Dom Davis (The Blog)

Driving home from work last night¹ I got to witness 3 idiots in cheap, little hatchbacks almost literarily ram their way into the queue of traffic by the airport. These yoofs² has shot down the outside lane at well over the speed limit, slammed on the anchors when the merge arrows appeared and forced people to perform near emergency stops as the dove into the tiniest of gaps to avoid the also breaking oncoming traffic.

These prats then proceeded to literally swarm round the back of the car in front, desperate to overtake. The one attempt that was made was foiled due to the inability of cars like that to do 60 to anything appreciably faster than 60 in a small space of time. I know, I drive one. Another flurry of break lights and into the rather large gap the driver following these morons was leaving.

The next bit of interesting driving was undertaking the car in front on the roundabout while it tried to turn left. I think he knew it was going to happen so he let them scream off before taking his exit.

The three cars in front of me all went left at the roundabout leaving me the lead following car behind the idiots so I decide to keep up the best I can to see what they get up to. Little Po shot out of the roundabout and was soon gaining on the morons, who were now swarming behind a van that wasn’t exactly being slow. 500 yards on and the van starts breaking and indicating right. As he pulled into the turning lane I saw the final part of ridiculous driving. Two cars undertook the van, the last one overtook him so this poor sod had vehicles flying past him on both sides.

What really made me laugh was that I was now behind them and, knowing how Po responds, was actually able to keep up with them until I gave up at 65. I hope for their sakes they were in 1 and 1.2l cars because otherwise they just got pwned by Po

I didn’t see them after that. I was rather hoping they would get stuck behind someone doing 40, which you so often do down that road³, or maybe see them in a ditch somewhere as they were definitely racing and were probably hitting a ton down a road that’s not designed to support it. It’s little wonder car insurance for teenaged boys is so expensive.

¹ Yes, I know. Sucks to be me.
² because, let’s face it, it’s only going to be idiot teenage boys who have just passed their test driving in cars like that in a manner that proves that they are just dickheads.
³ as I did 5 minutes later.

Im so very tempted to start a website called youdrivelikeanasshole.com where I can vent my frustration at the absolute cocks out there on the road.

This weekend we’ve had the bike that didn’t like the fact I was slowing down so tried to overtake, only to notice the flashy yellow thing on the right of the car whereupon he aborted his manoeuvre and allowed me to turn. We’ve had the guy doing 53, regardless of the speed limit, refusing to go and faster when we hit 60 areas, and yet when someone started doing 50 in font of them they started falling back, accelerating very hard and braking sharply right up the arse of that car in order to make them go faster. There’s been multiple “I’m going to do 40 in a 60″ people, a twat of an estate agent driving right up people’s arses, lane hopping, speeding, jumping lights and brushing his hair, some moron ‘reserving’ spaces at a carpark. And not forgetting the van driver who was so far up my arse I couldn’t see a thing (I ended up slowing down to about 20, but instead of overtaking he shot down a side road, only to pull out in front of me 10 minutes later and scream off doing 60+ down a road that’s 40 for a reason). As he charged down roads that are not quite single track, but fairly tight when passing, at least two cars coming the other ways were forced to break hard and dive for the verge to let him past. The great irony being he never got that much further ahead as he was having to brake so hard for everything and I’d just catch up.

So yes, a website, where I can record as much detail as possible about each and every moron I encounter. And then, when I’m elected into power: death squads. Or failing that a sternly written email to The Daily Mail

No blog yesterday as I had to drive into work. Unlike blogging and commuting on a train, blogging and commuting in a car first work. At least not if you’re the driver.

On the way back home the car went beep and the little petrol warning light went on. Since I normally fill the car up well before this happens, and since we don’t drive all that often, the beeping confused the hell out of me initially. A few seconds later and I’d worked it out and was being told the car now had a range of 49 miles. No problem, the garage I was going to stop at was less than 10 miles away.

5 minutes later at 50mph and the car was telling me 52 miles range. Clearly not the most accurate of fuel gauges and/or algorithms. I’ve no idea what it was telling me when I finally pulled into the garage (probably 100+ miles) but I don’t think I was in any danger of running dry. That said, it was the emptiest it’s been in a long time.

Now if you’d asked me there and then how much it costs to fill the tank I’d have told you just over £30. There’s a bit left in there so probably £32. Nope. In went the hose, up went the trigger, in went the fuel. £30 came and went, rapidly followed by £32, £34, £36 and £38. When it hit £40 I did a quick check just in case I was trying to fill the wrong car. I mean, £40 worth of fuel is for big cars, not little ones. *clunk*. The tank was finally full. £42.18!

So it would seem that, from dry, it now costs somewhere in the region of £45 to fill the tank. Maybe I’d better actually start taking notice of petrol prices instead of just whacking in fuel when I’m near a garage and the tank is two-thirds empty.

Goron, I dread to think how much your car costs to fill. Or how much pressing the loud peddle must cost.

I know you’re all¹ dying to know if we made it back OK and I can happily say we did. Despite dire warnings of severe weather, predictions that this was going to be the busiest weekend for travel of the year, and stories of various motorways that we needed to use being closed the journey was, in fact, for the most part quite boring.

Starting off was fun. There was only a couple of inches of snow but the road we were on was an infrequently travelled B road which may or may not have been gritted, but was certainly very snowy with lots of ice in the tracks made by vehicles that had proceeded us.

On our journey up I had discovered that I drove down this road far too slowly for the Welsh, who proceeded to flash me, bully me and generally be a nuisance until they could overtake me. That’s fine, but it was dark, icy and I didn’t know the road so I was sticking to 40 on the bendy bits. On the way back even the people in four wheel drive vehicles seemed to accept my choice of 20-30mph with nary a complaint.

5 miles into the journey we emerged from the B road to an A road. The tracks were wider and were devoid of ice, although on sections where it was dual carriageway only one lane was passable. Still, improved conditions and less windy roads meant speeds could creep up to 40.

As we hit the M54 the slow lane was pretty much clear. Speeds increased to 60, although some people had decided that this wasn’t enough. One moron in an 4×4 pulled out into the snow and ice covered fast lane and tried to overtake. They got as far as accelerating, skidding and scaring the crap out of themselves before meekly pulling in behind me again and letting me set the pace.

By the time we hit the M6 the roads were clear and 70 was both perfectly possible and safe. The roads stayed like this until Thursford where we made a stop of a few hours to see the Christmas Spectacular² before heading home. During the show the snow had begun falling in Norfolk so the final part of the journey was again done slowly and with care.

Personally I enjoy the challenge of driving in icy and snowy conditions so the 30 minutes or so it added to the journey wasn’t an issue for me. I suspect it would have been if we were stranded for hours not moving but thankfully we avoided that. Not sure the same can be said for some of my friends though.

¹And by all I am, of course, excluding those I’ve already spoken to… and those who’ve read Facebook… which leaves 1 of you I think.

²Well worth going. You’ve probably missed out on 2010, but if you book early for 2011 you can get good seats.

It turns out that motorway driving at night is, in my opinion, easier than during the day. You’re separated from oncoming traffic enough that their headlights don’t cause the same issues as on a single carriageway and, when moving between lanes it’s easy to spot where everyone else is, especially if their in your blond spot because their lights just give them away.

I also discovered that in third at about 4,500 revs there is a tiny bit of grunt in Po’s 1104cc engine which meant I could risk overtaking some of the slower moving vehicles on the drive.

About 90 minutes into our journey we stopped at a pub for food. It was here that I discovered Po had a massive scratch along her passenger door. Some bastard had either keyed her, or run a shopping trolley into her or otherwise injured her while she was parked. Since were not sure when it happened we can’t be sure. There’s me thrashing the nuts off her and she’s injured, albeit just winged.

Despite her wound Po performed admirably over the weekend, if a little thirstily (for her size of engine) as squeezing out that last little drop of performance rather wrecks the fuel economy. Unfortunately the biggest challenge was about to come.

25 minutes from home, entering a little village called Letheringset (fantastic pub there if you ever fancy a meal by the way), we had slowed to just under 30 when a big four wheel drive pulls out of a side road to our right. He’s already made one abortive attempt at pulling out and we’re that close to him that I assumed he was going to pull half way out, wait for us and the car behind to pass and slot in behind. After all, Po is bright red, he’s surely seen us and isn’t going to pull out in front….

…yes, yes he is. Brakes were firmly applied and I wondered if I’d stopped in time or if Po was now sporting a new accessory off her offside front wing.

Now, to give you an idea of the final speed of the incident imagine, if you will, you’ve turned off a roundabout that has two lanes that instantly merge into one. Some tosser has gone round you and is bullying their way in front. You have to slow and they try squeeze in front of you. Eventually both cars stop at close to hitting and the car that can proceed without causing a crash wins. It was like that only in our case there weren’t two lanes going into one, just one small lane that our new appendage had tried to merge into and they weren’t slowing, or indeed doing anything to avoid us. Not going to work.

Anyway, he pulls off into the next little turning on the left and we followed. Not sure what to do, or how to react (he wasn’t the first person to drive at me that weekend, just the most successful) I opened the door to be met by a very apologetic man which rather diffused the situation. The Zozo, being infinitely more practical than I, proceeded to take charge of the situation and organise things like insurance details and the noting down of the number plate.

During the discussion the damage was assessed. Remember that I wasn’t even sure if we’d hit. I’d stalled the car and been a little surprised but during the whole thing hadn’t heard any bangs. The Zozo, on the other hand, tells a tale of hearing the tortured screams of metal upon metal. The reality was somewhere in between. We had hit, but barely. Po was sporting less red paint and more silver paint than before and the other car was slightly scuffed if you knew where to look. I believe the term is traded paint.

As accidents go it was almost pleasant. It’s not something I’d like to repeat, but if you absolutely, positively have to crash then that’s how you want it to happen. Meanwhile we’ll get a quote for buffing Pos front wing and see if we can’t get her scratch sorted at the same time.

This weekend The Zozo and I are off to the northern part of the Republic of Yorkshire to visit my family and go to a zoo (the name of which escapes me, but it’s near Doncaster so we’re going Sunday and driving home afterwards).

The drive North will involve motorways. On a Friday. At night. I have done motorway driving before (twice, the last time we went to North Yorkshire so the drive there and the drive back) but this was during daylight hours at more sedate times of the day. Tonights journey will be advanced motorway driving which is why I’ve asked The Zozo if I can drive. Got to learn sometime

Anyway, if you see a little red Citroën C2 pootling along the A17 or A1(M) cut me some slack… and please don’t drive at 40.

Hopefully Mondays post will be about Zoo visits (due to an uneventful and therefore unblogworthy drive) and not the drive up :S