Just got back from one of our mountain biking trips. There's a forest about 20 miles away we use a lot.
To get there, it's A roads, a mixture of 60 mph, 40 mph and 30 mph limits. Seems though on a Sunday, we always seem to get stuck in a queue behind an Arthur Dent as we call them. A person to whom the answer to everything is 42...
No one will overtake them either. They all just sit there in a funereal chain, half a car length apart, all doing 42. If you pull out to move up the queue, they drive even closer to the vehicle in front, determinedly ensuring you can't safely get past despite their own inability or unwillingness to overtake. When the limit drops to 30, perhaps there might be a clue there as to potential hazards chaps, they still convoy along at 42.
Sometimes I'd quite like a bazooka or high calibre machine gun mounted on the roof...
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Yep. Sonds like the A40 from Carmarthen to Llandovery. Often the fastest bit of the journey is the 40 limit between Nantgaredig and Pontarcothi.
Only difference is we get it seven days a week not just Sundays.
Last edited by: Harleyman on Sun 9 Sep 12 at 15:12
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>> Sounds like the A40 from Carmarthen to Llandovery. Often the fastest bit of the
>> journey is the 40 limit between Nantgaredig and Pontarcothi.
Not Welsh are they?
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It's a mimser's world more and more, as much in the South-East as up there in the sticks. Thank your lucky stars that the mimsers up there at least go through 30 limits at an undiminished 42, giving you the option of keeping up with them or driving at a law-abiding speedometer 35.
Down here mimsers are more finicky. When they come to a 30 limit, especially one with no overtaking opportunities, they slow to a speedometer 27 just to be on the safe side. The route between where I live and London has progressively acquired more and more 50-limited dual carriageways and very long, totally unnecessary 30 limits on what used (and ought) to be 40, 50 or NSL stretches. At the same time the roads have been deliberately narrowed to ensure that one of these PITAs can't be passed except riskily. The misery! The misery!
Actually you must know this perfectly well Humph because you get about.
I'm afraid your roof-mounted 50 calibre would only waste a few pathetic victims of modern safety wonkery. What's needed is a series of powerful bombs under the offices of council traffic planning departments. That'd learn'em.
Last edited by: Armel Coussine on Sun 9 Sep 12 at 17:18
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Acually I don't mind the ones who do 55 in a 60, 45 in a 50 and 25 in a 30.
At least they're aaware of what they're doing.
The ones who drive me nuts are the ones, as said, that do 45mph no matter what. The A41 between Aylesbury and Bicester is a case in point. People troll along in the 60mph it at 40 which drives people nuts, and encourages reckless overtaking. And then get to Waddesdon which is a 30, but quite frankly could be a 20mph limit its so dodgy, and carry on through at 45.
Those people need extermination as punishment for their oblivious behaviour.
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My attitude is different. I'm not interested in their thought processes and I don't want to educate or punish them. I'm just grateful when by exceeding the speed limit through low-limit places they stop getting in my damn way. Of course I will deplore it when one causes an accident. But they are just one of many kinds of bad, incompetent driver. The awkwardness, clumsiness and wimpishness make you want to weep sometimes. In fact a lot of the time.
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>>My attitude is different
Yes. Mine is oriented around whether or not I think someone else is making a conscious choice which is their right.
Yours is blindly around whether or not it affects you.
Do you not think you should respect someone else's freedom as much as you expect yours to be respected? N.B. that's not a real question, I know the answer.
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>> Mine is oriented around whether or not I think someone else is making a conscious choice which is their right.
Exactly. You're faffing about the thought processes of crap drivers and about what you should do about it. You can't cure them or make them disappear. They are a condition of the road. You are wasting your energy and intelligence.
>> Yours is blindly around whether or not it affects you.
That 'blindly' is just damn cheek, but yes. I want to get on with it and go round or over them so they are not an offence in mine eye. I'm not a traffic copper.
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>>That 'blindly' is just damn cheek
"just" ? its not "just" anything. It is representative of the level of respect that I believe you and your opinions deserve.
You are a selfish, pompous idiot who is driven by a social behaviour and personal belief derived from a belief that society consists of a list of privileges you are owed, not duties that you may have.
I am recognising the freedom of others to make a choice which may or may not not align with mine, you're still residing in a world where your opinion was of significance - and you're 20 years out of date.
Consequently my true opinion of the person in front depends on whether I believe they are exercising a right, or that they are an oblivious jerk.
Last edited by: No FM2R on Sun 9 Sep 12 at 19:49
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No FM2R. It's just damn cheek.
As is the tone of the rest of your silly little rant. You are, yourself, an oblivious jerk.
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>> Hardly.
You may think you're aware FM2R but you do seem to be a lot more oblivious than you think.
Hardly surprising of course in a trainspotter's catamite.
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>>You are a selfish, pompous idiot
He's not an idiot.
As we have dropped the civilised veneer, I'll say a cigarette paper wouldn't fit between AC's pompousness and your bombast, to which you have added gratuitous insult.
As for selfishness, sharing the roads is a prisoners' dilemma. There are times to be selfish, and times when it is more profitable not to be.
Good night.
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>>I'll say a cigarette paper wouldn't fit between AC's pompousness and your bombast
Aren't pompousness and bombast the same thing?
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>>and times when it is more profitable not to be.
Correct. It depends on what is your main driver. And whilst it is tempting to judge by what may or may not be profitable to oneself, it is to be hoped that a higher driver is possible, albeit mere aspiration for some.
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>> Correct. It depends on what is your main driver. And whilst it is tempting to judge by what may or may not be profitable to oneself, it is to be hoped that a higher driver is possible, albeit mere aspiration for some.
No doubt I am capable of being pompous but I don't think I have been in this thread. On the other hand the quote above does manage to sound pompous, although without meaning anything intelligible.
There have been other pompous-sounding assertions of good rational attitudes too.
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>>He's not an idiot.
But you're ok with selfish and pompous?
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>>As we have dropped the civilised veneer
I never had one.
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"Consequently my true opinion of the person in front depends on whether I believe they are exercising a right, or that they are an oblivious jerk."
Based on whether you've met him or not of course.
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>>Based on whether you've met him or not of course
My opinion of someone and actually hating them would seem, to me at least, to be different things.
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Thing is AC, I really don't mind if someone on a Sunday morning, on a country road, wants, or chooses, or only feels able, to do 42. It may well be an inexperienced driver out trying to gain some or someone who's car is not in the best of fettle, I wouldn't neccessarily be too judgemental on that. It's the twonks behind them I want to vapourise. If they don't want to, or don't feel confident to overtake the plodder then why the heck can't they hang back a little so that those who wish to overtake can safely "sew" their way up the line? Contrarily, they seem hell bent on deliberately preventing just that and get really obtuse when someone fairly politely tries.
I was driving the Qashqai this morning. It's only a 1.6 and it had 3 mountain bikes on it's roof. It wouldn't particularly have enjoyed being thrown around but even with a horsepower deficit and the need not to rip the roof rack off it could easily have smarmed it's way up the queue if it hadn't been for the progress prevention brigade driving as if they were all on a ten foot towrope behind each other.
It's them who need to be executed really. The mim-meister at the head of the queue might or might not have his or her reasons which may or may not include incompetence and utter stupidity...
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I agree with all that Humph and have sometimes made similar points myself.
Back in the fifties William Boddy, the Motor Sport editor who coined the term mimser, proudly quoted his children as chanting: 'It's number two who starts the queue! Yah, boo to number two!'
The point you were making about the hypnotised mimser trains cluttering up our single-carriageway A roads.
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Precisely. It's not the one at the front that makes it a rolling road block.
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It gets significantly worse around here in Summer. People oohhing and aahhing at the view off Britannia Bridge for instance, I reckon that is a major factor on tailbacks at that particular spot, especially when coming from the island side. I whizz across....
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Since we are on mimsers of various sorts, let me mention my least favourite typical mimser behaviour: obtuse failure to make use of the landscape by allowing the car to gather speed downhill to make the uphill stretch in full view less stressed and more economical. The archetypal mimser will brake nervously down the hill to stay within the limit, hesitate at the bottom losing speed, then accelerate uphill.
I hate this behaviour more than I can say. It's the antithesis of elegance, intelligence and frugality: utterly dunderheaded.
Cruise control is dunderheaded in the same way, and I never use it in hilly places for that reason.
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I have never taken issue with people who drive slowly as ive never suffered with an all dominating sense of entitlement to the roads.
The people that get up my nose are the ones that are so inconsistant, that you hav eto have you eyes on stalks incase they do something odd.
I followed a BMW estate the other day and on an NSL road they seemingly went between 30 and 60 at random with heavy braking for the slightest kink in the road sometimes, but others they went flying through. They were constantly speeding up and slowing down on the straights - I can only suspect this lady behind the wheel was sending a txt or changing a CD, who knows, but she was a challenge to follow.
Id far rather have Mavis in her Micra doing a steady 40 because atleast when there is an opportunity to pass, she wont boot it and hang me out to dry ( with 54 bhp one has to be quite certain of success with overtakes! ).
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>> boot it and hang me out to dry ( with 54 bhp one has to be quite certain of success with overtakes! ).
Quite. Most of my motoring has been in low-powered cars with momentum very important. It breaks your heart when some fool baulks you at the bottom of a hill and then zooms away up it.
And of course these people whose speed varies wildly at random are a menace, even if they are 'exercising a right'.
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Someone is going to bleat the old "The speed limit is a limit not a target"
Sorry but the speed limit is a target, and everyone should try and attain it where it is safe to do so*. Yes there are some limits that are stupidly low and others that are too high.
*Unless you are all on your own, then you can dawdle as much as you like.
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>>Sorry but the speed limit is a target, and everyone should try and attain it where it is safe to do so<<
Which is entirely open to the interpretation of the individual driver. What one person feels is safe may not feel safe to anyone else. Since there are no hard and fast rules about what exact speed is safe in any given circumstances, there will always be a variation in the perception of what is and isnt safe person to person.
Thats why I dont go all 6 year old and have a tantrum if the person infront of me doesnt feel safe going as fast as I would.
Maybe there is an element of where people live an dhow busy local roads are as its ever so rare to get stuck behind anyone for a long period in Northants, so its almost never a problem to come across a slower driver as within a few miles you can pass them. I know from the few times in recent years ive been to the hellhole that is the SE, its been one big traffic jam, so I can see why people might suffer the red mist more often.
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I wouldn't challenge anyone's right to drive within their, well, rights I suppose, but I would also contend that when in the course of doing so, they have and should recognise an obligation to make it possible at least, for others to drive within their rights or choices rather than to apply a form of unilateralist default control to all in their vicinity.
If you see what I mean.
Oh and do stop being prats above. It's my thread and I'll thank you for some decorum. You're behaving like primary school children... I conversely, have limited myself to the mature discussion of methods of annihilating fellow road users of whom I do not approve...
:-))
Edit - In other words, do what you want, just leave enough room for others to drive around you while you're doing it is all !
Last edited by: Humph D'Bout on Sun 9 Sep 12 at 21:23
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>Oh and do stop being prats above.
You started all this. You should be ashamed ;-0
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I am a bit. More disappointed though that a bit of what was intended to be lighthearted trivial ping pong has once again sunk into a slanging match and dispute.
One can reasonably suspect alcohol given the timings though. Sunday afternoon / evening. A few too many sherbets here and there perhaps? Or indeed almost certainly. All depressingly predictable.
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>>One can reasonably suspect alcohol given the timings though
One could, but I suspect that one would be wrong. I've had the laptop balanced on the stool next to the barbecue. I'm not allowed to drink when in charge of children. I am allowed to take out frustration on the internet though.
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I'm not allowed to drink when in charge of children.
Someone has some sense.
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Humph,
I found it amusing. Not hysterically so as my wife did, but amusing nonetheless.
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>One can reasonably suspect alcohol given the timings though. Sunday afternoon / evening.
You were drinking on your mountain bike trip?
No damn wonder you cause all this ruckus!
;-)
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The Highway Code has the answer -
144
You MUST NOT
•drive dangerously
•drive without due care and attention
•drive without reasonable consideration for other road users
Not that 42 mph everywhere drivers would ever read it.
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>>the speed limit is a target,
A guideline perhaps.
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come on Humph, about time you got yourself some proper wheels so you could blast past these mimsers.
How about a white Transit.
Failing that,set phasers to full power.
Its life Jim, but not as we know it
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The funny thing is, its always Humphs threads that degenerate into a ruckus.
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Blimey, I've missed some fun here, haven't I?
It's times like Humph describes that make me miss my early days of turbodiesel driving, ten years ago. When I first got it, the S60 D5 was as quick for all practical purposes as anything sub-3 litres on the road, which meant it was faster than just about anything that was likely to be causing a hold-up. I often didn't bother selecting third; a quick extension of the ankle in fourth and the mimser would become a dot in the mirror. Enjoy responsibly, of course, but boy, was it satisfying!
These days the S60 is (probably) no slower against the clock but (a) I live in the Southeast, with its blanket 40 limits, and (b) everyone and his trilby hat now has a turbodiesel too, which may not be able to outpace mine but rather diminishes the element of surprise. I've pretty well given up being in any kind of hurry to get anywhere; as AC says, it's the planners (are you reading, Oxfordshire County Council?) who deserve more blame than individual drivers.
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Other people, usually common ones in my experience, are a nuisance when they impede one's progress, so I sympathise with Humph.
I hope there weren't any fat people walking in the forest to compound his misery.
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Two main gripes. Those morons that brake for no reason just as you pull out to overtake them and those friends of the first set of morons who ALWAYS fail to up their game to compensate for hills. Hillocks to them all.
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>> I hope there weren't any fat people walking in the forest to compound his misery.
>>
I hope there weren't any fat people walking in the forest, blowing their ciggie smoke at Humph, to compound his misery.
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>>any fat people walking in the forest to compound his misery...
Well of course there were but the people who manage the forest facility have a very effective method of controlling that problem. What they've done is to site burger and doughnut vans at strategic locations to sort of herd and concentrate them in specific areas. Works jolly well. Once you know those locations you can simply take an alternative route. They never stray far from a fast food opportunity...
:-)
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...Once you know those locations you can simply take an alternative route...
Then fall off, bust your bike and your hand.
It's fat people karma I tell you.
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Chill out and take life as it comes. Be happy while you're living, for you're a long time dead.
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>> Chill out and take life as it comes. Be happy while you're living, for you're
>> a long time dead.
Up to a point, Lord Copper.
Some things you can change or avoid. But I do agree that most of us have to deal with the world as it is, and not as we would like it to be.
Get worked up, and the only person who suffers is you.
The Golden Rule is a good place to start - do as you would be done by.
Perhaps Humph is just applying this rule - if he drove everywhere at 42mph he'd want to be blasted with a 50mm cannon;-)
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And a green thumb from me, too.
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Funnily enough....happened to me today - needed to pop to Llanberis from Caernarfon to buy some new trousers. Coming out of Caernarfon on a very familiar road - stuck behind some drivers doing a constant forty I felt compelled to overtake them at one point. They were on big BMWs I was on my little Majesty....showed them a clean pair of heels.
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42 or bust - Harleyman
