Square peg in a round hole?
STURDY wooden toys are often given to children when they are very young.
A common one is a simple board with different shaped holes in it through which the youngster is challenged to insert a correctly shaped wooden piece.
So answer me this. Why when children grow up into adults have they totally lost this shape-into-space ability?
A classic example came near a Weymouth primary school where the entry was jammed with cars and so were the exit, both sides of the road and the only remaining traffic lane in the middle.
Yet even though a blindfolded lemming could see the way was blocked it didn’t prevent some bright parents from driving into what clear space was left, naturally doing so from both ends of the road at the same time.
The result was a driving farce that Brian Rix would have been proud of.
No one could drive into the school to collect children or, having got them, drive out of the school gates while those who had parked by the side of the road were forced to stay there.
This was because the only lane they could pull out into was blocked both ways by drivers meeting each other head on in the middle.
It was the ludicrously surprised looks on their faces that amused me as if it was somehow unexpected that each driving towards the other along a single lane should end with a logjam in the middle.
I have no defence for getting snarled up in this battleground because I’ve driven through the area enough times to know that you avoid the end of the school day like the plague.
So why did I do it? Well, I’d tried to take a short cut because the main road in front of me had seemed even worse because of roadworks. I think I should have stayed at home.
What price filling up potholes?
A NATIONAL news article claimed that one county council had suffered so much winter road damage that it was facing a £5 million bill to fill in all the potholes.
What price filling in all the potholes in Weymouth, eh?
There are some beauties on Radipole Lane, Chickerell Road, Lanehouse Rocks Road, Dorchester Road and Quibo Lane near my home. I know because I’ve abseiled down into some of them.
The trouble is that snow has been replaced by rain and so the holes are full of water and often completely hidden.
The first inkling you have of trouble is a bone-shaking jolt as the wheel of your car is swallowed.
At least two potholes I know of are more than 12 inches in diameter and if you hit that big a hole at any speed it will shake your tooth fillings loose.
I can’t hold out much hope for them to be filled in soon because it is budget time at the council and every penny is being watched like a cat at a mousehole. Maybe we’ll get it done in time for next winter.
Will they get the message?
THEY were casual kings of all they surveyed, lounging lords wreathed in cigarette smoke as they relaxed after school by sitting on someone’s garden wall.
The wrist cocked languidly to tap ash on to the pavement had just the right degree of superior indifference to the rest of the world and set just the right “Look at how adult I am” tone for younger pupils to admire.
Unfortunately this spotty poser and his cronies couldn’t have been more than 14 or 15 years old and presumably were only superior because they were out of sight of teaching staff.
I have deliberately avoided identifying the senior school involved because under-16 pupils smoking cigarettes is not a cross borne solely by one site. It is pretty much a universal problem.
What got me was the brazen nature of the pupils involved, smoking right next to a major Weymouth road and a bus stop where they were bound to be seen. It certainly didn’t appear to say much about the deterrents facing them because furtive they were not.
Also, leaving all the obvious health hazards to one side, are local schools now so indifferent to residents living near their premises that pupils are allowed to puff away while lounging on people’s garden walls?
I’m not calling for them to be strung up, but an occasional and public tour by teaching staff of the area near a school might just catch enough of the little darlings to get the “no smoking” message across because that message is certainly being blatantly ignored at the moment.
The unkindest cut!
TWO elderly women chatting over a cup of coffee were worried about their doctor.
One said to the other: “He’s a lovely man but he don’t half have cold hands.”
The other woman replied: “Yes, I noticed that. Must be those budget cutbacks they’re on about in the health service. Don’t have enough money to turn the surgery radiators on!”
www.viewfrompublishing.co.uk
No comments:
Post a Comment