On your bike Blair!
There are 24 million cars in the UK with 23 million parked at any one time, nine out of ten of those parked illegally because there’s only ten million (and falling) legal parking spaces in our metropolis where we most need them. 90% of the ones that got a ticket had paid a parking fee. Like a true capitalist Blair is creating congestion and demand for the roads and not cutting it.
Because the car is a borough council cash cow now, bringing in more revenue than housing rent and council tax combined in some smaller inner city London boroughs, Tony Blair insists that our nation’s children should now take to their bikes to cut the congestion of the school run and the those millions of lazy car journeys of less than one mile. David Cameron likes to cycle with his little England flags on the back so why not join him Tone? On your bike, as they say.
My new lady friend likes to cycle. She sticks it on to the special rack on the back of her gas guzzler, drives out to the local reservoir, cycles around a bit and then drives home. No ozone wrecking gases were really saved and no fitness really gained. I told her she is going to have plant some trees near the reservoir to boost her ‘carbon banking’ for actually increasing the global heating gases through her eco gesture. That tedious yawn that’s running the Tory party did it when he went to the glacier to witness global warming so why not Jo! Jo tells me we can’t fit a tree sapling and her bike on the back of the car at the same time.
I, myself, sometimes cycle to work, although I find the whole experience rather gruelling and exposing. You get flies in your mouth and wind in your hair; oil on your strides and motorists fingers in your ear. It’s not the most pleasant experience and takes twenty minutes to recover from it all at your place of employment, especially in the winter; earache, eye strain and thigh stiffness comes to mind. Then 8 hours in front of a computer screen only adds to those symptoms…
Types of cyclists
- Healthy middle class’twentysomethings
- Eco warriors
- Old men
- Old women
- Drug dealers
- People who wear those fluorescent jackets and can’t afford cars as they work in warehouses
So therefore there’s a certain type of person that was born to cycle. The first ones are the guys and girls that enjoy wearing those extremely unfashionable hard hats and Lycra shorts, fit as a butcher’s dog, managing to find somewhere to park their bikes where they never seem to get stolen. I will admit that the female cyclists of this breed have exquisite thighs.The other cyclist family are the ones we all dislike. They hate cars as much as they hate the rules of the road and will often cycle in the middle of the lane at 15mph.They also slip through traffic-lights like motor oil over a crankshaft. These guys and girls are not in a hurry and feel the slower they cycle then the easier it will be to save the planet. I’m sure president Bush and his oil cronies would like to wipe these guys out before Al-Quieda.
The most tedious breed of the two wheel race brood is the ‘Incumbent’ rider. The Incumbent is that ridiculous three wheeled contraption, low to the ground, which always has little triangular flags on the back, usually adorned by a rainbow motive. These guys are always rake thin with bony elbows and have ludicrously bushy beards; gardening coloured green clothing or eco ‘logoed’ T-shirts expressing their dislike of the capitalism that paid fore the roads they are gliding along serenely, believing in a God that surely wont save them when ‘lady that lunches’ mistakes the accelerator for the brake with her Jimmy Choo stiletto and shows them the bottom axel…
These guys are not the most responsible people either as their kids are usually on the contraption with them, breathing all those exhaust fumes at ground level, the young inquisitive minds calculating, even then ,what would happen if that articulated lorry or four-by-four happen not to see them and go over the top of the fragile and ridiculous machines. As much as you want that to happen when your tapping your steering wheel with a naughty grin, looking down at him(and its always a him), you don’t go there because of the innocent and put upon sprogs of the green world are always strapped in there with him to some how justify the ludicrous things
The other types of knob cyclists are the ones that get knocked down a lot and whiz around like they are the only ones on the road. These are usually couriers, kids or leisure cyclists who have yet to experience metal on skull and are completely fearless. These breeds rarely have lights on their bikes, expecting drivers to be able to pick them up in pitch blackness by that tiny reflector.
Have you noticed, guys, how you never see any crumpet on bikes. I suspect it’s to do with hair getting ruffled and lipstick drying out and stuff and so until we address that there’s no chance of David Cameron saving the planet by forcing more people on to bikes. So could the resistance to use a bike, bearing in mind that 23 of the 24 million cars out there are parked at anyone time and 80% of all journeys are less than one mile, be more about vanity and laziness than over economising and effort. I mean the people that use the buses don’t really do it to save money or ozone gases, but because they can’t drive.
Blair’s policies on cyclists are pretty simple: it’s a nice ideal but doesn’t make me any f**ing taxes so I want you in your cars. Yes the planet is getting smokier but as your oil loving PM I’m not investing in public services and I want you in your cars burning that petrol that makes my good friend Gordon brown billions of cash. Even villains and tax dodgers have to pay fuel levies you know! I can not foresee a situation where any government wants to discourage car journeys in favour of bikes.
Right, enough of this waffle as the misses’ wants to cycle to a place where you can buy a windmill to save 9.1% of your energy bills over 7 years. Wait a minute; its raining…well it is Wimbledon fortnight, which means one thing—the car! Not even eco loving middle class babes cycle in the rain.
Advantages Healthy
Disadvantages Your roadkill!
Summary: Keep fit,keep exercise...
