Diary Of An ADI

It doesn’t surprise me – there was this story on Autoblog last week. There is a new menace on the roads: Facebook.

I’ve mentioned on several occasions (just search for “texting” using the search facility on the right) that the number of people who are obviously texting whilst driving is increasing all the time. But it seems there may have been more to it than I thought.

Now, I’ve got to be completely honest about this. I have never understood Facebook or its appeal. Oh, I’m a member – but whenever I follow a link back to the page it came from I am amazed by the utter rubbish at the other end in most cases.

It is full of sad people having conversations with themselves, or “making friends” with other sad people (which amounts to clicking a button and appearing as a “friend” on their “friends” list, and almost nothing else). Even where there is a page with attempts at sensible discussion on it, Facebook  is not exactly the most navigable system in the world – and it is infested by halfwits who are only there to swear. And who gives a toss whether “Frazer from Hertford likes this”?

Here are some examples picked at random from profiles and Facebook discussions:

Music: Cheryl Cole, U2, Snow Patrol

…here’s a good tip if your feeling sh*t WEAR GLOVES

F*** YOU! 🙂          [censored by me]

finks its time 2 calm down abit now and maybe grow up … actually f*** that il just calm down 🙂          [censored by me]

It doesn’t get any better than this. So it should come as a shock to everyone to learn that the sad imbeciles who can’t live without Facebook are now using it while they are driving! According to Autoblog:

The success of websites like Facebook and Twitter, combined with the rise of the smartphone, has added another dimension to the list of likely distractions.

While calls and texts remain the biggest reason for taking your eyes off the road, the study also listed the applications motorists were most likely to use at the wheel. The largely predictable top five were email, Google Maps, music, photos and Facebook.

And let’s not just single out Facebook here. Twitter lends itself far more easily to being used whilst driving. But the problem is the same.

It truly is frightening that people like this are allowed to keep their licences. They should be banned for life.

I’m keeping my fingers crossed that we don’t have another winter like last year. The persistent snow and ice led to me having to cancel quite few lessons.

But – just like every year – the media is intent on talking things up into a crisis.

This story from the Telegraph today says that Met Office data indicate a milder than usual winter is on the way, although both it and the Met Office point out clearly that long terms forecasts are no longer given (mainly because of the “barbecue summer” forecast where B&Q had to start selling diy Ark kits so people could get about).

That’s not good enough for the Telegraph, though. It had to rake in some people from the Association of Village Idiots – no doubt specially selected for their alternative vibes about the forthcoming winter.

Now, it’s worth pointing out again that the Met Office no longer does long-range forecast. The Telegraph story says so, and the Met Office says so. In fact, the Met Office has just sent out an email alert which says:

Following public research, the Met Office no longer issues long-range forecasts for the general public; instead we provide a monthly outlook on our website.

Despite this, you may have seen some reports in the media on Thursday, suggesting the Met Office has produced a forecast for the coming winter.

These media reports have based their interpretation for the coming winter on probability maps on our website. However, they have been selective about the information they have used and you should not take these interpretations as a guide to the coming winter. Instead we would recommend using our monthly outlook and short range forecasts.

But this doesn’t stop one Village Idiot declaiming:

“It baffles me how the Met Office can predict a milder-than-average winter when all the indicators show this winter will have parallels to the last one,” he said.

“The Met Office is standing alone here, as ourselves and other independent forecasters are all predicting a colder-than-average winter.”

Personally, I just have a horrible feeling that we’ll get another bad winter. I don’t care about the temperature, but I do care about snowfall.

It has been quite wet recently. I don’t care how “dry” it has been statistically, I know how “wet” it is now (it’s raining as I speak). They’ve already had snow in Scotland, and although the temperature outside today is around 13°C, only two days ago it was as low as -5°C and I was getting ice off the car before starting work two mornings running. But when it is cold, rain can fall as snow.

Fingers crossed.