I look forward to my monthly email from Google telling me of my ‘activity’ during the month. In fact, it’s the only email I get which I want. The rest are all from groupon who, I’m sure, are lovely people but in the interests of sanity should just FUCK OFF! A better man than me would ‘unsubscribe’ or do something technical, but really, it takes me no more than 17 minutes to delete the 274 emails I get each day.

Google Maps is a god. Because it is omnipotent and omniscient. It not only knows every single place I’ve been, it knows how I got there. Ok, I get that others might reduce the ‘godlike’ bit to ‘invasive, intrusive, unwanted, stalking, tracking, Big Brotherish’, but I get my monthly hilights and can actually re-live those fabulous moments spent in ‘Edgware’, which is odd because I avoid that place more than Covid, but may have driven past it on the A41 on the way somewhere better. Or that fabulous time in Colindale buying rawl plugs. That lunch at the Bells of Ousley, with a proper Harvester salad bar. It’s my monthly walk down memory lane.

Last month I drove 472 miles. It was a ‘big’ month for me. I had to drive to Chelmsford twice for the new car, and I went to Windsor to see the boatman. Both of which involved motorways and, generally, faster roads. Yet those 472 miles took me 29 hours. I’ll never get them back. That averages to about 16mph. Including the ‘fast bits’. Thus, I can deduce that it is quicker to walk round London than drive. As long as you can walk at about 12mph which of course you can’t. But 16mph?? That’s awful. Yet according to Sadiq Kahn and a bunch of pedestrian protectionists, stop oilers (even for Electric cars), Labour councillors, Vegans, pedophiles, Hamas supporters and Arsenal fans, the traffic needs to be slowed down. On the odd occasions you move at 24 mph, you now have to slow down to 20. Well, you don’t have to, you can keep driving at the ridiculously dangerous and highly emitting, deathly speed of 26 and get flashed 3 times on the same day and get a driving ban. Like my mate Jon did. But it can happen to bright people too.

The government have realised that there are one or two voters who actually drive cars. And thus are acting to prevent tossers like Sadiq Kahn implementing blanket 20mph limits across entire boroughs.

And in a few weeks get to vote for a new mayor. As a stalwart ‘Anyone but Kahn’ devotee, I’m still trying to find a candidate worth the 3 minute walk to the polling station for. It’s just like the American presidential election: how do you find the most ridiculously inappropriate and useless people out of massive populations, to stand for important jobs?

I’m going to stand next time. Then London can become a complete ‘no speed limits’ area and we can finally approach the Mad Maxian dystopia I’ve always craved.

Happy Thursday

A xxxx