Mirror Man

Is it the case in other countries, the UK for example, that car wing mirrors are likely to become detached from the car with quite the same degree of frequency as they are here? And if not detached, then hanging off, flapping or in some other way less than completely associated with the vehicle. I pulled up by a café in Puerto Alcúdia yesterday morning. The next car was minus its passenger-side wing mirror. Around the corner, there was a bloke who was attempting to replace a wing mirror which had, at some point, parted company with the main body of his car.

A few days ago, I commented to a friend that neither wing mirror of his Golf was quite as Volkswagen had intended it: one was minus the actual mirror, the other had assumed an angle of 45 degrees from the position it might normally expect to have. He was of course already aware of this, as you might hope, and pointed out that the car was not actually his but his wife's, thus giving rise to some under-the-breath mumbling of a women drivers' nature. To have one wing mirror battered and bruised is unfortunate, but to have both in a state of disrepair - simultaneously - is carelessness (on behalf of the other driver of course), to say nothing of making the actual act of driving more hazardous than is normally the case here and probably also illegal.

I am glad to say that I have that rather neat electronics trick that enables me to, as it were, close my wing mirrors. And it is a necessity. For this is the land of the broken wing mirror. "Take this broken wing mirror, learn to drive again etc. ..." And that was Mr. Mister, in case you were wondering; well not exactly those words of course. Whether there is anything specifically about wing mirrors and their partial or total removal in the local version of the Highway Code, I would doubt, but I am delighted to be able to report that I am now aware of someone who is taking Spanish driving lessons, i.e. Sara of Ben and Sara. And this is by way of shaming her into reminding her to send me some invaluable snippets which can form the basis of some damn good bloggery. One such is that I have discovered that there is indeed such a thing as roundabout etiquette, though etiquette is used here to mean procedure as opposed to something that might be performed with a degree of courtesy; as far as I know there is no word for courtesy or any word approaching its meaning in the local highway code lexicon. That this etiquette exists is rather beside the point, however, because no-one has clearly ever read the same theory book that Sara has, let alone ever been asked a question about it. And the same absence of etiquette at roundabouts is evident among the two-wheeled ranks of the cycling terrorists of Germany. Let me give you an example. I happened - also yesterday - to be behind a car that was intending to leave a roundabout at the left-hand exit. I say "intending" as his exit was blocked: blocked by a great pelaton of Germans on bikes who were quite happy to totally ignore the fact that the car had right of way and were advancing from behind those white marks on the road which, for drivers at any rate, indicate that you are meant to stop. Is there, possibly, someone out there who is similarly ill-disposed to the norms of the road and can thus enlighten me as to why he or she should feel that he or she has the right to treat these norms with total impunity? In other words, is there a cyclist who rides like a complete prat and is willing to admit to it in public, or as public as this blog can be?


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - I am always delighted when a blogotee responds to one of the quiz questions for the first time, especially when the question is fairly obscure. So, congratulations to Tom for knowing Torchy The Battery Boy (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wujTB-nDe-M). Today's title - which other blog can possibly bring you Torchy and then the next day the weird musical genius responsible for this?

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