Good angel cyclists (letter to Time Out)

I’m sure Michael Hodge’s Slice of Life last week (Time Out 1915) was calculated to get hundreds of letters from irate cyclists, but I’m going to ignore that fact and write anyway.

I think his column misses the point. Every day I see the vast majority of my cycling colleagues flouting the rules of the road, often creating dangerous situations because of their carelessness.

But a leaked Transport for London report two weeks ago (reported in The Times) came to the shocking conclusion that cyclists who stop at red lights are more likely to be killed on the road than those who don’t.

Many pedestrians put themselves and others into danger by dashing across the road in front of cars and stepping out when they aren’t looking. But when do you hear the whole class of pedestrians being vilified, except perhaps by Jeremy Clarkson?

Law abiding “good angel” cyclists don’t deserve death on the roads just because fellow cyclists don’t obey traffic signs.

Noisy neighbourhood

I'm working at home this week and have discovered my upstairs neighbour vacuums her floor about three times a day, no exaggeration.

I do mine er... up to once a week. Am I a slob or is she crazy?

(She does have builders in at the moment, but even so is three times a day necesary?!)

The noise is, incidentally, more irritating than the screams of her month-old baby.

I won't even go into "tuneless whistling man" who lives over the fence or the icecream van that plays the Match of the Day theme tune. (Gah!)

On a more positive note, I'm rather proud to have discovered a blackbird using my garden as a foraging patch.

Funky Mary

Her name was Mary Func, so she couldn’t help being known as Funky Mary. But she wasn’t funky in the least sense, which made it worse. And it wasn’t the sort of easy nickname people tossed around like Sharpie, Mikey or Red. It was just another needle to needle her with.

She had short brown hair and moony glasses, because one could never be pretty with a pair of specs. Her skirts stopped below the knee showing a short length of stout calf before the start of her socks which led to her flat shoes.

And anyway, as a surname Dysfunc would have been more appropriate.