Category: Madness

Surgery Closure Petition


If you live in Locks Heath hopefully you will know about this.

The Locks Heath doctors surgery in Locks Road, which has been in operation for around 100 years, is set to close. Current Locks Road patients will be transferred to the newer joint practice surgery in Whitely,  a seven mile round trip.

Hundreds of people have signed a petition opposing the planned closure of the Locks Road Surgery and a worried resident has placed forms protesting about the closure in local shops. So far just under a thousand people have signed on behalf of themselves and their family.

Anyone who knows the area will know that the distance is not the only issue with the surgery move. To get from Locks Heath to Whitely one has to negotiate one of the busiest roundabout/junction complexes in the region. This route is the main interchange between the M27, A27, local business parks and residential areas.  It is a complete log-jam at peak times and very busy the rest of the time.

Anyone who is sick and having to visit the Whitely surgery will find this quite stressful. It is also not a route to walk, for those who do not have a car.

There has been some suggestion that a shuttle bus could be run to get folks to the new Whitely surgery. Of course that makes perfect sense….NOT.

Will the shuttle be available all day or at least for all of the normal surgery hours ?

And how much will that cost ?

Couldn’t such money be made available to upgrade the current surgery to make it “fit for purpose” ?

When does a surgery that has been in operation for nearly a century suddenly become unfit for purpose ?

Just another example of  what is good for the bean counters taking precedence over what is good for the community.

If you are a user of the Locks Road surgery I suggest you look out the petition and get your name on it.

Get Juggernauts Off Residential Roads


Before we go any further I don’t really want to get them off the roads completely. There is a place for them but it certainly isn’t delivering to our local Tesco Express.

To be precise, the WATERLOOVILLE LAVENDER ROAD EXPRESS.

Lavender Road is a residential road leading off Frendstaple Road. It is the main access to a number of private homes, an old folks home and the local doctors surgery as well as being the address for the aforementioned Tesco store which has a car park capable of taking nearly 20 vehicles.

This road is regularly compromised by the parking up of  articulated lorries which are waiting their turn to deliver goods to the store.  They are usually waiting because there is already an articulated lorry offloading.

Any vehicle parked in this spot would be causing a hazard but an articulated lorry is well over 40 feet long. If a car was parked in this spot you do have some chance of seeing around it and even some visibility through the windows. An articulated lorry doesn’t give you any visibility through the vehicle, it is significantly wider than a car and also higher.

  1. Quite often lorries parked here do so facing the wrong way. That is to say it is parked on the right hand side of the road, facing the oncoming traffic who, if they are turning left  into Lavender Road, cannot see if there is anything coming towards them until they are already exposed.
    I guess the direction they are facing doesn’t really matter since the obstruction is the same either way.
  2. The folks who were lucky enough to have safely made it into the car park and now wish to leave cannot see round the back end of the trailer (or front) to see those vehicles that are also playing Russian Roulette and about to make the dash along the far side of the trailer.
  3. At peak times in the morning i.e. during the school run this road at its junction with Frendstaple Road becomes very busy. With an articulated lorry parked just short of the junction to say this road becomes congested is an understatement

If there hasn’t already been an accident caused by these trucks I will be very surprised.

The current weather / road conditions has exacerbated the situation.  I was witness to latest milk delivery when the truck driver was struggling to turn his vehicle around so that he could reverse up to the Tesco loading dock. Needless to say his 40ft trailer did not want to go where he wanted it to go as it skated from side to side on the ice. During his many attempts access to the doctor’s surgery, the old folks home and a number of private houses was completely blocked.

Come on Tesco. This is dangerous. Its time for you to rethink the delivery options to your local stores before you cause the death of one of your customers.

Dickheads


What a pair of total dickheads.

Harassed and corralled a hapless motorist. Prevented them from leaving the motorway and all the while shouting and gesticulating at them as they drove at speeds up to 80 mph.

How could they be so incredibly stupid. I believe they deserve a custodial sentence.

Its herberts like these that are driving our insurance costs sky-high. No wonder the insurance companies make it nigh on impossible for youngsters to get insurance at a reasonable price.

Personal Grooming


The PC brigade are on the loose again.

School dinner lady, Pat Lavery, handed a boy a biscuit after he asked for one. The boy is a relative.

Subsequently, Mrs Lavery was  told  that under the Child Protection Act she could  be seen to be grooming the child. Over a period of  two years or so the situation escalated to the point that she was informed she could lose her job.

All because she gave a boy a biscuit.

Mrs Lavery’s experience is yet another example of common sense being thrown out the window. Full story here

Taking things to an illogical extreme, at the end of this month there will be thousands of children accepting sweets and other treats from thousands of strangers.

Is it possible that I could be accused of grooming young children if I respond to the  Trick or Treat requests on my door step ?

Give These People A Kick Up The Arse


An unemployed man, spends his own money to tout for work, has his benefits cut because he wasn’t actively looking for work.

This is madness.

No wonder so many of the benefit claimants sit on their bums all day and just take the money. What incentive is there when the government jobs-worths take punitive action against those that try to help themselves.

The Job-Centre staff in Basildon, Essex need their arses kicking

See here

In The Wrong Job


I am definitely going to change jobs. Or perhaps I should say I am going to give up working.

Heard on the radio today about a guy who apparently was “earning” in excess of £20k a year thru begging. He was also claiming benefits.

It is estimated that he was collecting around £50 per day and nearer £100 per day at the weekend.

Oh, by the way, he’s not homeless. He lives in a flat with his girlfriend.

So, yes I am giving up working. I just need to decide on the best spot to place my tin. Anyone got some string, with a scrawny but cute mongrel attached, that I can borrow.

Extreme Tourists – Cape Town to Paris 20,000 km, 3 years on, foot


Are Guillaume and Enora just plain crazy or are they on the ultimate adventure ?

I don’t know, but what I do know is that I am ever so slightly jealous. This is just the sort of thing that I wish I had done when I was much younger.  Unfortunately I am now of an age where I have too many encumbrances /  responsibilities  which probably make me a coward when I wonder if I could do something like this.

Guillaume and Enora are travelling off the beaten track on foot with back packs weighing up to 17 lbs (8Kg) and their budget allows for less than two dollars a day. Days when they don’t know where they will sleep, how far it is to the next village or when they will eat or drink.

Their journey is taking them through areas which are still recovering from conflict and certainly through some of the poorest areas of our world.

I for one am intrigued to see how they get on and wish them the best of luck. I intend to follow their journey through their website and, if they ever get it going, their blogs. You too can follow their adventures here

Council Jobsworths Should Hang Their Heads In Shame


What heartless people Milton Keynes Council are.

A disabled pensioner, Brenda Coker,  is set to celebrate her 80th birthday alone after the council banned its carers from visiting her on their days off. Where as all the community spirit gone ? These carers have been visiting her for fifteen years, so why is there a problem now ?

Its actions like this that make us, as a nation, look stupid and uncaring.

These carers should be congratulated for providing care above and beyond their duty. But no. In our twisted world they are banned and a pensioner is penalised.

The Milton Keynes Council Jobsworths Should Hang Their Heads In Shame

Read more HERE


School Sports – Not In The Real World – Why bother ?


It beggars belief that those schools that still have sports days are rewarding all participants, winners and losers. And this helps our children how ?

Note I used the word “loser” because in the world that I was brought up in if you didn’t win then you lost. OK you may have come second or third or even forty-third. The point is you didn’t win. The only awards were for those that won. The only names that went up on the achievements boards in my school were those of the winners. Yes those that came second and third also received certificates but they didn’t win and they knew it.

Just like in the olympics, the world cup, Wimbledon or any other international sporting event there will only ever be one winner.

Just like all those job applicants for the plum post there will only be one winner.

So I say again, how does rewarding all participants help, how does that prepare our children for the real world ?

By rewarding everyone we dilute the achievements of the true winners, we take away the rush that winners feel, we diminish and devalue their efforts.

But the real crime is that we change the expectations of the other participants. Somehow it makes it appear that it doesn’t matter if you don’t win because you will still get a prize. And if it doesn’t matter why should you try ?

And now the government are trying  to reinvent the wheel.  The following is culled from The Daily Mail

“Ministers are launching a new ‘School Olympics’ programme to end the widespread culture of ‘prizes for all’.

The championships are intended to give every child an experience of hard fought competition and prevent schools from refusing to pit youngsters against each other.”

“The new school sports championships are designed to reverse the decline in competitive sport brought about by Left-wing councils that scorned it as ‘elitist’ and insisted on politically correct activities with no winners or losers.

The first championship will take place in the run-up to the 2012 Olympic Games. They will involve a wide range of sports including football, rugby, netball, golf, cricket, tennis, athletics, judo, gymnastics, swimming, table tennis and volleyball.

Schools will compete against each other in district leagues from 2011 with winning athletes and teams qualifying for as many as 60 finals.

The most talented will then be selected for national finals.

Education Secretary Michael Gove said: ‘We need to revive competitive sport in our schools.

‘Fewer than a third of school pupils take part in regular competitive sport within schools and fewer than one in five take part in regular competition between schools.”

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1291627/Winning-banned-thirds-schools-teachers-reward-ALL-students.html#ixzz0siYe322v

When I was at school we had all this. Where did it all go ?

I didn’t go to a posh school. No, I went to Claverham County Secondary School just outside Battle.  Its where all the kids from the surrounding villages went to school. It’s now a Community College but back in the day the school had 4 houses and we all wore badges to show which we blonged to. There were charts in the “public” areas as well as each of the classes to show which house was leading the points and the sports tables. There was active competition between the houses in everything that we did from sports through all of the academic elements of school.  Furthermore there were county level and national competitions in which the school was an active participant.

So I say three cheers for the new government initiative.

Irish Biscuit


Well if that doesn’t take the biscuit !!!

The ministers of the Irish assembly at Stormont are planning to take an “away day” to conjure up some ideas on how to handle the cuts being handed down by the government.

Presumably that’s cheaper than all meeting in the usual place ……. Stormont ???