NEAR-DEAF EXPERIENCE #3

hi to dave m
wot no blog?

this is a close one!
i am on my way home
from purchasing my new steel toecaps
and some cut-price ales
from a little off-licence run by an indian family
i climb on my mean machine
next to the busy dual-carriageway
and freewheel across to the central reservation
i look left and see a couple of cars approaching fast
shall i go?
nah! i'm gonna have to defer to the deaf machines
i stop a second or two and wait
when suddenly three machines flash-roar across my consciousness
from right to left
and i realise that i'm actually standing in the middle
of a kind of triple-carriageway
scary images flood my mind
of a cyclist being tossed into the air
like a stray bull runner at pamplona
one day my absent-mindedness
gonna get me in real trouble...

i am hanging out the washing the other day
like the reconstructed modern male that i occasionally am
and it suddenly hits me
the idea not the car
the solution to so many of our problemos
it's very simple
we just ban all private death machines from the roads
we only allow essential service vehicles
emergency services and stuff like that
public transport
and busyness vehicles like delivery vans
at a stroke
we give a massive boost to public transport and cycling
and we make the roads safer and quieter
among the problemos this would obviously solve
obesity
people get more exercise
noise and air pollution
for obvious reasons
community breakdown
people are forced to meet n greet n actually talk to each other
supermarkets
death to those soulless sheds
that bleed the colour and life out of our communities
jeremy clarkson
go and get yerself a grown-up job
so tell me
how long we gonna put up with the miserable status quo?
where our neighbourhoods are racetracks
with a bunch of houses in the middle
where the only shops are charity shops on short-term leases
or supermarkets
where it ain't safe for our children to be children
where nobody talks to each other
where modern life is a bit rubbish