chemical giants as are the rule-makers. Although concessionary access to busy bus lanes has been afforded the cyclist, many instead opt for the narrow pavement, frequently riders who really should know better. Ongoingly unlegislated scooters continue to operate along variable libertarian lines. (1)
Beware! The Direction of Traffic remains geographically to the left, fundamentally to the right!

Sir Keir Starmer, former Head of the Crown Prosecution Service (net worth £37.7 millions [2a]) chuckles to script, pressed upon nothing by Sir Anthony Charles Lynton Blair KG, current War Criminal (net worth £50.3 millions [2b]). 'Forensic' Guardian Journalist, Mary Louisa "Polly" Toynbee, Villa in Tuscany (£3110,000 per annum), endorses former Head of the crown Prosecution Service, Sir Keir Starmer's chuckled dismissal of the removal of austerity's two child benefit limit, in his drive to "grow the economy" ad nauseam. Conjuring economic growth from the Jaws of Austerity 3.0. Andrew Bailey (£575,338 per annum) urges restraint to those who already cannot feed their children. Eugenics through stealth?

Those fleeing persecution from Rwandan human rights abuses- adjudged legal refugees under international law- who are granted refugee status, still to be deported to Rwanda. Both in reality and in the dreams of the current UK Home Secretary. Apartheid State granted protected status against those protesting state racism. The Direction of Traffic!

David Lammy (LBC platform and [New] New Labour MP), opposing Corbyn, interviews Mike Katz (Jewish Labour Movement [4]), also opposing Corbyn, on 'Corbyn as a continued member of the Labour Party.' David Lammy interviews Ed Balls (LBC platform and ex New Labour MP), also opposing Corbyn, on the same subject. Andrew Neil (Channel 4 platform, Chairman of Spectator, Sunday Times and other Rupert Murdoch outlets, former Chairman GB News), also opposing Corbyn, interviews Ed Balls on the same subject. Frenemies, (3) Ed Balls and George Osborne (former chancellor whose austerity program is calculated to have caused approximately 300,000 excess deaths, former Evening Standard editor and platform), both opposing Corbyn, team up to 'produce' economics podcast.
Informing the public on our behalf? Building a better tomorrow, a future for all? The roundabout to damnation rotates eternally to the right.

The UK reserves its Empirical right to drive on the left but the Direction of Traffic continues to veer ever further to the right. Taking back control!
But on whose behalf?

We're going to need another couple of lanes here! And that's just for starters.



(1) Scooters (frequently hired) continue to pay into the stuttering economy. Pedestrians and bikes (frequently) do not.
(2) Consider 'worth' as a purly numerical label. Conversely, calculated 'value' is likely to fall into negative territory.
(3) 'Frenemies,' don't you just hate it? Such frenemies, so 'fundamentally opposed' was Balls that he was invited to the wedding.
(4) The Jewish Labour Movement mysteriously re-founded in 2015, under curious circumstances but with highly questionable and undemocratic motives ('Weaponising Anti-Semitism,' Asa Winstanley, from page 54). Sir Keir Starmer, former Head of the Crown Prosecution Service, has maintained something of a hot-line relationship with the Board of Deputies of British Jews since his dishonest rise to Head of the (New) New Labour Party. Alongside this, the sudden rise of the Jewish Labour Movement and the 'operations' of Labour Friends of Israel, one could easily be forgiven for wondering just how little genuine democracy remains within the Party. Where indeed is the real steering committee?

Hate!

The conversation might go something along the lines of, "Would you like something to drink?"

"No thank you, Granddad."

"How much have you had to drink this morning?"

Silence might ensue. My granddaughter is carefully colouring the strange creature she has just drawn.

"What sort of creature is that? It looks very happy!" It has the sort of smile that might easily compromise the upper part of its head.

"It is. It's a unicorndragon!" So, the ears are working, then?

"How much have you had to drink this morning?"

Nothing! Maybe not then?

"Can we go cycling, please Granddad?"

"We can't sensibly go cycling, unless you've had something to eat, can we?"

"Milk, please granddad." All without glancing up from the task in hand.

"And something to eat? Would you like a yoghurt?"

"What flavour are they?" Maybe there is just the merest hint of a suspicious glance?

"Raspberry!"

"I hate raspberry!"

Now, this isn't true. If she's hungry enough she might not even notice a raspberry, smuggled through in the guise of a strawberry yoghurt. It both amuses me... and it doesn't.

'Hate,' not 'hatred' is one of the many throw-away words that children may so easily pick up from all manner of situations- 'basically,' 'literally,' although not yet 'like,' I'm pleased to note. These words might easily be substituted for a more correct choice, or even be used to fill an otherwise blank space in an already adequate sentence.

As I have already admitted, I am amused by such things. But, I do still try to make a point of picking up on the use of the word 'hate.'

"How is it possible to know, if you haven't tried it?" I might venture, about any untasted foodstuff or drink. But there is, of course, a more serious point to be made here.

So, I usually make the time to point out that 'hate' tends towards one of the more unpleasant extremes. "Hate is a very strong feeling!" I might remark. "I doubt that there's anything yet in your life that you've had proper cause to hate."

She might listen. She might ask really pertinent questions, and we might have one of the sort of in depth conversations that tends to stick in the memory and leave me feeling a great pride in her ability to so quickly collate information  Or, she might remind me about her earlier request, regarding cycling. But, we're getting there! Hate is a mighty strong word and a mighty powerful emotion to either feel or to channel! Best to head it off, before it slips seamlessly into adulthood. It hits all the wrong keys!

More so when it is so ruthlessly being channelled by our current Prime Minister, in order to drive a mighty wedge through the heart of British society. Now, he's had the sort of privileged education that will have left him in no doubt as to the damage that channelled hatred may cause, locally, nationally or internationally! The exponential growth in examples of exercised, practised and genuine hatred is already sitting not so proudly at the top of Ms May's shameful legacy. Boris is fast approaching that goal in a tiny fraction of the time! He's clever enough to circumvent the word, but he still choses to channel the sentiment, via the worst of the British MSM!

So, be in no doubt, he and his chums have calculated what they're doing. And, just in case we should be in any way uncertain of their motives, we might consider what trashing the economy might do for those more interested in shorting the pound and bolstering their hedge fund investments. Those who can really afford a privileged education! I seem to recall recently reading that one of this government's Brexit advisors placed a bet of several million pounds, upon the sinking of the economy after the event has been enacted, I might even recall the name, but was unable to re-find the same article, so best not... Curious!  

'Hate' is a word more deserving of challenge than ever before in most of our lifetimes. It's often where it's left unspoken that it hits home hardest. Either that, or else this is just "so much poppycock!"  

The Grand Divide

I've come to consider it somewhat of a duty to attempt to keep abreast of the news. We should, shouldn't we? It's a kind of obligation that goes along with living in a 'democracy', to be aware of what is happening, often supposedly, 'on our behalves'. Otherwise, when we're actually required to 'participate', how will we be able to put our role into some kind of context, upon which we might then act?

That's what I've done, anyway. Perhaps, at first, I didn't use to view reading, watching or listening to the 'news' as something of a duty, because I was just naturally curious as to what was going on in the world, but, regardless of the reasons for beginning to take an interest in regional, national and global affairs, a kind of reciprocal duty is how I have now come to regard this simple interaction with the radio, television and some of 'our' newspapers.

That's not to say that I claim to be able to keep abreast of all that is currently judged to be newsworthy, or that I fully understand the finer points of international currency fluctuations. Things like that, I presume, will never, by covert design, be entirely revealed to minions like me. I suspect that the vast majority of us just glaze over, when somebody with an important-sounding voice informs us that the FTSE is up or down a seemingly-random number of points. And, by the time that these already forgotten points have seeped through to the real world, where they might actually impact upon an aspect of our everyday lives, we no longer make the connections, even though we may harbour more than a niggling suspicion that someone is really to blame.

Thanks to daveblume

Of course, there are also times when things are just too darned depressing to watch- the repeated and most graphic footage of natural disasters, MPs, from within their far more cosy lives, seeking to justify their outrageous greed or English football's latest over-remunerated revelations. At such times my language has been known to blossom into something far more colourful, often to the point where watching the news offers absolutely nothing that might be conceived as beneficial to personal wellbeing, nor helpful to any degree of domestic harmony. So, at such moments, the option of whether to watch or not might have already been wrested from my control.

Oh, so often, when attempting to analyse any 'newsworthy' event, we may stumble upon finer points, secreted within finer points, any of which might seek to lure us down any number of alternative pathways to discussion. But, I ask, entirely for the purpose of continuity, you understand, that we take much of what I have written thus far at face value, just for the present.

Having 'accepted' this dubious premise, do you still, like myself, find yourself, daily, confronted by items with which it is virtually impossible to agree? And, before you nod affirmation- how can you not?- thinking, "We all do that at times," allow me, please, to clarify further. What I mean isn't just that I find myself opposed to certain proffered opinions, arguments and statements; my objections increasingly seem to run so deeply that I can find myself offended by the mere premise of certain political 'discussions', before they have even commenced. 

Seeking to analyse this (let's for the moment refer to it as a) gulf, that serves to separate me from the world in which I reside, I think that I may have hit upon one very significant and major contributor to this chasm. 

There have been more than a couple of reported issues lately, with which I have struggled to get to grips. Indeed I would go as far as to say that I am as certain as it is possible to be that the alluded to issues are (currently) unresolvable, from within our society's 'chosen' political framework. 

For example, let us consider the very recent issue of 'dealing with rioters', perhaps in the extreme circumstances whereby they might be actively seeking to burn inhabited properties, thereby (obviously) accepting that others might die as a consequence of their actions. To shoot or not to shoot? Would you or I, were we armed, actually shoot upon someone who is seeking to burn our home and family?

For my part the answer is, "Absolutely!" if such were the very last resort. Having studied so much footage and comment, relating to recent events, it strikes me that reasoning would have been unlikely to result in anything other than significant injury to the intervener. So, yes, I am as certain as someone who has never so much as held a gun can be, that I would shoot, and might additionally resort to any form of violence that I deemed, in my heightened panicked state,  to be justified.

Thanks to Gideon Tsang

But, would I want to know that Police officers, acting on someone else's orders, could shoot such people? Remember the control that I reluctantly sought is now no longer mine. Is the answer still a rather more reluctant 'yes'? Someone, armed with something akin to a Molotov Cocktail, who might view my (should it happen) heart attack, in the stark reality of their life, as a wallet gaining opportunity, threatening to set my home and family ablaze? Again, priorities scream, "Absolutely, shoot!" But, just pause for thought for a moment; in so doing, might I not also be accepting yet another tweak to a system that is becoming ever more reactive and divided? "Where next?" I might be justified in thinking, as I cradle my vulnerable and recently saved-from-certain-death family.

You see, the real problem, I believe, is that the debate, as it stands, doesn't really have an answer; not the sort of answer that a civilised society should be seeking anyway. And that's because, I would argue, that the questions that really need to be asked at the outset are not (by design) being asked. Ask the right questions first and then the subsequent debate might take on an entirely different, and more pertinent, hue.

Currently, we reside in a country (the UK) where capitalism is king; not just king but some crazily elevated and unchallengeable deity, that nobody- not New Labour, certainly not the Conservatives, not the invertebrate Liberal Democrats, nor any other likely-to-get-elected party- dares nor wants to significantly question. This would be an increasingly laissez-faire system, based upon the simple premise of supply and demand, entirely controlled by those with the biggest wallets. Now, even if we naively accept that successive governments haven't sought to tweak, even further, the gradient of the 'level playing field' upon which we are expected to eek out an existence, in a country where the richest 3% grasp 95% of everything, before we can seek to make any sort of headway we need to address this point. The issue of the great divide is not only highly significant, it is also accelerating away from the poorest and in favour of the richest at an ever more alarming rate, and has been doing so since (I think) 1979. 

Ask yourselves this: If supply and demand (with additional tweaking from the richest, via their pawns in government) really dictates the level at which goods and services are to be made available to the wider public, how is the 'right' price arrived at? Imagine, as a fictitious shop owner, of a fictitious shop, with the freedom to determine your own fictitious retail prices within, that you seek to maximise your profits- a good thing we are constantly being reminded. You would consider, I would imagine, the means by which profits are to be sought, thus the customer and his or her means to pay.

Thanks to Caffeinehit

Now skew this beyond comprehension, by factoring in the range of customer incomes; a very 'hard-earned' £115,000 per week with many taxes avoided, right down to a reluctantly paid £150, with all manner of variables ranged in-between these extremes. Remember that exploiting your fellow human beings is the system under which we currently exist and aspire to thrive, so pitch your prices where you hope they will gain maximum profits.

Supply and demand remember; you wouldn't just give things away to beggars hoping for a free hand-out, so don't be taken in by the sob stories of those who haven't sought quite so hard to climb the employment ladder; make them show you the money before you relinquish your goods. Remember also that if lovely Phil Davies MP has his way the gap could become even wider, so this might also affect your calculations in the future. 

I know it's just a fictitious shop and you, for the purposes of musing this idea, are just pretending to be a shop keeper, but, on the other hand, this is basically the system by which so much of our lives are currently being governed. If you can afford the rail fare in to London, to undertake your job, it's because your income is deemed high enough to permit you to travel, in no way because of your need to travel. When, should it happen, your salary is not enough to afford such luxury as travelling to and from your place of employment it is simply because you are being judged, via your means to pay, as insignificant to the aims of the provider of the train 'service', which is to maximise its profits. 

The same is true of your means to buy or rent a property, your means to afford a holiday, visit a distant or sick relative, eat at a certain restaurant, obtain the right foodstuffs for a healthy lifestyle, heat your home or shack, clothe yourself, travel at all by any means, increasingly your access to adequate health care, ultimately your means to live as a dignified human being. And, if you've noticed this widening gap and every day had your nose rubbed up against the consequences of this gap, would I be right in thinking that you would feel almost ostracised by society, disenfranchised, an almost persecuted minority? Might you, in your anger and almost parallel universe, wish to react somewhat differently to the world around you? 

Now, imagine changing just one thing, in this unequal society. For example bringing the incomes of the top and the bottom earners closer together. Let's imagine bringing them as close as, for example, the top earners never receiving more than twenty times the lowest earners. £150 x 20 = £3000 and who amongst us wouldn't jump at the chance to take home three grand a week? Consider how this might affect the imaginary prices in the imaginary shop. Consider how it might affect the likelihood of rioting taking place in some of our inner cities, or simply your chances of being able to avail yourself of an affordable dentist.

Do you see my point? Maybe we need to change the parameters within which these discussions are being undertaken. Then, maybe, just maybe, the answers that are arrived at will suggest more in the way of genuine solutions and rather less in the way of reactionary responses and further subsequent restrictions upon our freedoms.

Fingers crossed and good luck to everybody as we release those magic balls.

Great minds at work?

Was I imagining it, or did it really happen? Surely someone with a sense of humour has created this one, carefully crafted its form, revised its potential to be taken seriously and pushed it out there to be considered, laughed at, and more sensibly dismissed as a pointless hoax. What do you think?

I could be wrong, I haven't actually got the time to devote to such nonsense. I really am fully committed to my own, far more pertinent, avenues of investigation. All the same, did I read that the tyres of vehicles upon Europe's roads are to be produced to a quieter overall standard, thus reducing the hiss of passing traffic? Tell me, please, that I imagined it!



Shh! Thanks to Cadigan's photostream

Am I the only person thinking, 'Oh, for the sound of hissing tyres to occasionally grace my ears, I might sell my very soul'? For these gently rounded creations to murmur more loudly than the gun-like-salvo of the speeding heavy goods vehicle, as it careers dangerously towards its next near miss or accident, whisper above the challenge of souped-up shrine-seeking youths, susurrate more clearly than the whining mosquito-engined toy-moped as it seeks out the next exclusive gathering of its kind, where the incessant revving of screaming engines might compete to cause the very ground to tremble. How on Earth will we recognise the passing of this world-changing event, so swamped will its meagre offering be?

Next, I'll be reading that the sales of exhausts with a diameter large enough to house a muscle-builder's leg have ceased, that the manufacture of cars that might easily treble the legal speed-limit is no longer permitted, or that Jeremy Clarkson has achieved gainful employment, working commitedly towards a more egalitarian and sustainable planet. Or, far more likely, it was all a dream and we are all sailing up said creek without said paddles- and that nobody thought to mention that ruddy great waterfall!



Silent night exemplified by doommeer's photostream

Distractions, who needs them? Or so I thought, but then isn't it funny how often, if you follow a false trail for long enough, it brings you back to the one true path? And what might all this have to do with Faeries, you're probably thinking.

N.B. The European Union has agreed a target of five years time, for the fitting of 'whispering tyres' to all (with the usual exemptions) European vehicles, thus reducing traffic noise by as much as two decibels per vehicle. I can barely contain myself.

'Perfect' placement.

I absolutely love music, can’t get enough of it. At home, in the car, via the i-pod, when in the city or about town; there’s just so much talent out there. Whether it’s delving deep into the past, in order to unearth some previously unheard requiem, listening spellbound to the haunting strains of a newly discovered African oud player or just revisiting old favourites from the sixties, it often really doesn’t seem to matter.

I would say that music is one of my true passions. Therefore, it might seem somewhat strange to here read that it is also one of my pet hates. Or conceivably not. A love of something would necessarily hone and perfect one’s appreciation of such, would it not, leading one towards an ever greater discernment for what feels ‘right’ for one's self.



Atmosphere by Niall McAuley's photostream

Were you to stop me in the street or driving in my car you would not have the first clue as to what my particular taste in music was, that is unless you already knew me and had had the distinct ‘misfortune’ to have listened to me banging on about this artist or that composition, or the particular resonance of a favourite instrument. My music would not have been permitted to encroach upon your day.

You see, that’s really the thing about music, at its very best it’s sometimes going to be quite personal. Areas of common ground probably, but in the fine detail it’s got to be personal, hasn’t it, appreciated and listened to largely on a personal basis, at a volume that reflects particularly this aspect of its choosing? That, of course, is not to say that some people will not also choose to listen to their particular choice of music collectively, amongst others who will have chosen to do likewise.

So now allow me to attempt to explain also my absolute loathing for music. Surely I cannot be alone in recognising that music is an art form and, as such, cannot be loved, or even liked, by everyone when represented in just one dominant, invariably rather mediocre, form.

So, as I was attempting to explain, why a loathing for music, or some forms thereof? Allow me, if you will, to transport you back to your last telephone call to any company. Recall, if you can, the imposed music that was piped down the line as substitute for the interpersonal contact you were perhaps hoping for. Or permit me to remind you of your last shopping trip, where you may have been subjected to constant assault by the musical preferences of someone-else-entirely. Or maybe last Friday night’s strained attempts at conversation, over the foot-stomping beat offered as pub ‘atmosphere.’ Picky, you’re thinking. Maybe you had assumed that your hearing had somehow taught itself to become more attuned to TV advertisements or that it was a fault with the volume control of the same said set?



And again from Mr. Greenjeans' photostream

Maybe some people would have ‘chosen’ those very ‘musical' scores, with which to have approached each individual task. Maybe I’m wrong. It’s possible but, then again, most unlikely!

What about the ear-splitting (don’t you even dare contemplate starting a meaningful conversation) bursts of drum’n’bass (is it?) that ‘have to’ fill the ‘void’ between every point in Davis Cup Tennis, or the ‘humorously’ chosen snippets that follow every wicket during the One Day Cricket Internationals? Who are we catering for; those who want to follow the tennis or the cricket are already there? Please, for the love of God, don’t tell me that we are trying to bring other civilized sports into line with the ‘needs’ of the football-type supporter! Sport for the attention deficit hyperactivity disorder spectator?



Atmosphere we can all do without from perldude's photostream

I feel that I must warn, again, of the ease with which such minds are subjected to the advertiser's whim, and of the related mind-wash that is currently rife already within 'our' lives. Music is a powerful and a  curiously dangerous tool. You would no more leave the likes of a Robbie Williams or some gun-toting rap 'artist' in charge of such than you would leave a baby alone with a razor-sharp kitchen knife- contemplate the carnage that either decision might cause!

Recognise, if you will, where such evident damage has already occurred! The youthful driver, with those vacant eyes and skewed baseball cap, that half-threatening yet terminally confused frown, window down, perhaps the ‘delicate’ strains of some rap (surely a spelling error) ‘artist’ ‘wafting gently’ outwards, ‘selling’ the ‘virtues’ of mob violence, before going on to clarify that said ‘artist’ has not yet grasped the simple definition of a word like 'respec(T)' (and surely yet another spelling error).

Which will live on longer in the memory, we are forced to consider, the imposed thrum of the bass behind the rant, or the guttural roar of the lad’s new exhaust that seems to have evaded any social requirement to considerate driving? Listen on and you may be able to track his journey for a further mile or so, before he is usurped by the next unwitting advertisement on wheels. Worryingly the link in this paragraph is to a US site, at least there the problem has been acknowledged. Meanwhile, here in the UK?



Encore Jeremy by boxchain's photostream

And that, I’m afraid, is it. Advertising, impure and simple, leaking into our lives, just like all that mercury at Minamata Bay, that seeped so venomously into the lives and bodies of all those unfortunate villagers.

It would appear that frequently the loudest of ‘musical’ impositions is selected from the very narrowest of ‘musical’ choices- perhaps from one of those cloned commercial stations, revolving around the same wafer thin selection of music industry imposed ‘tunes'. Maybe the rap number that we are ‘encouraged’ to listen to is the current cloned ‘identity’ of rebellious youth, either way the 'choice' was almost certainly an illusion, no more than blatant product placement upon an almost inert 'vehicle'. Whether that vehicle is a current sporting fixture, or the challenged intellect of a mobile youth, it makes little difference.



Yet more from Robbie Howell's photostream

Whether the roar of that surely illegal exhaust is being endorsed by the ‘razor-sharp intellect’ of Jeremy Clarkson or just ‘Darren’ (Dazza to his ‘mates’) from down the road the differences are separable solely through the turgidity of semantics. It's no more than product placement by those with huge vested interests, the Motor Trade or the Music Industry, sales figures are, as ever, ultimately the bottom line.

And you thought that Clarkson was 'speaking his mind'; you thought he didn't reap certain rewards for all that screaming product placement? I wonder if he might have chosen to reside somewhere where idiots like himself might roar past the house at any time of the day or night, or else somewhere that he doesn't have to put up with morons like himself?

In effect what he appears more than happy to perpetuate is a world where outrageous driving is almost endemic, just so long as he is able to comfortably cushion himself from these excesses; a sort of stuff you outlook.



And yet again from estherase's photostream

Has nobody explained to him the psychological and physiological impacts of this type of sustained noise upon the human mind? The softer the brain the more compliant to the advertiser's influence it will become. Beware!