I thought I’d seen it all on Monday, when the North Downs turned into one giant ski slope, and even ambulances crashed off-piste.
But yesterday was worse. The snow – although still in evidence – had stopped, er…snowing, and instead we had thick fog. 50-metre thick fog – that’s 4 coach lengths – and thickening.
Or sickening, I should say, at least when it came to the crazy, mindless antics of people who were driving in appalling visibility yet gave not a single thought to switching on their car headlights. Although judging by the majority of culprits, my guess was that they did think, and thought “Am I bovvered?’
About one car in ten loomed suddenly out of the fog with not so much as a nite lite in the window. About half the rest though that side lights would do, which, considering the conditions, would be like trying to land a Jumbo at night on a couple of bicycle lamps. And the silly thing is, the drivers had gone to the trouble of switching on some sort of lighting and then presumably decided that switching on their headlights would be a waste of a good battery. This despite the fact that they must have realised from the fellow idiots coming towards them that side lights simply could not compete with the fog.
I’ll give you one guess and at which combination of car and driver made up the greatest number of offenders – and I saw hundreds of cars without lights, by the way, so my observation and sampling was sound.
The fog dilemma which confronts many of us in the UAE during our pre-dawn commute is not related to the behavior of specific marques or genders, but of mixed breeds of driver (generally of regional origin) who, at the slightest whiff of mist or fog immediately activate their fog lights, hazard warning lights, and main beams… thereby compromising the night vision of those behind and in front of them.
Frustrating because all you can see are blinding lights in front and from behind!
AlfaMartini | 14 Mar 09 - 17:29