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where is mashton driving today?

I went to Coulsdon to referee an under 16 EPSB snooker tournament.

Maybe I should have spent the day laughing at people instead.

Bingo!

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Couldn’t get a train yesterday as we were sick (£200 train tickets seeya) so tempted to drive up today. Is it a hellscape or can I get fuel somewhere between SE London and Kendal? With an impatient toddler

Not sure about other locations, but it was easy to get fuel yesterday in Bristol.

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2021/sep/26/keen-spirit-australian-cyclist-uses-gps-to-recreate-nirvanas-nevermind-cover

It’s more that 50 miles left in the tank get it to start warning you is a bit much.

Fuel companies claim to prioritise motorway petrol station than local one.

Not with a vehicle that is designed for long distance travel, that has a fairly poor mpg figure. Ignore the warning until you get 30 miles left and the next services is 32 miles down the motorway and join the dots.

Mercedes did not design the global E-Class platform as a London city car.

There is no fuel around my bit of SE London.

Nationalise it

Given the bulk of their sales are to China* it might not have been a crazy idea tho.

*TBH idk if this is actually true for sub S-Class cars.

My shitty old car warns you at about 50-60 miles, then stops telling you how much you've got left at 30 odd, I reckon there's probably a secret extra 10 it doesn't mention too.

All the matrix signs on the M25 were saying no fuel in any of the services yesterday.

https://youtu.be/_W8J8cycHTQ

Lots of motorway fuel shortages reported at https://twitter.com/mwayservices/status/1442027826908176390?s=19

Feels quite south east.

Nice. Went out there for a wedding a few years ago as a friend moved out there a while back, it was (embarrassingly) my first time in Ireland. Great place. I think I saw that sign actually!

We found the eating out and service excellent too. Did you fly into that mad massive airport for the pilgrims?

What about carers who have to drive between appointments (which is almost all of them, because social care is so short staffed they are constantly late for clients)?

For most people this would be fine but there are genuine key workers.

It's almost like you need some kind of scheme to identify them so they can be prioritised!

You highlight the problem carer face that they have to pay for visiting clients, rather than paid by the companies.

In a sensible world the carers would be driving a company vehicle with a fuel card so the employee wouldn't be affected, much like the typical Openreach van. But then if we treated employees like carers decently we would probably have something similar for truckers and wouldn't be in this mess in the first place.

Yeah, I'm being a bit facetious and am aware something like that would hit the poor the hardest. Got a friend who goes to hospices and the like to do massage therapy and was panicking because she was struggling to find fuel and needed it to get all her equipment to places to work.

Thanks. Just dropped another £220 on train tickets. 3 hours instead of a gruelling 5-6 though

In a sensible world the carers would be driving a company vehicle with a fuel card so the employee wouldn't be affected

I drive these vehicles, we don't get any kind of special treatment when it comes to access to anything... Disabled permit is about it...

If petrol stations demand priced without the fury of the tabloids then panic buying would reduce and essential workers could still buy fuel and it wouldn't come out of the pocket of the drivers.

Back in the 2000(?) fuel crisis I worked for a Telco in an essential role and had a magic letter which I theory gave me priority access to fuel. I didn't use it since I walked to work.

Interesting article on the resurgence of Assad as a regional player
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/sep/26/assad-the-outcast-being-sold-to-the-west-as-key-to-peace-in-middle-east