Be Excellent To Each Other

My son's current favourite plaything is my harmony One remote control, not any of the nice toys we've bought for him.

Our old wardrobes don't fit in our new bedroom.

Loaded up a new series of a TV show onto my tablet. First episode doesn't work

My new deodorant has made my armpits all tingly, like I've smeared them with toothpaste.

I looked at the can and it has 'built in air conditioning'. WHY WOULD I WANT THAT IN WINTER?

Resale value.

My moisturiser does that. It's really weird and I only bought it because I realised I had forgotten my normal one when we got to the cottage.

I mean it makes my face tingle. Not my armpits - that would be weird.

Actually, it only makes my eyes tingle. Not my eyeballs, just around my eyes. Like toothpaste.

You out toothpaste around your eyes?

My healthier more active lifestyle and resulting weight loss means my winter coat is too big and I need to spring for a new one. Woe!

I am having to get two suits altered as I have lost too much weight

Wear an extra jumper under it. Problem solved.

Get the price of the coat, and the spend half of the amount on pizza.

Ye...nope.

What on Earth is a roz pocket?

I'm guessing it's what I call a Poacher's Pocket, which is a large pocket on the inside of the coat for smuggling game.

Got stung by customs for VAT on a tshirt from the US of A.

The VAT was £3.14. Their own charge was £8.

Fucking cunts.

Tshirt was still wrapped inside and the limited edition prints I got were all 250/250 which was cool.

Decided to educate an American friend about Britpop, so sent him a link to Pulp's 'Common People' on Youtube . Only later realised that the link I'd sent was a version that omits the last two words from the classic line 'dance and drink and screw'. Grrr....

Been getting more hours at work than expected. So I'm making more money. Now I'm tired.

I left my wallet on a plane on Friday, and it hasn't been handed in.

So now I get to try and convince the travel insurance people that it had £350 in cash in it.

I'm guessing the ATM receipts will also be in your wallet.

Could you send them a copy of your bank statement with the withdrawn cash showing?

I guess we'll find out.

Arses, sorry to hear Grim..., what a ballache.

Hardly comparable, but one "First World Problem" thing that's always irritated me: people who flash you for having xenon headlights. Man, I get so pissed off with driving at night, on normal beam, having a faceful of high beam from oncoming cars... surely people know that xenon headlights are brighter, right? You can spec 'em on virtually any car these days and they're hardly unusual; I've even had the alignment etc. checked just in case there was something amiss, but they're tickety boo.

Apart from anything else, it's bloody dangerous deliberately trying to dazzle an oncoming driver, especially on a narrow, unlit country lane, in the middle of the night.

In other news, I spent the second half of my morning commute with a National Express coach driver giving me "The Full Audi", mere milimetres from my arse, for reasons unknown. When I filtered into another lane, he craned his neck out of his cab and gave me the finger, which was nice of him. Gah.

Then maybe it was a mistake to spec your car to dazzle oncoming drivers at night. Just an idea.

They don't though, they're just brighter (and a slightly different colour). You can easily spot them coming toward you and I've seen other drivers flash cars that aren't doing anything wrong.

Yeah, and lights dazzling drivers is little to do with brightness and everything to do with angle. That's why even dim lights on full beam dazzle - because they're not pointed at the ground.

Maybe its a height thing - I'd certainly be lower on the car than you, but my experience is that they entirely kill my ability to see.

Which doesn't greatly please me.

I must admit, I did prefer it when the only cars on the road that had them were police cars. Made speeding on the motorway at night much easier.

.... Riiiiiight.

So according to you I'm somehow in the wrong here, despite having 100% standard, totally road-legal lights; that all those manufacturers who've spent many millions developing them are also wrong, as are all those safety bodies governing their use as well? Presumably therefore, it's quite okay in your book for people to not just briefly flash, but deliberately give it full-on, sustained beam, on dark, narrow roads, when oncoming at speed mere metres away - and I've got my missus or one of the kids in the car...?

For my part, that doesn't greatly please me, I can tell you....

I flash back and wave.

Don't get chance most of the time, since many of the twats leave it until the very last possible minute, when they're right in front of me.

It almost certainly is a height thing - driving the Celica at night is sometimes an exercise in annoyance because I'm sufficiently low enough that oncoming xenons are basically pointed straight into my face.

In the BMW, it tends to just be higher vehicles like Range Rover Sports etc. that cause it, but it's definitely a problem.

I only flash if I can see that they do actually have their main beams on.

Like I did the other day to a car coming towards me on the A5 dual carriageway with their main beams on - until I realised that, actually, they were on MY side of the carriageway

I'd still argue that those cars have their headlights pointing too high.

You should be able to sit on the floor in front of them and be okay.

Yeah, I'm with Grim... on this. The alignment of a car's headlights must take its height into account such that regardless of vehicle size/height, the headlamps still shine on the same patch of road. (I believe headlamp alignment is tested as part of MoT)

In my case I wouldn't mind so much, but xenons (which TBH are excellent) were standard fit anyway...

Also Gaz, someone was coming at you in *your* carriageway...? Shit, now *that* is something to complain about!

Well, yeah. But as I understand it they're required by law to self-level when they're switched on, which means that either a) the self-levelling is faulty, or b ) the level set by the manufacturer isn't right.

Cavey: Yep, someone else swerved to avoid her and ended up on their roof - it's the only time I've ever used my phone while driving (to call 999!) but I guess they couldn't catch up with her in time :/

Hmm, that's new in the last three years then - the Mundano leveled (and centered, because it did the "point around corners" thing) when it started up, but you could still adjust them up and down manually if you liked.

Some are definitely worse than others, aren't there a few variations on the technology out there?

I know I've had oncoming cars on the mountain road (a totally pitch black unlit road at night if there's no moonlight) that have dazzled me to an extent that I've had to slow down considerably, such has been the effect of them. That's just on normal, not main beam.

4x4s seem to be particularly bad because they're higher up to start with.

The Scooby had LEDs and the C6 had xenons, but the Accord has traditional headlamps, and I have to say that I don't miss the LEDs/xenons at all, which I thought I would.

Maybe it's my imagination but the xenons of today seem a lot more ferocious than when they first started to turn up on the roads, ten years ago or whatever it was.

http://www.blindedbixenon.co.uk seems to have a bit of info on the subject, though.

They should make windscreens like mirrors that just go really dark when headlights shine on them. I can't see any drawbacks to this idea at all.

I had to drive to Birmingham and back in MissChap's Yaris on Saturday, and it made me realise just how much the BMW has spoiled me - all the rear view mirrors in the BMW dim automatically if they get too much light shone in them, and the Yaris' don't.

I spent most of the journey with the manual dimmer activated because the lights of everyone behind me were so bright it was ridiculous.

I was quite amazed the first time mine did it. I hadn't even heard of it before.

It's hard to search for, but headlights are being developed that are constantly on main beam, and lots of thin "eyelashes" move over them to cover up the bits that would be shining onto oncoming cars.

My main point is that, even if you *do* think someone's lights are "too bright", or if they've got their high beam on, surely the thing to do is to slow down, briefly tap your high beam when still at a reasonably safe distance - as opposed to doing nothing until within 10 metres, then putting both normal and high beam on right into their faces?

Many's the time some twat has left their beam on; it happens to all of us. If they don't turn 'em off I just slow down until they've passed and then drive on. It seems seriously stupid to do anything else; why increase the hazard even more? If someone is veering all over the road, it's not as though you should too, so as to "teach them a lesson"...? (Besides, they're obviously fucking dozy to have done this in the first place - and quite possibly pissed. I had xenons on my TT 11 years ago now; they're hardly new fangled).

I truly despair of drivers/driving. As a motorcyclist, the standard - and temperament - of your average driver on the road, in charge of 2 tonnes of flying metal, is truly terrifying.

It's best to turn your lights on and off to flash someone at nighttime, rather than flip your main beam on.

I can't do that unless I turn auto lights off completely.

That sounds daft. On a Ford the options on the dial switch are "Off", "Side", "On", "Auto" - so you just flip it off and back to auto again.