Driving force

I am not good at this…

….I have said it before and I will say it again, I am no good at blogging regularly, although I spend a LOT of time of the computer I never seem to get round to it. To make it worse, a lot has happened since I last bothered to write anything down and things have been bouncing around my brain ready to launch into cyber space but then I forget all about it. Which is typically me, I have definitely got some attention span issues. I am full of ideas; it’s the execution that fails me.

So much has happened that I have decided it is not worth writing much of it down, it’s just the account of one life among many anyway so not of much interest. There is one thing though that has been a recurring theme over the last few weeks that I think is worth a mention. I started this whole thing to observe differences in Spanish and Anglo Saxon ways of bumbling around on the mortal coil, more as a reference for me than for anyone else, although, there is an off-chance that others might be interested.

Anyway, blah blah blah. Driving. Driving in Spain is not for the fainthearted. For the first time in my life I feel genuinely brave when I go round a roundabout. Which is nice I suppose.

I don't mind driving here; you just sort of have to have eyes in the back and sides of your head. At the same time you have to pretend that you don't see anyone at all so that you can still muscle in and go where you want to go. Trick 1 of driving in Spain: Master the art of seeing EVERYTHING whilst appearing to see absolutely nothing and seemingly not caring one jot for your car. It is not easy. I have an irrational sentimental attachment to my car. And my life.

Trick 2: Please understand that indicators are optional extras on cars in Spain and it seems that most people don't like to pay the extra for this feature. That or somehow they charge here per usage of the aforementioned indicator. Whatever the reason, they appear very scarce. Endangered even.

Trick 3: my dad gave me one piece of good advice (ever) and it was "if you drive as if everyone is out to kill you, you may just make it out alive". This is indeed wise advice although it has done nothing to lessen my innate paranoia about the world.

Trick 4: Avoid women drivers. Yes. I am a girl and yes, I am all for equality BUT having said that, the women drivers here are among the worst I have seen anywhere. The problems are many and varied, they have: no sense of anyone else’s existence, the attention span of gnats and basically drift in and out of lanes in a rather listless and disinterested fashion, sometimes at high speed while talking on the phone, doing their makeup or shouting at their kids/boyfriends/husbands. They seem to genuinely disconnect from reality the minute they get in a car, they do the strangest things and then get really really outranged (and a outraged Spanish woman is something to see) when they drive into you or pull out without looking and you overtly question their decision-making capability. Spanish Women Drivers: AVOID AVOID AVOID (especially when outraged).

The next thing is less a trick and more a series of observations that relate to the drier more central and southern areas of Spain rather than the north. When it rains here, people crash, a lot. The roads in the city grind to a halt owing to the number of people randomly smashing into one another. The windscreen wipers on the cars here are different and they are basically not up to the job. Rain here is scarce so the roads get greasy when they get wet. They also don’t use cat’s eyes here on the roads. I had not really noticed the difference here; I drive at night and have street lights etc so no big deal. Well, it is a huge deal when the heavens open, the roads turn to rivers and you cannot see the little painted white lines on the roads. Cat’s eyes. I miss them (but only when it rains).