Aaaaaaaaah.
I’m in Torchwood Town having arrived just before one o’clock this morning. Traffic wasn’t the snarling snake of frustration I was expecting (”Snarling snake”. Hmm. Yes. I like that. Do you like that?) so the late arrival was down to my having stopped off for an enthusiastic bitch-licking by Daisy en route. Oops - I mean “daisy”.
After considering the weather forecast for this weekend, I really thought hard about which vehicle to bring down. It would have been a wonderful trip with the roof down, assuming I survived it, but in the end common sense prevailed and it’s the Sirion which carried me.
I say “survived it” because it seems the Copen is developing the power of invisibility. Five times in the past week - thrice on Tuesday alone - I had to sound its mighty horn to stop idiots in the next lane side-swiping me when the decided that the lane I was is would be a much better place to be driving than the lane they’d originally chosen. As it turns out, the third of Tuesday’s idiots was also going to Ganglion Square car park. I was still shouting obscenities at her when she turned off and I imagine she was a little concerned when I, too, turned off. Then followed her into the multi-storey. When she pulled into a space and I noticed her look, worried, into her rear view mirror I couldn’t help mouthing one last obscenity before whizzing off to a space of my own.
What I don’t understand is that - at this time of day - 99% of the traffic is commuters, who make this journey every working day. Why, then, can they not plan their journey? My thought process follows the logic: I’m going in to Ganglion Square, so I need to be in the middle lane at the Dook Street roundabout, so that means the inside lane at the bottom on Haemorroid Hill and stay in that lane at the next roundabout. Easy, because it’s a journey I make five times each week. Now it could well be that the outside lane between the bottom of Haemorroid Hill and the Dook Street roundabout moves a little faster than the inside lane, but that’s no reason to stay in this lane and then try to barge someone out of your way when you suddenly realise that - just the same as yesterday - it seems you have to turn left. Quelle surprise! Idiots.
But enough of that. I’ve no irritants to deal with for four days.
Apart, that is, from the clueless strudelkopf who reached the ticket barrier at a surprisingly busy the Severn Crossing before realising that he did not have £5.10 in cash on him. He was two vehicles ahead of me and I had not bothered to source the correct money in coins to allow me to use the “bins”, nor have I got around to getting a “TAG pass” yet. I’d expected the crossing to be quiet, you see. The strudelkopf actually got out of his car and opened his boot at one point before the toll collector called in backup and the strudelkopf was led away by an official-looking vehicle to be treated appropriately. I hope he enjoyed the probing. Bah.
Most of four days, then.
This break will give me time to reflect on why I should learn to “drop” subjects. It seems I may have strayed a little too close to the edge this week with Ferny the Goth. Now FtG has a perfectly valid excuse for mixing up letters and not being the World’s Best Speller and she has exhibited a sense of humour about this.
I was ranting quietly about a program I’d written having failed because someone had ‘corrected’ the spelling of a folder name on our shared drive.
“Well it wasn’t me”, FtG said.
“Well, no. I didn’t think it would be you.” I countered, without thinking. My tone having made it obvious that this was a reference to her difficulty rather than any particular faith in her ability not to meddle.
I got away with this, though. It was later in the day that I went too far.
“How do you spell ‘innocuous’?” she asked me.
“‘innocuous’?”
“Yes.”
“YOU’RE trying to spell ‘innocuous’?”
“That’s not fair. You can go too far, you know.” she laughed (briefly). “So how do you spell it?”
“To tell you the truth, I wouldn’t.”
This she found amusing. Thank goodness.