Today I've mostly bin...

[eirian]

we got a parking ticket last year. I appealed (I'd parked in a disabled spot apparently, but since the markings were impossible to see in the dark and the wall signs were miles away from the spot I thought it was worth it). After a long wait (and I mean long - months, not even weeks), we got a notice from bailiffs that we now owed the excess as well, plus admin costs. We contacted them and explained that we'd appealed but not heard back. They said they'd contact the parking ticket company and get back to us. Guess what? They didn't. Again, another couple of months later, we were contacted again. Sigur carefully pointed out that since they hadn't come back to us within the specified time, the ticket was no longer valid.
He looked up the company on the WWW and found lots of posts of similar cases, and the recommendation to send a cheque shaped piece of paper in an unstamped envelope just to make them pay to get it! They basically haven't a leg to stand on if they come back to us again.

However, when we got the speeding fine, even though we'd not seen any sign of a speed camera on the stretch of road mentioned (and we always keep an eye out for them...), Sigur is going on that 4 hour course. Oh, and Bunny, it's only £70 for us as we were stopped in Lancashire. If we'd been stopped in Greater Manchester it would have been £80, so I guess you are in an expensive part of the world!

[SparkOut]

I was once stopped by a police driver on the motorway where the "missing link" of the M20 between Ashford and Maidstone had recently been opened (so there was a *lot* of speeding going on) and advised that "I've been following you for 2 miles at speeds between 102 and 108 miles an hour".

Now seeing as this was untrue (I guess he'd spotted some speck speeding in the distance and getting closer, decided it was me...) I was afraid of the "your word against ours" situation, but my statement that "I don't think my car can go 108 miles an hour" (Ford Escort 1.3, manufacturer's quoted top speed of 98 mph) seems to have lead them to think twice about raising a prosecution.
So sometimes you can argue with unfair cases and have the right result, but I wonder what my chances would have been if I'd been driving a more powerful car.

[Snoopy]

.....picking up my grandsons from school at the start of the summer holidays.....in the pouring rain I hope we don't have this for the next seven weeks

[MBH]

I went on this course then I didn't get points on my licence - which is good because they load car insurance by 10% once you have points...

Yes Sis - been there done that It sounds like it's had as much effect on your attitude as it did on mine.

I'm just so irritated that I hadn't actually done anything wrong.

Interesting - sounds like a story there.

Since I tend to always be in a hurry, it's probably a minor miricale that I've lasted as long without being caught (I have great awareness of cars, pedestrians, cyclists, etc - but never notice speed cameras). So it was very annoying when I got a letter through regarding a day when I wasn't in a hurry, just on my way to pick someone up.

It was a new car that I was busy getting used to, I was in a 40 limit through a business estate, and I was on cruise control at 40. As I went up a bank towards a roundabout I was busy slowing down. It's a roundabout for crying out loud - of course I was slowing down. After getting the letter saying I was doing 38 in a 30 limit I actually had to drive back to the area to see what was going on.

Due to problems on the roundabout a number of YEARS ago, they've stuck aa specific shift to 30 (which I somehow missed) Within spitting distance there is then a 'camera' sign, and an easy lob of atennis ball after that was the camera. I never paced it out, but I figure about 50 yards for the lot and all this within sight of the roundabout (which was where I was obviously concentrating).

A number of people in the claass seemed very 'moved' bby the lessons we were taught, but it didn't changge my view that speed doesn't kill it is HITTING people that does the damage. Experience tells me I don't hit people with my car but they always fight back with the "But what if....." Feels like you're being punished for what might happen but hasn't and I can't see myself in the same criminal category as someone who goes ont and bops an old lady over the head for her purse

[SparkOut]

A number of people in the claass seemed very 'moved' bby the lessons we were taught, but it didn't changge my view that speed doesn't kill it is HITTING people that does the damage. Experience tells me I don't hit people with my car but they always fight back with the "But what if....." Feels like you're being punished for what might happen but hasn't and I can't see myself in the same criminal category as someone who goes ont and bops an old lady over the head for her purse

Oh definitely true. IMHO speed restrictions are there for the "blanket" case and I believe are often in inappropriate places. It seems that for a few mph over the limit but "otherwise" in full control and safe, many people are being penalised, yet the ones who are dangerous and reckless will ignore the limit whether it is 60 mph or 30 mph. I do think that outside a school speeding should be treated more harshly, but so should the parking!

[Bunnylump]

Well, you can imagine how annoying that was when I KNOW I was actually driving at 28 mph, NOT 36. It made me laugh though. I was sitiing next to a 20 year old girl (who was really thick). The instructor asked us to rate ourselves on a 1-10 scale on how well we thought we drive, 1 being a new learner and 10 being an experienced, excellent driver. I rated myself as 5 - I'm a pretty careful driver but I am not all that confident in driving in, say, places like London, or where there are lots of interchanges etc. On the other hand, I have now been driving continuously for for 34 years. Basically, I know my limits. The girl next to me (as I say, 20 years old) rated herself at TEN. Which, I thought, summed up the problem nicely. Young dirvers (including me, when I was young) THINK they know it all. They are ridiculously over confident, and combined with that are often driving old clapped out cars which aren't particularly well maintained or safe.

There was also a bimbo, who not only turned up 20 minutes after the course had started (everyone else had turned up 15 minutes beforehand, as instructed) but who also (despite strict instructions to the contrary) was texting in the middle of the session. When we were doing the interactive bit with the zappers to vote for what choices we were making on the IWB, she chose, for the questions "what is the maximum speed limit on a dual carriageway?" 40 mph. We were rather surprised by this (of course it is 70) until she admitted that she didn't know what a "dual carriageway" was. As I drove off, I watched her driving off in the car park in front of me, with her phone in one hand and the steering wheel in the other, chatting away. Obviously the course made a massive impact on HER.

The man running the course spent the whole time asking "does that make sense?" or "I expect you are all surprised by that". No, I wasn't surprised by any of it. I know about stopping distances: I passed my driving test and have a highway code book. I know about the difference a couple of mph make to the death statistics: I've seen the adverts on the TV like everyone else. I know how to recognise when it is likely that the speed limit will change - I've been driving for 34 years. I KNOW children outside schools are stupid and step out without looking. I know that safety cameras cost 21 000 a year to run and install. I EVEN know that at certain speeds the first impact point on your body is the safety belt, followed by the airbag, followed by your internal organs rattling about inside you.

I can honestly say, that in the four hours (plus half an hour either way to get there) the ONLY thing I learned was that putting winter tyres on your car could be classed as a modification as far as your insurance company is concerned. And the only reason I found that out was by asking him.

An utter waste of money and time. Not to mention the admin costs of the letters I was sent and processing the prosecution. All for a crime I didn't commit. Haven't they got better things to do, like catch criminals? Well, obviously not: when my son was in year 10 he was assaulted on his way to school, and despite this being reported by both me and the head teacher, telling them that it was the postman who was delivering in a certain road at a certain time, the police couldn't possibly manage to find out who did it. It's enough to make you weep, isn't it??

[strep98]

...just been up the sealife viewing tower in Weymouth and survived without wanting to jump out

[giraffe]

I had to go up a narrow spiral staircase in a library the other day. Claustrophobia and vertigo at the same time!

[Bunnylump]

Spiral staircases are DEFINITELY the invention of the devil.

Strep - you could have popped in to Cenwulf for a cuppa!!

[gill216]

... killing slugs and snails that have appeared in bountiful numbers because of the rain. I used to feel awful about salting them and watching them shrivel until I discovered that each slug can live 2 years and in that time they can be responsible for 40,000 descendants. I think the entire slug population lives in my garden because in the time my son lived here he was too soft to control them.

[Bunnylump]

I've even resorted to slug pellets. Which I don't want to use really because stupid cat eats them. But snails have completely demolished about half of my bedding plants and all of my strawberries, so I'm not happy. My hanging baskets, however, are glorious (because the snails find it hard to get to them!)This year I used miraclegro potting compost and I have to say it is brilliant. I also used it for my courgette plants and so far they are growing really well. Further up the garden it looks like a jungle because the grass is seeding in the flowerbeds and I can't go near it for fear of asthmatic attacks.

[gill216]

I'm looking at my tub of pellets now. They are called slug death. Good enough for them too. They've had my tomatoes cucumbers peppers potatoes bedding plants and goodness only knows what else as well. Oh yes, strawberries as well as the beetroot and I've even found them on my raspberry canes.

Cats? My tub says nothing about being harmful to animals Next door one way has 2, the other way has a dog. Our garden is like the cats M1. Next door has the fox M1. I don't want to be harming any of those creatures.

[Bunnylump]

You can get pet friendly slug pellets but they don't flipping well work.

[LAT]

we have also been inundated with slugs and snails this year (but no puppy dogs' tails )
The pellets I am using work to a certain extent but they still keep coming.

We seem to have spent a large part of today watching the tennis but were amused to see a few of the fans in the crowd watching the Murray Baghdatis match. There were four of them with bright pink tops on with the letters M U R Y on them. We guessed that R and A had to go as they probably had something better to do this evening!

[Bunnylump]

Yes, I spotted that too. Or maybe they were supporting a Liverpudlian Madonna?

[LAT]

Naah, I reckon they were wise enough to escape before the end.
Did you see the little boy earlier, just before the match started, that the commentator likened to Just William?

[Bunnylump]

No, I missed that bit. That probably means the poor lad will be called that forever now...

[LAT]

he was wearing school uniform complete with cap and he had his entrance ticket tied through his blazer buttonhole so he looked a bit like an evacuee with a "please look after this bear" tag. He was wriggling around rolling up his trousers and sleeves!.

[strep98]

....learned to shoot an airgun yesterday, off to learn archery today!

My daughter shot a golf tee off a block at 20 feet. I knew that call of duty game was good in a way, you should have seen the look on the boastful lads faces

[Bunnylump]

Remind me not to wind you up then...