Things Learned Today!

[John Knight]

Oh it would be real traffic alright. I would have to come straight down Oldham road and the best you get there is a buss lane to get killed in.

[stimpsonslostson]

I learned that Tramps can be funny! Cycling to work in the pouring rain today, a tramp lightened my mood immensely.
I was approaching a junction and the lights were turning amber (I'm glad I stopped or I'd have missed the show). A drunken tramp lady comes over and starts screaming and shouting at a car, she goes over and starts kicking and punching it whilst yelling "you nearly hit me ya B@ST@RD!" The driver seemed strangely reluctant to respond...
thats because it was a parked car! The driver was getting a coffee and returned to see this piss head beating his shiny little focus!

"What are you doing?"
"This C##T nearly ran me over. He's too scared to get out of his car!"
"Thats MY car! I've been parked there for 30mins!"
"So it was YOU!"
"WTF!" The look of utter confusion on the drivers face was AMAZING!


I dearly wanted to stay and watch the floorshow develop, but the lights were green and it WAS pouring.
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[Fez]

roadworks and heat turn reasonable people into cabbage brained-morons.

roadworks on the east lancs road had closed the righthand lane. a lexus in that lane not only didn't move over but waited whenever the lefthand lane stopped despite the fact there was a good thousand yards of empty tarmac in front of it. once a considerable cue had built up behind it, a nova mounted the central divide to go around the lexus and eventually the driver took the hint and changed lanes. a rush down the righthand lane then began until a lorry infront pulled into the centre of the two lanes to stop the cue jumpers. next a bmw on right started weaving about not indicating but closing in on my car, as if wanting to sit on my lap - i left a gap in front to give this prick space to move in but the driver fell further behind and eventually moved across a few cars behind me.

i know we all see maddness on the roads but this all happened in the space of quarter of a mile; has the heat turned people's brains to mush?

[Mike]

I think that the clue was in the car manufacturer's: Lexus + BMW, not renowned for their courteous drivers are they?

[John Knight]

There is a roundabout near us where you can pretty much guarentee that some arsehole will jump the queue. This is not down to roadworks it has been entirely caused by some shag-wit traffic engineer! The roundabout has 6 roads joining it, the worst approach is along Greengate, which is a large dual carrage way in front of what was British Areospace in Chadderton. Right so we have two lanes approaching...... the left hand lane is for 1st left (a small residential street about 3 cars a week go this way), and left onto Hollinwood avenue (busier but not that busy), the right hand lane is for the other three. Needless to say almost all the traffic goes along these three. towards manchester or Down Victoria Avenue. What you tend to get it people forcing there way up the left hand side and pushing their way in on the roundabout.

Oh yeah the roundabout is now traffic light controlled (absolutely ruined) and every side st has its own lights, so thats 5 pairs of lights on a diddy little round about, so try to get round the first section without some prick in a BMW driving into your left to jump the queue you get the added bonus of people jumping the lights (and it happens all the time) into you on the right or just blocking up your entrance onto the roundabout.

If the left hand lane was for 1st left, left and staight on, and the right hand lane for the other two it would be fixed. oh and they took the sodding traffic lights off and put zebra's in for the pedestrians instead.


Yes traffic has slowed down over the last few years but how much of that is due to the fecking idiots "upgrading" our junctions?

[stimpsonslostson]

I learned that...
I felt ok at the weekend, came to work and immediately my sinuses blocked up... same happened to Andrew... and Jen... and Paula- We all work slightly different hours in my labs, which are right next door to a refurbishment site... and I learned that the builders have been working with the door to my floor open because of all the DUST they are generating clogging up their site! So its now in my lab! I arrived this morning to find EVERYTHING under a film of dust. No wonder I feel like SH1T, but feel fine when I get home. Time to start complaining to high ups I think. (not that they'll believe us or do anything about it if they do).
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[Mike]

Say its a Health and Safety Risk for Building and Construction sites to have such large amounts of dust on a construction site as they are supposed to take measures to keep the dust levels to an acceptable minimum and provide protective devices to prevent your airways being blocked.

I am sure the Health and Safety Executive and the Construction Design and Management Co-Ordinator would be delighted to find out.

[stimpsonslostson]

I've just had responses from everyone I've contacted...
One said work elsewhere (hard seeing as this is my office and suite of labs- he did say he couldn't TELL me to go home but... )
The rest are looking for work arounds- we wait with baited breath. (I think the mention that we all have sore throats and are starting to cough raised a few alarms).
p

[BarcelonAl]

Just mention the fact that you know an asbestos engineer who is willing to come and check the content of the dust...

[liz.brownlloyd]

What age is the building they are working on?

[stimpsonslostson]

its relatively new... but its an extension of a much older structure.
The problem is fixed. the second I mentioned that 3 members of staff were feeling rough they fixed it and installed extractor fans to get rid of the dust. YAY!

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I've not learned ANYTHING so far today! Result!

[Mike]

I learned that the Deli near Pizza Express sells Fentimans Ginger Beer (probably the best Ginger Beer in the whole world! - paraphrasing a famous advert!).

[stimpsonslostson]

probably the best Ginger Beer in the whole world!

Sorry mate, but you're wrong. This is the best ginger beer in the world! You can get it from Costco, I'm getting some from my parents when I go up- I drank my dads entire supply last time I was there.

p

[Mike]

That is a good Ginger Beer, for sure, and it is sold on the Burton Road Deli just on the way from yours to the Metropolitan Pub! Not the best though!

[stimpsonslostson]

i learned that having big shoulder muscles means having big pain when one of the buggers decides to lock up... So I can't move my arm, or my neck. Marvelous.
Thank god there's an Olympics to watch
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