Of Northern lights, and local airheadedness

EmissionRegular visitors to this little corner of sunshine will (hopefully) be pleased by the fact that I haven't been strapped to the front of an irate trucker's 18-wheeler and driven into a tree. Repeatedly. As to the rest of you, you just don't know what you're missing.

Not that I've had a particularly safe week, mind. I've suffered more than my fair share of frights at the hands of motorised maniacs, more of which presently.

But first off, I was gratified to note that at least someone of influence is reading my rants. I refer particularly to the honourable members of our fine police force. Now, I'm a humble chap (just ask my thousands of ardent fans), so I'm not going to take any credit for proposing this very idea weeks ago. That said, it was without a hint of smugness that I heard they plan to erect signs all over the country displaying a phone number for Joe and Jane Public to call if they witness anyone driving dangerously.

They estimate they'll get 5,000 calls a week. Around a third of them will be from me, ratting on clowns ripping through city streets one-handed as they blab on their phones.

I'll presume the Phoenix Park supremos have thought of using massive letters and an easily-remembered number to avoid the unfortunate carnage that would otherwise ensue from people straining to read them. I do have one question, however: If you're driving along a motorway in the rain and see some loon overtaking seven lorries at 105 mph, what are you supposed to do?

You can't just pull over onto the hard shoulder. You certainly aren't supposed to whack out your mobile phone and grass merrily away as you break the law yourself. Or are you? And, if you don't get the registration number of the miscreant, are you supposed to chase him?

A better plan, perhaps, would be to install a little swivel-mounted video camera on the bonnet of every willing snitch.

I would have run out of film last week. Never have I seen so many loons in such a short space of time. Not even in my other capacity as sometime court reporter have I encountered such an array of dangerous thugs in such close proximity.

There's something horribly chilling about watching some bumfluffed idiot in your rearview mirror as he bobs his head along to some poxy Ibiza trance music, chugs on a fag and itches for a 20-metre straight that he can use to justify overtaking you and the 14 other vehicles in front.

"Don't do it, man," you mutter to yourself, shuddering at the potential outcome. But they always do. I'm a great man for the schadenfreude, but even I baulk at the prospect of seeing the contents of some idiot's skull splattered on the road. Not to mention all the innocents he's nonchalantly putting in mortal danger.

Nearly all of them were sporting Northern Ireland plates. What is it about Nordies and their insane driving? At first, I guessed our speedfreak cousins come down here to avoid getting kneecapped by "community activists" at home for their antics. But a colleague from Co Down dismissed this outright. "Naw, they're at it everywhere," he said, resignedly.

A point illustrated by the fact that the PSNI unveiled the first of a new batch of fixed speed cameras in Belfast city centre last week. Admirable though it may be in theory, I feel this may be akin to relieving one's bladder into the wind.

Perhaps fixing individual cameras to every car in the North would be a better option. Just to be on the safe side, you understand.

There was a time Nordies could use the state of the roads in the South as an excuse for their antics. Sure, with their modern motorways and other high falutin' amenities at home, how could the poor laddies be expected to adjust to our donkey tracks?

Not any more. I was quite humming with pride during my weekend jaunt to Kerry to see all the mighty roads traversing the country. The fact that none of them are actually joined to each other by anything more substantial than the aforementioned relics of our donkey-droving past is incidental. Eventually, like a tattooist with a 40-stone subject, they'll join all the dots.

Here's hoping. If I survive long enough to see it, that is.