I had to do some stuff in Claremont this lunchtime. (It’s a Friday, in case you are reading this far into the future, or if you are reading today, but have no understanding of basic time stuff.) I didn’t have much choice in doing this thing at this time, but it was a bad time to be doing it, because it was school kicking out time, and there are a number of schools in that vicinity which were, as was their wont, kicking out.
The school run each day makes up nearly all of the traffic in our area. There are many, many schools and therefore many, many students and most of them get driven to school. It can be chaos. I get it. I see it twice every day.
The upshot of this is that parents make their own rules to deal with the traffic a bit more easily. And yes, this works, but there are some drawbacks. For example, Kenmar Road, adjacent to a very prim and proper posh Girls’ school, becomes one way for the duration of the school runs. But… not officially. The Yummy Mummies in their big Chelsea Tractors and Phat White Porsches only go in at the bottom and out at the top. And while this undoubtedly makes the traffic in that area flow a bit more easily at these times, if you don’t know that it’s temporarily and unofficially one way (because there are no signs and your Girl is not at that posh Girls’ school) you can cause utter chaos by simply (and legally) going the “wrong way”.
This is both frustrating and a whole lot of fun. But you’d likely only do it once.
I have done it once (by accident), and I was sworn at, hooted at, and had several mummies roll their eyes back so far they could see their overpriced haircuts from the inside.
But how was I to know? And why should I abide by their self-imposed “rules”, anyway?
Today, I didn’t drive the “wrong way” down Kenmar Road. But, I did have the audacity to [gasp] pull over and [second gasp] park(!) on a road nearby. Oops.
For the record, your Honour, I had no choice in where I parked, because it was where I needed to load a lot of heavy and messy stuff into my car.
But it made one posh Girls’ school mum in a John Cooper Works Mini (nice) so incandescent with rage that she wound her window down to fling her hand out in a “what are you doing?!?” kind of way, before screaming away up the road, knocking a squirrel over (and yes, killing it – unfair contest) as she raced off to collect Persephone and Jocasta from the posh Girls’ school.
I’m a bit sad about the squirrel. Well, I was sad briefly. If the nasty lady had been paying a bit more attention instead of frothing at the mouth, she might have avoided it, but on the other hand, the squirrel was on the road and they are annoying little invasive bastards, so one fewer of them is not bad thing.
But what if it had been a children?
Long story short (really? – Ed.), I’m tired of having to fit in with these little Hitlers and their selfish made-up rules to make their lives easier at the expense of everyone else around them. They come over into our middle-class suburbs in their larney cars for a few minutes each day before heading back to the salubrious safety of Silverhurst and Bishopscourt, but they still feel the need to be in charge of us peasants while they’re here.
Well, sod ’em. I don’t go into their posh-end estates and try to tell them where they can drive and park, do I?
No. Not often, anyway.
So, I’ll – legally – drive where I want and park where I want, when I want, thank you very much. Just cos you have a nice car and a posh Girl, it doesn’t make you the boss of me, lady.
Ha! And I told my wife I’d get right through this post without actually mentioning Herschel by name.
Mission accomplish-oh.
