One of the many advantages of living some distance away from your place of work is that it gives one the spaciousness each morning to study one’s fellow man and woman as they make their happy way to their place of gainful employment. How I have enjoyed seeing the faces of my fellow commuters as they enthusiastically bring themselves ever nearer to their place of professional fulfilment.
Not today. Not in a traffic jam which extended for the whole of my journey along the Ronda de Dalt. I was glad to see that most of the people I passed (and pass them I did, you have to choose the right lane along that road to get ahead, and I know which one to choose) were as little satisfied with the situation as I. The fantastic expressions ranged from resentful resignation (if such a thing is possible – of course it is I am a teacher and that is our standard default response to things which make the job impossible) to outraged disbelief as we staggered forward in little spurs of a metre or so.
I am not sure if this is a sensible thing to do, but I do it anyway. If I can see that the Ronda de Dalt is congested as I sweep towards it along the curving link road from the motorway which joins Castelldefels with the airport then as soon as I merge with the static traffic (having chosen my ‘lucky’ lane) I then use a car or van in the other lane as my ‘marker’ and judge the intelligence of my choice by how many car lengths I gain or lose. Just in case you are interested, being level with a car counts as 0.5.
I am proud to relate that in a traffic jam that ensured that I took a whole hour to get to school and was only just in time to get to my class which was waiting plaintively on the patio to be brought in, I ‘made’ so many points that I stopped counting.
Another way to counteract the boredom is to ensure, when driving, that no other driver cuts in front of you. I am not unreasonable about this; if a car is indicating and seems to have a real need to enter my lane I am more than prepared to allow its entry. The thing I object to drivers who try and make sneaky gains by sticking to a lane dedicated to a turn off and then suddenly joining your lane. I admit that this does cause some commotion as I edge ever nearer to the exhaust pipe of the car in front, but it does keep me sharp.
Motorcycles are obviously exempt from these games as they have rules of their own which seem to mean that motorcyclists can ignore with impunity all other road users (including fellow cyclists) and drive as if the roads were empty. Yet again, on one of the few occasions when the three lane motorway was free enough to allow me to attain a reasonable speed, travelling in the middle lane with cars and either side of me, I was passed by two cyclists simultaneously on left and right as they zoomed by in the spaces between the cars.
As motorway driving (at least on this motorway) encourages the swerving in and out of cars from lane to lane as though they were involved in one of the more elegant and complicated dances of the eighteenth century, motorcyclists need to be of diva-like competence to be able to survive as they dance their own counterpoint to the major themes of the moving cars.
And, of course, many of the cyclists are only pretend-divas and their pretention lacks the foundation of real skill and ability and so they are ruthlessly mown down.
Now I have no objection to suicide per se which is what the expectation of buying a motorcycle seems to entail in this part of the world, but I do object to the delays that the mangled machines and bodies force on the motorists. And on motorways as busy as those around Barcelona the accident doesn’t even need to be on the side of the road on which you are travelling. Thanks to ‘rubber-necking’ a slowing down to see what is going on is all that is necessary for chaos to spread up and down from an accident.
I was told that the delays this morning were from an accident (who knows if a cyclist was involved) were from an accident early in the morning which had long been cleared up by the time I was setting out on my way; but the delay consequences of the event were still causing havoc hours afterwards!
I was unable to have my customary cup of tea when I arrived in school and had to jump straight into teaching. Only now, after a cup of the brew that makes life worth living and a small square of chocolate donated by a concerned colleague am I approaching the liberal humanitarianism for which I am famed. I am also in the staffroom of Building 1 which is much more conducive to quiet and contemplation and it also has power sockets attached to the underside of the communal table. Who could ask for more?
This lunchtime will be the occasion when I discover if my tummy is no longer the shy, retiring maiden aunt type receptacle throwing up its hands (or fili) in horror at the vulgar comestibles thrown at it or if it has reverted to its usual manifestation as a monstrous all-accepting maw.
At any event its alcoholic tolerances will be tested by the consumption of a bottle of Liberlis which is our (Suzanne and mine) preferred White of the summer. Or indeed of any month.
We are not meeting merely to drink a bottle of wine, obviously, but will be engaged on serious academic educational investigation. Which I am afraid is sad but true! I must be slipping.
So far there is no more news about the infamous holiday in spring of next year. I think that may be because I was just on time and therefore had no time to hear the latest developments: I will be very disappointed if I do not hear major changes in the way we are going to approach this problem which I am sure will, by next September, make the solving of Fermat’s Last Theorem look like doing a big piece kids’ jigsaw!
Two more lessons to go (interspersed with non-contacts) and an early finish, to allow enough time to take the wine from the fridge and put it in the freezer so that it is at the requisite temperature just above freezing for the arrival of Suzanne.
And yes, I do know that such a proceeding is vulgar. And no, I don’t care!
Not today. Not in a traffic jam which extended for the whole of my journey along the Ronda de Dalt. I was glad to see that most of the people I passed (and pass them I did, you have to choose the right lane along that road to get ahead, and I know which one to choose) were as little satisfied with the situation as I. The fantastic expressions ranged from resentful resignation (if such a thing is possible – of course it is I am a teacher and that is our standard default response to things which make the job impossible) to outraged disbelief as we staggered forward in little spurs of a metre or so.
I am not sure if this is a sensible thing to do, but I do it anyway. If I can see that the Ronda de Dalt is congested as I sweep towards it along the curving link road from the motorway which joins Castelldefels with the airport then as soon as I merge with the static traffic (having chosen my ‘lucky’ lane) I then use a car or van in the other lane as my ‘marker’ and judge the intelligence of my choice by how many car lengths I gain or lose. Just in case you are interested, being level with a car counts as 0.5.
I am proud to relate that in a traffic jam that ensured that I took a whole hour to get to school and was only just in time to get to my class which was waiting plaintively on the patio to be brought in, I ‘made’ so many points that I stopped counting.
Another way to counteract the boredom is to ensure, when driving, that no other driver cuts in front of you. I am not unreasonable about this; if a car is indicating and seems to have a real need to enter my lane I am more than prepared to allow its entry. The thing I object to drivers who try and make sneaky gains by sticking to a lane dedicated to a turn off and then suddenly joining your lane. I admit that this does cause some commotion as I edge ever nearer to the exhaust pipe of the car in front, but it does keep me sharp.
Motorcycles are obviously exempt from these games as they have rules of their own which seem to mean that motorcyclists can ignore with impunity all other road users (including fellow cyclists) and drive as if the roads were empty. Yet again, on one of the few occasions when the three lane motorway was free enough to allow me to attain a reasonable speed, travelling in the middle lane with cars and either side of me, I was passed by two cyclists simultaneously on left and right as they zoomed by in the spaces between the cars.
As motorway driving (at least on this motorway) encourages the swerving in and out of cars from lane to lane as though they were involved in one of the more elegant and complicated dances of the eighteenth century, motorcyclists need to be of diva-like competence to be able to survive as they dance their own counterpoint to the major themes of the moving cars.
And, of course, many of the cyclists are only pretend-divas and their pretention lacks the foundation of real skill and ability and so they are ruthlessly mown down.
Now I have no objection to suicide per se which is what the expectation of buying a motorcycle seems to entail in this part of the world, but I do object to the delays that the mangled machines and bodies force on the motorists. And on motorways as busy as those around Barcelona the accident doesn’t even need to be on the side of the road on which you are travelling. Thanks to ‘rubber-necking’ a slowing down to see what is going on is all that is necessary for chaos to spread up and down from an accident.
I was told that the delays this morning were from an accident (who knows if a cyclist was involved) were from an accident early in the morning which had long been cleared up by the time I was setting out on my way; but the delay consequences of the event were still causing havoc hours afterwards!
I was unable to have my customary cup of tea when I arrived in school and had to jump straight into teaching. Only now, after a cup of the brew that makes life worth living and a small square of chocolate donated by a concerned colleague am I approaching the liberal humanitarianism for which I am famed. I am also in the staffroom of Building 1 which is much more conducive to quiet and contemplation and it also has power sockets attached to the underside of the communal table. Who could ask for more?
This lunchtime will be the occasion when I discover if my tummy is no longer the shy, retiring maiden aunt type receptacle throwing up its hands (or fili) in horror at the vulgar comestibles thrown at it or if it has reverted to its usual manifestation as a monstrous all-accepting maw.
At any event its alcoholic tolerances will be tested by the consumption of a bottle of Liberlis which is our (Suzanne and mine) preferred White of the summer. Or indeed of any month.
We are not meeting merely to drink a bottle of wine, obviously, but will be engaged on serious academic educational investigation. Which I am afraid is sad but true! I must be slipping.
So far there is no more news about the infamous holiday in spring of next year. I think that may be because I was just on time and therefore had no time to hear the latest developments: I will be very disappointed if I do not hear major changes in the way we are going to approach this problem which I am sure will, by next September, make the solving of Fermat’s Last Theorem look like doing a big piece kids’ jigsaw!
Two more lessons to go (interspersed with non-contacts) and an early finish, to allow enough time to take the wine from the fridge and put it in the freezer so that it is at the requisite temperature just above freezing for the arrival of Suzanne.
And yes, I do know that such a proceeding is vulgar. And no, I don’t care!
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