Penalty Points

As an aside to the foglight fraternity post, you’d be amazed at what you can unearth reading the rules of the road.

The Road Safety Authority recently sent a copy of the rules to just about every household in the Republic. I say ‘just about’, because as with the government’s inspired reaction (stop laughing, they had to do something) to September 11, that involved sending out iodine tablets (now probably out of date, or popped into your martini as a dare) in 2002 to every household in the Republic, the definition of ‘household’ only extended as far as anyone on the electoral register (who said being an active participant in democracy wasn’t a life and death matter?). Surely, the RSA’s definition was similar. Regardless, the book makes for enlightened reading.

http://www.rsa.ie/publication/publication/upload/017024-RoTR2nd.pdf

Rather than deterring drivers from breaking the law, it surely better succeeds in illustrating just how pitiful the penalties are for performing what can only be described as some hair-raising feats, usually only performed by illustrious current and former politicians such as Jim McDaid (http://www.fiannafail.ie/person.php4?show=TD&pid=66&bid=65 ) and GV Wright (http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/archive/index.php/t-117065.html ).

Here’s a sample of the paltry points and fixed fines for what would seem to be pretty risky manoeuvres:

· Driving against the flow of traffic on a motorway - Points (2) Fine (€80)

· Dangerous overtaking - Points (2) Fine (€80)

· Failure to obey traffic lights - Points (2) Fine (€80)

· Driving on the hard shoulder of a motorway - Points (1) Fine (€80)

· Driving on a footpath except to access premises - Points (1 ) Fine (€60)

· Driving on a cycle track - Points (1) Fine (€60)

· Failure to comply with traffic lane markings - Points (1) Fine (€60)

So the lesson is: next time you’re stuck in traffic on the M50, nip onto the hard shoulder. You might get away with it dozens of times before being actually caught, making the fine and points you attract seemingly worth the risk. Alternatively, you could just turn around and head back home on the same carriageway against the flow of traffic, and on the hard shoulder. After all, it’ll ‘only’ cost you €160 in total, and if you can afford your SUV, you can certainly afford that.

Front Foglights

Wanker. Look that up in the dictionary (the one in my head, anyway), and the definition will be thus:

“A wanker is a person typically characterised by their need to have full front foglights activated on their vehicle at all times.”

So, who are they, these wankers of the night (and day, even)? Better not be you. It used to be the idiots who went around with rear foglights on all the time that were considered irritating, but as front foglights became increasingly standard, so the number of wankers on the road rose.

Front foglights are the shit drivers’ Viagra – they may not be much of a driver, but they think the front foglights make them really hard. Eh, they don’t, they make them look like arseholes. While it’s actually against the law to have foglights on except when driving conditions necessitate them (say, surprisingly, when it’s foggy), the Gardai obviously do nothing to stop the growing craze, unlike police in Coventry in the UK, who years ago took to the streets to issue £30 fines to any wankers they happened upon http://www.cwn.org.uk/999/west-midlands-police/2001/01/010118-fog-lights.htm .

Although the Garda press office previously said that members of the force will always enforce traffic laws when they are seen to be violated, that’s clearly a load of arse. If indeed it was the case, half of them should be handing themselves in at their local station for speeding.

The English Class, RTE

Kudos to Liam Fay in The Sunday Times for his insightful review of the latest ‘comedy’ offering from RTE – The English Class. Fay encapsulated what everyone else was already thinking – that the series was, and is, a pile of smelly fresh dung. After the first episode of the series was aired at the beginning of October, messageboards ( http://www.anfearrua.com/db.asp?a=topicdisplay&tid=389564 ) came alive with instant rebukes for what was clearly a waste of taxpayers’ money. Not only that, but the clips of future episodes were quickly removed from You Tube as lively criticism mounted.

As one poster pointed out, rightly or wrongly, this pièce de résistance cost €80,000 per episode – a whopping €480,000 for the series. Could this be true? Probably. Why RTE fails so miserably every time with its efforts at comedy should be a mystery, but isn’t.

As Fay points out, one of its writers is Declan Jones, RTE’s chief light entertainment scriptwriter, “the brains behind the brainless clichés uttered by presenters on shows such as You’re a Star”.

Surely the English Class, produced by www.visionindependentproductions.com will not succumb to a second series. If it does, I’ll gladly lead the lynch mob to Donnybrook, for a, well, donnybrook, as the yanks would say.

Here’s a few quotes from Fay’s review:

“The silences, however, are by no means the programme’s most wince-inducing feature. That honour is hotly contested by its dialogue, its story lines, its leaden performances, its would-be jokes and virtually every other aspect of this truly ghastly production.”

“A study in embarrassment that never manages to be anything but embarrassing.”

“To most comedy fans, a penchant for [Alan] Partridge impressions seems pitifully outdated. To RTE’s comedy cognoscenti, however, it’s evidently all you need to get a sitcom of your own.”