Towed away
staying with a mate for a couple of months in the picturesque country town of Henley-on-Thames. Would be even more picturesque if they drowned all the fucking chavs in the now nicely swollen river, but that's not the point of my story.

My mate's house in on one of the main roads into Henley, about 100 metres from a junction which normally backs up a bit during rush hour.

Come 4th July, it's the start of Henley Royal Regatta and every man and his dog descends on Henley if they have any connection with the sport of rowing or have an inclination to get lashed on expensive Pimm's on a cloudy and windy Wednesday afternoon (or in my case, staying sober as I'm racing in it myself in the evening). Consequently it's traffic carnage.

My mate's house is on what is normally classed as a 'country road' and has no parking restrictions on it at all. Hers is a little victorian place in a terrace of cottages. All the residents park their cars on the road outside their houses - no problem.

Not so 4th July. 8.30am (by which point my mate is well gone to work in London and I'm not even up) they put out 'police - no waiting' bollards where my mate's car is parked. 9.30am they give it a 'parking on no waiting zone' ticket with a £30 fine and then at 11am tow the bloody thing away to that armpit of Berkshire that is Reading.

Fair enough, it was causing an obstruction, but did they put up any notices beforehand that they were making this a 'no waiting' zone? did they fuck, nothing tied to lamp posts, nothing in the paper, nothing through the door. useless fucks.

When I spoke to a (very helpful) bike copper about it to find out where it had been towed to, he found out and also told me, and said he'd been drafted in from Warwickshire to help out over the regatta period and couldn't believe how unplanned they were for some stuff. It's not like it's a surprise, this thing's been going on every first week in July for over 150 years!
(Calamity wetter than a fish's wet bits - bloody rain on, Fri 27 Jul 2007, 15:49, Reply)