I’m not sure where to start today’s rant blog. Perhaps I’ll start with the the woman on the mobility scooter who sounded her horn at me because she thought I was holding her up as I walked along a pavement with my walking stick.
It is legal to drive one on the pavement, it seems, though not legal to drive one on a cycle path. Strange laws…
It probably isn’t legal to zip along the pavement sounding your horn and imitating Boadicea, as we always used to call her before we were told Boudicca was the proper name. Even the spell-checker doesn’t like Boudicca.
However, unless I’m going to set myself up with a bodycam I don’t suppose I’ll be able to do much about it.
Little Old Lady out Shopping – photo from pixabay.com
That has set me thinking about old people and an experiment I have in mind. We have an endless supply of them, so if we lose a few along the way I don’t suppose it will matter. Well, it will matter to them, but it won’t matter to me.
My idea is to fit Mobility Scooters with defibrillators wired into the horns. Sound your horn at me and you will get a high voltage reminder about courteous driving.
OK, it might see one or two of them off, but in conservation terms they are of Least Concern so it’s not like losing a Black-Footed Ferret or an Orangutan.
This way we can teach the drivers better road manners and, in all probability, liven some of them up. The unlucky few who can’t cope with 1,000 volts will serve as an example to anyone else who wants to run me down on the footpath.
(Two cautionary notes before any elderly readers get upset – I’m old too. I’m officially old enough for free prescriptions and tonight, at the pharmacy I wasn’t quizzed as to whether I had to pay for prescriptions. Though I’m not yet old enough to spread terror on the footpaths in a mobility scooter.
And two, a serious point – I was once rammed in the back of my legs by someone driving one of these scooters in a Supermarket. They need tests and they need insurance! And I need protection.)