OK BH, I know you have been chomping at the bit for this so here goes.
Arrived at MG's gaff with Peperami to find we had been beaten there by Blinky, Tom Tom and Kiwi. Bacon baguettes were ready and waiting for the steady stream of schunters who were arriving by the minute. Big thanks go to MG and her daughter and neighbour for sorting this out for the bunch of nutcases who had descended on them for some strange reason.
Bennage managed to get himself lost in more ways than can be described, but once we knew he was close we all suited up and got ready to go. We all pulled up at the hilly end of MG's road and waited for the long awaited arrival of Bennage. When he finally appeared we all gave him some piss taking applause and we were off.
That's when Peperami decided that despite having everyone in MG's road watching us he would promptly drop his bike because the camber in the road was so bad that he couldn't get his foot down far enough to keep his bike upright.
After only a slight delay when Blinky kindly agreed to take Peperami with her as a pillion passenger while the AA sorted out PP's broken clutch lever, off we went to the Kent Police Headquarters.
To say that the masked and green vested riders caused a stir on our arrival may be a bit of an understatement. There was hardly a window in the rather large building that houses the whole of the heart of the Kent Police force that wasn't occupied with coppers or support staff wondering what the **** was going on!
All these masked, green jacketed, who know whats had suddenly descended on them and their curiosity was getting the better of them.
So in we go to to see the duty officer.
She was a very nice lady who was a bit confused by the sudden appearance of "biker types" but to her credit was completely approachable. So a certain BE began to explain what exactly what was going to happen both today and in the future. At some point during BE's explanation he became aware that everyone else in the room had stopped talking and was listening to him explain what we were about to do. And everyone, cops included, was smiling.
The nice lady went away and consulted with some people, and when she came back she gave us an incident number telling us that if there were to be an unfortunate incident between us and any $car, the copper called to deal with it should call in and quote the incident number and he/she would be told exactly what was going on. Job done.
Then under the instruction of MG we split up into three groups of four and went $chunting at the already scouted hotspots in Gillingham, Strood, Chatham and Rochester, ably led by Monkey Girl, Tom Tom and Blinky.
Within about 45 minutes we had both Medway cars under observation, and shortly after they were both safely back at their base.
After conversations with some other council employees who were going out for lunch, it became apparent that the main parking service department was situated in a building very close to where the $cars were holed up.
Well, it would be a missed opportunity to not at least discuss with them what was happening, so me, MG, Chalky and Crabby all went off to have a word with someone in the parking department to let them in on the fun. You should know that MG, Chalky and Crabby all had cameras with them, and MG and Chalky both had masks on.
The woman who was used to just collecting money from pissed off members of the public in payment of parking fines was more than a little surprised to find four members of the public asking questions that she was not prepared for. I asked to see somebody about the CCTV cars but instead of dealing with my request she told me that she had not given her permission to be photographed (there were three video $cameras trained on her ) and that she would not talk to me on camera. So she disappeared into the back offices.
So we were standing there like lemons for about 5 minutes, watching various heads pop out from various offices behind the scenes, and then suddenly a man with the ill fitting suit and an attitude came out and asked us to move away from the counter where everyone comes to pay their fines because we were apparently "obstructing members of the public".
I will not go into how offensive I find this statement, but suffice it to say it really pisses me off that because I ride a bike I am the subject of discrimination. Am I not a member of the public?
And since I know you guys at Medway are reading this
, you might want to look at your own policies on discrimination.
I ride a bike. I am a member of the public. You are public SERVANTS. Please deal with it or get another job.
Anyway, on with the story. After about 15 minutes of head scratching and fevered action behind the scenes we finally got a response. I can't quote verbatim but it went pretty much like this.
"My staff here are feeling intimidated by your presence and I am asking you to leave the building otherwise I will call the police" The lady who announced this was backed by some very smug looking council employees (ill fitting suit man included) and obviously thought that this would do the trick.
Wrong!
After some banter we agreed to wait for someone more senior to arrive to deal with the situation. He turned up within the promised 20 minutes and after some argument agreed to have an interview ON CAMERA with me and Crabby. Poor old Chalky wasn't allowed to come in because he dared to wear the V mask.
With the deepest respect to Mr Moore and all of the other public SERVANTS who might make this a reason for not dealing with members of the public who ask questions of their SERVANTS, one might question why there is a difference between wearing a mask and a burka, and whether mask wearers are being discriminated against.
Anyway, Mr Moore was very nice and listened intently to what me and Crabby said. It is all on video but we will not be putting it up for public consumption at this time.
After the meeting, having been served tea by the nice lady who had threatened to have us arrested, we went back to waiting for the $camera cars to come out to play.
And we waited.
And we waited.
And then we waited some more for these noble cars to come out to do their duty by assisting with public safety.
To our disappointment, and to the shame of the council, public safety seems to have been compromised for that particular day in favour of working out what they are going to do now they have been rumbled.
$chunt safe you Medway guys. I will be with you whenever I can.
Stay cool
Bald Eagle
