This morning's commute and other commuting stories

#shotsfired

Ha, literally just got off conf call where someone thought I was talking over him but his mic wasn't working. "No mate, I was just talking over you, I'm Aussie, it's what we do."

Dear People of London,

The panniers I leave on my bike when it's locked up are not a fucking dustbin! Keep your Ribena cartons to yourself.

Kind regards,

Sid

To the bloke on the Brompton on Great Queen Street I apologise, couldn't see around the Shredder Lorry and didn't think there was enough space between it and the footpath for anything to be coming down the other side, especially at any kind of speed so tried to edge out and there you were. Hope you accepted my apolgies at the time.

Bus driver decided to overtake me from lights when he knew he was stopping just 50 meters later.

I was in secondary position and behind another bus, expecting him to overtake and continue.

He pulled over into my line of so I banged side window to try get attention of driver or passengers. He continued to pull in forcing me to onto the pavement or else get squished.

Accused me of speeding up to prevent overtake, acknowledging he was aware I was there and yet still continued. I didn't do any more than progress as though he'd pass me and continue onwards, seems he felt he'd use the bus as a weapon to prove a point to me.

Complaint going in, within which i'll also apologise for adrenaline fueled expletives I used.

request the footage as well.

Will do. Ta.

Travelling into London on the train at the moment, eavesdropping on the conversation between two young girls at the table opposite. It's quite an indictment on the level of education in the UK at the moment. Questions have included:

"Is the USA a country?" - they're not sure on this one, because 'What about LA?'
"What's the UK?" - correctly answered with 'United Kingdom' but no idea what that meant
"What's the difference between a country and a continent?" - not a clue
"Is the USSR in Germany?" - apparently a distinct possibility

On the upside, one of them can say hello in Mandarin.

Anyone know the millionth Embankment rider?

https://twitter.com/adamtranter/status/1021441362103816192

How old were they, 18?

Dunno, but probably younger than that. 13-15 at a guess.

Did you help them with pre-GCSE geography homework or let them fail/google the answers?

first sub 50min commute (11 miles) in a long while, absolutely flew in and even though I had a decent run of lights for a couple miles I still hit plenty of reds.

am still pushing 110kg and was carting my laptop in this morning so pretty pleased with that. quicker than getting the tube by about 10 minutes.

Left them to it. Shortly after that we arrived at Cambridge where the train was cancelled due to overhead line problems, and we were all told to go and get on a different train, which was a stopping service and which then broke down. Good old Govia.

RPM

Traffic lights switched off down Moorgate for the last couple of days. Sort of works in a chaotic kinda way... forces people to slow down, be aware and slightly considerate for a few seconds. Might even make the traffic flow more evenly.

Switch them all off forever?

This idea was put into practice by a Dutch engineer called Hans Monderman - Tim Harford's book 'messy' talks about it It's an interesting read, the basic premise being that accidents happen when humans run on auto-pilot, so unpredictable and unusual environments force people to pay attention.
@Oliver Schick may be able to explain better, he seems to know about this kind of thing!

Had another run-in with a cyclist here on my way home last night: https://www.lfgss.com/comments/13994381/

Or rather he almost ran into the back of me as I went through on the left path. Dunno whether he was trying to pointlessly undertake me the whole time or was just right on my back wheel as I started slowing down, but I think the former as his discs howled as if he was going much faster than me and had to slow down suddenly (almost jumped out of my skin because the noise came from so close to me). As was said before it's not the best road design but him tutting and shaking his head as he mounted the pavement and sped off really boiled my blood. Come the revolution the tutters will be first against the wall.

It's quite an indictment on the level of education in the UK at the moment.

Sometimes I despair at the state of education in this country, then I remember how many of my friends were total fuck-wits when I was at school. Plus ca change.

I've also just remembered they were having difficulties with the 24 hour clock. The driver announced we should get off the train and get onto the 14:08 train instead. One of them said '14:08? Is that 3 o'clock?'.

Genuine question, probably best answered by a teacher but do people think being that thick is really a failure of the education system? I've met people with more GCSE's and A levels than my entire family (i have 3 GCSE's...) but on the face of it they seem like morons.

Conversely we keep getting 16 year old work experience kids into my work place and it's intimidating how smart and well rounded they appear to be.

Genuine question, probably best answered by a teacher but do people think being that thick is really a failure of the education system?

IANAT, but ignorance of things like how to tell the time and basic geography does strike me as the kind of things you should be taught in primary school. I know I was.

Book smart vs Street smart.

I seem to remember my parents teaching me that stuff rather than assuming it was the school’s job.

So did mine, along with reading, writing, maths, science and history, but while telling the time on a 24 hour clock might be considered a life skill which should be a parents' responsibility, I think it's a bit unrealistic to assume that all children will be taught geography by their parents. After all, the young girls I overheard yesterday will one day be parents, and if they don't know whether the USA is a country or not now then I'm unconvinced they'll know any better later.