Driving - Part 2 The Grumpy Guide To

If you're one of the over 40 million drivers living in the UK today, well, you have my deepest sympathy.

I honestly think it's like some Kafka-esque nightmare.

We don't indicate in London, it's uncool to indicate in London.

We don't want people to know we are going. We want it to be a surprise.

-BEEP

-Whoa!

If you can afford the lessons, the vehicle, the insurance,

the road tax, the upkeep and the continually rising cost of fuel,

well, you might just be lucky to make it to the end of your street,

and then straight into the giant traffic jams that are Britain's roads today.

Driving in England isn't really like driving, because you are

generally just in one giant queue.

It is not helping anything. It's not making you fit,

it's not making you healthy, it's not making you happy.

After all, the automobile is nothing but a cash cow,

milking us all dry from the moment we decide to slap on the L-plates.

Congestion charge schmeshtion charge!

In fact, everything to do with driving drives us crazy, grinds our gears and makes us see red.

"Get out the way! What's the matter with you?

"You could get a bus through there, you idiot!"

Karl Benz has a lot to answer for.

When he invented the car back in 1885,

he also invented the previously unknown side effect we now call "road rage".

Car travel is like sitting in your own personal space.

You can lock all the doors, close all your windows - you're safest of all.

That is, of course, until someone else cuts you up.

Then, all of a sudden, you are a car-driving caveman, a 21st-Century troglodyte,

a cursing, swearing, gesticulating ball of anger.

Your territory has been invaded and, suddenly, the air, like the traffic lights, turns red.

Hell is other people, and hell is other drivers.

So, driving is hell.

Bus drivers - arseholes.

-Minicabs.

-Massive four by fours in town.

-Fricking rickshaws get on my nerves.

-The ditherers.

I hate you people, I hate you.

Shopmobility, those things.

If I had to pick one group, I would say the worst are the Post Office van drivers.

Post Office workers, when the gates open and they come out like bees - but like bees whose nest is on fire.

They don't care, they drive like they are in dodgems. They just don't care.

Road rage is a very odd thing.

I don't know why, just because somebody

manoeuvres slightly incorrectly, or does something which inconveniences you for perhaps a couple of seconds.

You know all the...

How does it elevate from that to that?

"Get out of my bloody way, you useless..."

I have rage, I do get angry, I have got out of my car

on a couple of occasions, but when I realised it was

an elderly man, who looked quite frail, I sort of went..."Ooooh".

You stupid cow!

We drive on the left-hand side!

It is really embarrassing when the skinny guy who uses

straighteners gets road rage because it's all the more pathetic. I almost wrote off my first car.

I lost my temper, and pulled the manual gear stick

and pulled the gears out through the engine and broke the gearbox when I lost my temper.

I've ripped a sun visor off.

"You shouldn't be allowed to drive!"

I have become a really, really awful person. There is no doubt about it.

I have become incredibly violent and my language is very bad.

I have to be careful now, because I've got a young child in the back.

Just at that age when they might start picking stuff up, so I can't do my usual language.

But yeah, I've become, I can take quite a lot, I think, but if I'm pushed too far, I'll have a go.

"Argh!"

I do shouting, swearing, I'll do the finger.

I'll do...

I do like as you're driving away, the gesture between the headrests, in silhouette.

I think that's quite cool.

"You... Gggggrrrr!"

An angry motorist is a bad motorist.

-Yes... An angry motorist is a bad motorist.

-Right.

-Right. And a happy motorist is a good motorist.

-Splendid!

I've actually had, I was on Dartmouth Park Hill, which is just

off Highgate Hill, during rush hour, the traffic was awful and we were driving down and there was one guy,

it was very tight and very narrow, and as he drew up parallel to me, I said, "You know, you could

"have waited a couple of minutes there and we would all have been sailing sweetly down here."

He jumps out of his window, into my car and got hold of me round the neck.

Did you beep?

Ummm, yes, sorry.

Why? Why? Why?!

Ummmm, Gary?

I've got a crowbar in the back. I'm going to bring it over and shove it through your window.

It's a good job I had a bunch of boys in the car with me.

They all started laying into him,

as I am sure he would have killed me.

That's road rage. And I had merely pointed out that he was a terrible driver.

That terrible thing when you catch up with the driver and you haven't planned what you are going to do.

It's like, "I've caught you up!" Then just drive off again.

"I could of decked him, babe".

HORNS BEEP

-Come on, you.

-HORN BEEPS

Men are quite good at ruining the whole day just because of a driving experience.

You'll be getting ready for a party, it's been a really nice evening, and then is a traffic jam

on the North Circular and the man will be going,

"Oh, for Christ's sake, the whole evening is completely f'd up!"

And then he'll carry that anger with him for the whole evening and make sure it ruins

the whole evening, whereas the woman normally, I am making a massive stereotype here, but a good one,

the women will go, "Look, we got there on time, OK? We're at the party, it doesn't matter."

And the man will be, "Because I've slightly gone into a temper,

"I will now hang onto it and ruin your entire evening, all right?"

Motorists are being asked to be more courteous to each other.

The RAC and the Polite Society say road rage is causing an increasing number of accidents.

I am unequivocally, ideologically speaking,

completely and utterly opposed to capital punishment.

However, there is one exception,

which is these people who you pull over to let them come past,

when there's not room for two cars, and they go by and they don't even say "Thanks".

I'd hang those bastards.

Sometime I think, when people know they are doing a sneaky pull out, they don't indicate,

because if they indicate, you will say, "No, I don't think so!"

And you'll close the gap. So I can understand why people do things like that.

But on a narrow street, you stop and you let someone go, wave. If you don't wave at me,

I feel like reversing in their way and keying their car.

I wouldn't hesitate, just as the trap door was going...

.."That's all it took".

Honestly, I've wound down my window and gone, "Where's my wave?

"Wave, you ignorant bastard!"

That's all it takes.

That's it, that's all I ask for.

And it's very important.

Cast your mind back to when cycling was a pleasurable pastime.

Weaving through country lanes, feeling the fresh air on your face

and trustingly leaving your bike against a pub wall whilst enjoying half a cider.

Today, cycling is more like a white-knuckle ride,

with lyrca-clad loonies zipping in between lorry-laden lanes,

jumping red lights, cycling on the pavement.

They simply have no regard for us fossil-fuelled folk who actually pay road tax.

# I want to ride my bike I want to ride my bicycle

# I want to ride it where I like. #

I think cyclists should be taxed like the rest of us.

And if they jump a red light, we should be allowed to tazer them.

If I've jumped a red light, I've always gone by the book.

I've gotten off the bike, and pushed it through the red light, and gotten back on it again.

"You can't touch me, copper, I know the rules."

I can't stand it when cyclists jump red lights and getting off the bike

and walking through the red light and then getting back on it,

that is still jumping it.

I just love the way that they've got this rule - red lights, not for them.

"No, no, no, we're on two wheels. That's different. Kind of. Sort of."

# Don't stop me now. #

I said, calm down, or I will nick you, all right?

-I've come to go to work...

-I said, calm down.

I spent a long time as a cyclist, because I didn't have a driver's licence.

I pretended it was for environmental reasons, but it was just because

I hadn't bothered my arse to get a driving licence.

So I sympathise with the cyclist, but, you know, some do take the piss.

This whole, treat them like a small car.

Well, act like you're driving a small car.

Small cars don't go across zebra crossings.

We recycle all our food for the chickens, we do this, we do that,

but I cannot stand cyclists on the road. Get in a car.

-Sound your horn.

-There's no need. It's to turn right.

For the cyclist. Don't just go tearing past and surprise him.

Let him know we're coming. Sound your horn.

HORN BEEPS

They are so horrendous, they're awful. They come banging on your windscreen. You know, "Get out!"

It's like "Get out of the road.

"Look at the size of my car, look at your bike.

"One of us is going to win and it's not going to be you, so take your lycra shorts and get out".

We've invested all our hard-earned cash on a flash new motor,

but it isn't long before something goes wrong.

Something always goes wrong.

The local grease monkey will confirm the diagnosis and then work out a price,

by thinking of a number, doubling it, adding VAT and then laughing up his proverbial sleeve.

ENGINE COUGHS

Doh! You vicious bastard!

There is always that worry of bringing your car to the mechanic.

The stereotypical...

is that intake of breath, isn't it? "Phhhhwwww."

-Phhhhwwww.

-Phhhhwwww. Phhhhwwww.

-Phhhhwwww.

-Phhhhwwww.

-Yeah, yeah.

-It will cost you.

Normally, they just fold their hands and go, "Eeh, Shobna what you been doing?"

I don't have any experience of mechanics, but I do know a good trick.

If you are a woman, and you have any dealings with mechanics, plumbers, anything like that,

what you do, is you tell them that your dad is a mechanic, and he usually sorts out your car,

but he's on holiday at the moment. And then they don't treat you like you're an idiot

who doesn't know she's being charged through the roof for a bit of spit and polish.

Here, come and look at this.

-What?

-This, look...

It's all changed, cars now have kind of computers, you've no idea what's going on.

Your average mechanic probably could fix it, but it's got to be hooked up

to the right kind of computer, which again is just a way of them charging you whatever they say it is.

There have been times, as a woman, when I go, "You are talking to me like I'm an idiot."

Oh, blimey, there's a bald tyre here.

Oh, yeah, well, never mind, the other three are all right, we'll have them.

Do you know what I think is horrible about cars made in the last

five or six years, is all the computerised beeping it does at you.

I want to smash the thing when it does that.

My one beeps for about eight different reasons every time you turn the ignition on. I cringe, I cringe.

I'd rather it bloody played Dido at me.

Well, don't say I didn't warn you!

I've laid it on the line to you time and time again!

Right, this is it, I'm going to give you a damn good thrashing!

I took this car in because a light was up, right?

And the local garage guy I usually deal with said, "I can't fix this,

"because it needs to be hooked up to a diagnostic computer",

which is a word they've just made up, it doesn't mean anything, you know.

And I took this car in and he said, "What's wrong with it?"

I said, "It's stopped."

And he said, "Well, do you know anything more than that"

And I said "That's what I'm here."

I hate it. You turn it on... "Beep!

"Service now".

I decide when it needs a service, not you!

"Beep". Oil. A little oil thing comes up

and you can fill it with oil, you could spray oil, you could put it in,

you could get one of BP's leaks and shove the car over the top of it

so it was awash with oil, and you'd turn on the ignition and it would go, "Beep - oil".

There is no amount of oil that will satisfy it.

I think it was £70 an hour diagnostics.

I don't know whether that's expensive diagnostics or cheap diagnostics.

I don't even know what diagnostics are, so it's very difficult for me to judge.

And I phoned him back and he's like "Oh, it's been on an hour and a bit and the faults not come up yet."

And I said, "You're telling me I'm paying you £70 an hour and you still don't know what it is."

I didn't know what the fault was when I brought it here, and now I am £70 worse off

"and we still don't know what's wrong with it".

Something else, beep, brake pads, beep, I need a wash,

beep, I don't like you, I want a different driver, beep,

beep, beep,

beep, you've smashed my dashboard.

Just a hundred things it's telling you off about.

When we were little boys zipping around our Scalextrix set,

there were no restrictions to our racing pleasure.

Now, us wannabe Lewis Hamiltons can't creep and inch

over the speed limit without someone taking our mug shot.

I've got a point for going at,

watch my lips, 37 miles per hour.

I will admit, I've already got three points and I've only been driving for two years, so...

No! Wrong, wrong! Not 37 - 33 miles an hour.

33 miles an hour. I've got three points.

They should turn those cameras off at night. There's no traffic, it shouldn't matter.

Yeah, it was the middle of the day, and there was plenty of traffic.

We must have all been done. I was only going the same speed as everyone else.

After I got the points, they switched the speed cameras off.

You know some points for when you've only just gone over, you know, you weren't doing 70, you were

maybe doing 34 miles an hour, but technically they can get you, that's just irritating when that happens.

I defy anyone to make me move any quicker.

HORN BEEPS

You see, I told you, it's going too fast again.

The French decided, to a man, when they were putting

speed cameras in, that they'd go out and smash them all up, and they did.

And so they put them all back in, they went back again the next week, and smashed them all again.

Vive La France!

They tried to introduce them in America. There's a masked man,

like a superhero, goes round with an angle grinder...and they don't know who he is. Good luck to you, mate!

As a driver, you fantasise of miles and miles of open road, a ribbon of highway that

caresses its way through the beautiful British countryside.

And to that end, the motorway was constructed and the fantasy became a reality.

But that soon turned into a ruddy nightmare, as every other bugger

decided they wanted to use the new superhighway, too.

Now we spend wasted hours creeping along bumper to bumper, hour after hour, getting nowhere fast.

Oh, God...almighty!

Driving in England isn't really like driving, because you are

generally just in one giant queue, and that goes from

Wandsworth to just north of Birmingham and then

you might be able to get to fourth gear when you get past Birmingham.

If you've got a fifth gear in your car you might hit it near Scotland.

It's like one giant traffic jam, England.

I always say, for a really super bank holiday treat,

you've got to go a long way to beat four and a half hours staring up a horse's bottom.

The thing about motorways is that they seem to close them all the time.

You know, anytime someone looses a wheel nut or something, they close about three lanes.

You know, it's like... I think we're all reasonable people.

You know there's going to be traffic jams some of the time, but if you queue and queue and queue

and you get past it, and it's on the other side and everyone has slowed down to have a look.

I want a proper accident to justify my waiting time.

I don't expect to see, you know, a Vauxhall Chevette in the middle lane that's got

a wing mirror knocked off and they close the whole motorway for that.

They close them all the time. When I was a kid, you whizzed past scenes of absolute carnage.

Oh, God.

You start to think,

"Am I ever going to get to where I'm going?

"Am I maybe going to spend the rest of my life here?"

You know, a bit like prisoners must think when they've done about

ten years and there is no hint of parole or remission or anything.

And you think,

"I suppose I am just going to have to come to terms with the fact that this is my life now."

I wish I was dead.

I wish you were dead.

Then I'd get some peace.

The thing that really bugs me about motorways now is people who will not shift out of the middle lane.

Two-thirds of the motorway has never been used because they are all over here.

Get over there. I feel weird if I'm in the middle, you know.

And there not always, kind of, old people drive in the middle lane a lot.

I don't know why, because they were all taught not to.

What is wrong with pulling over, you know, people don't seem to want to go into any gaps.

In France, they love a gap. They go in there. In England...

OK, you know, if you want to go 75 or 80 miles an hour, I know it's illegal.

But then you've got Mr Jobsworth Dickhead in the car in front

who only wants to go at 70 miles an hour and so everyone must go at 70 miles an hour.

Even though the lorry he's trying to overtake is a mile ahead.

They should be shot, those people.

# This ain't no technological breakdown

# Oh, no, this is the road to hell. #

What gets to me, is sometimes if you are driving along in the middle lane and there's nothing on the road,

you get one of those guys who comes up on the inside lane and sits behind you and then goes

round you, and then deliberately goes back into the inside lane, as if to prove a point.

This is what you are supposed to be doing.

I get really, "Yeah, very good, I should been in the inside lane, thank you for the demo."

They want to show you how proficient they are at driving, so they start

in that lane, then they'll go out, then they go in again, they go out.

In the meantime, you are like that in the car, you feel sick,

the picnic's spilt. It's a nightmare, the baby's crying,

poo everywhere. Just because they want to show you how brilliant they are at swerving in and out.

Just stay in the middle lane, doesn't matter.

If someone wants to overtake, they can go that way or that way.

What annoys me is when people go straight into the inside lane,

straight into the middle lane and then straight onto the outside lane.

And they tend to use that slip road as some sort of launch pad.

They don't want to judge the speed of it, at all.

I want a police car right there, right then and then I want them arrested immediately,

taken to a studio, a TV studio and I want them flogged live, by Noel Edmonds in a gimp suit.

It's an amazing invention.

Sat there on the dashboard is a contraption that

triangulates beams from three satellites orbiting the Earth

to pinpoint your exact position and then tells you where to go,

which is usually from here to nowhere.

I've programmed the TomTom to direct us to where my cousin lives.

'After 50 yards, turn right.'

'In 50 yards, turn right.'

'Turn right.'

IMITATES ALEC GUINNESS: 'I'm the Obi-Wan Kenobi one. The force will be with you.

'Take the second exit at the roundabout.'

I think satnavs are generally hopeless.

But to be fair, I don't think you can blame the satnav,

it's that people put one in and then think that they can

just go into a coma and not have to think, or look at anything, because the satnav will tell you.

So they deliberately tell you to go the longest way, the wrong way, the opposite way.

A satnav now, if you programmed it to say, I want to get to that cupboard,

the satnav would say, go over there first. "No, the cupboards there,

"you could reach and get it." "No, no, it says go that way."

I can even put the satnav on to go to my local pub, which is only 100

yards down the road, and it will take me three miles round to get to it.

Shortest route? Don't think so.

The first one that I bought, regardless of where I asked

it to direct me to, took me over the Dartford crossing.

I took it back and got another one and found it had no maps.

Got a third one and when I opened it up it was in Spanish.

SATNAV "SPEAKS" SPANISH

I find them unbearable, and also, you know, you can out your journey in, and put it on the thing and then

it takes ages for it to work it out, you've already gone the wrong way. 20 minutes the wrong way.

Waste of time.

You get these people driving these 400-foot great lorries with about eight tonnes of concrete in it,

and they're in the countryside and they end up going up a bridle path.

Don't they think, "There's a couple of horses coming the other way

"and there's a tree in front of me and a stile, I'd better go over it".

"You get off my land!"

"It's not your land, the satnav says this is the way to Crewe."

How... It's just... Don't they think?!

-'Turn right.'

-I've turned right and where do I go from here?

-'Go straight on.'

It's private property, no trespassing, high voltage and there's also danger of death.

If you put you life in the hands of a satnav, you will be,

you can get in trouble. I remember going to the Isle of Wight

with some lads for a crazy golf weekend, not many people do that!

We did a crazy golf weekend in the Isle of Wight and it was brilliant.

And we wanted to get back to Southampton Airport

and I put Southampton Airport in it and it came up.

And I went, "Brilliant"! Anyway, we drove for a bit and not knowing the area, we ended up on

a council estate next to an electricity sub-station

and there's a bloke in the garden and he went "Satnav? Airport?"

And I went "Yeah, like, what's this, Derren Brown?"

The TomTom voice I have downloaded is an Irish one.

It's on there as standard, but it's got one fault,

it can't say you have reached your destination, so it's really funny.

It sounds like he is being so friendly that he feels like he doesn't have to finish the sentence.

So he does everything normally, "Turn right, in 400 yards."

And then it goes, "In 100 yards you've..."

and then there is just a gap, as if he's saying. "I think we all know you've reached

"your destination No need to state it!"

My father didn't really like cars either. As far as he was

concerned, he'd say, "A car is there to get you from A to B."

A lot of people say that.

And I admire those people, although I do think they are responsible for a lot of chaos and congestion,

as surely someone at some point has got to go from B to A.

If everyone is going from A to B, it's bound to result in congestion.

Someone has got to start saying, "I have a car to get me from B to A"

And then eventually someone is going to want to go to C and that will even

better for us, as I am sure that is why there is so much congestion.

That's how Ceefax chunky graphics would depict a squirrel.

Think it has something to do with Dad's Army.

They wear it on their sleeves. "Sergeant Wilson is approaching, Sir. Ha!"

Does that mean, um, Italian job ahead?

It means nobody over 30 is allowed!

I know it... Just give me a clue. Give me a clue?

-You're on a motorway.

-Right. Another, another clue?

Danger of...lightning striking your...screwdriver?

I have seen it on a stick.

I think it means it's the end of something.

Something is about to end.

It might be, er... It's a good job I don't drive!