Roll call (in order of most distance travelled to get to CC):
Coco
Jonesy
News Shopper Martin
Bald Eagle
Mr Mustard
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
With so many of us there, the human blockade we formed was almost unbreachable, but that didn't stop a few from trying. Fortunately we managed to persuade the few that did try to take an alternative route rather than use the £130 toll road known as Connell Crescent.
The number of definite saves seems to be decreasing (about 40 yesterday), but we have it on good authority that when we aren't there the flow of traffic is fairly constant once traffic starts to build on the slip road that comes off the A40 to access the Hanger Lane gyratory system. Or as I prefer to call it the HANGER LANE ROUNDABOUT.
During the quiet periods yesterday we put our heads together to see if we could come up with a solution that would provide better compliance levels than that being achieved by the current rape and pillage method of enforcement. We came up with a few suggestions, but by far the most effective would also be the most expensive, but so what?! They can afford to pay for it out of the money they have picked from the pockets of unwitting motorists, a large number of whom include the local residents who voted for the scheme in the first place (the irony has not escaped us
).
And NS Martin picked the perfect day to break his CC cherry. I will explain. I was chatting with a guy who pulled over to tell us that he had received 3 tickets at CC which he had already paid under protest. He was glad to see us there helping others avoid the same fate as him and he thanked us profusely for devoting our time to what he obviously considered to be a noble cause.
Then he asked the most rhetorical question anyone could ever ask of a NoToMob $chunter. "Do any of you like a drink?", to which I replied "Does Dolly Parton sleep on her back?"
It turns out he owns the Ghost Vodka company that produces premium vodkas for the likes of Harrods, and he presented me with a bottle of his Union Jack vodka (pictured below) for us to share between us. A very nice and welcome gesture on his part, but unfortunately not a practical one. A quick discussion after he left established that young Martin was a bit of a vodka connoisseur
, so it was agreed that he should take the whole bottle, since divvying it up was not an option, nor was drinking any of it before climbing on our bikes and riding home.
We had a long chat with a couple of beat bobbies who had obviously been briefed about what we were doing there, and they had no problems with us doing it. There were the usual toots on car horns, shouts of encouragement and thumbs up in support, so it was with a warm glow inside me that I made my weary way home when our 4 hour shift ended.