Crazy British drivers shock France

French drivers are speed-mad road hogs while the British are cool and careful at the wheel. That old cliché is being turned on its head by a remarkable change in French driving culture in the past few years.

Roadside cameras and police traps have done a lot to tame the ancestral French mania for speed while British drivers have become a menace, barging aside the natives as they blast down the autoroutes from the Channel.

This behaviour, shared to a lesser extent by the Belgians, Dutch and Germans,  is spurred by the knowledge that foreigners are are immune from French speed camera tickets -- for the time being. There is also the old Brits abroad reflex that once across the Channel, anything goes.

In the north so far this year, British speed merchants have committed half of the most serious speeding offences -- those over 200 kph (125 mph). The motorway maximum is 130 kph (80 mph). Among those banned from driving in France was Lewis Hamilton, the Formula 1 ace, who was stopped last December on the northern A26 motorway doing 122 mph. Everyone has a tale. Adam Sage, my Paris colleague, tells me that he watched the other day as a British driver floored his Mercedes so hard on reaching the open road at Calais that the car went into a spin.   

The most flagrant British offenders are the types in luxury sports cars who stage races across France at extremely high speed. Quite a few of them (we don't have the figure) have been surprised this year when the gendarmes confiscated their cars and licenses on the spot. They get the license back later, but the courts decide when, if ever, to release the vehicles.

Most of the 650 speeding offences in the area of last June's Le Mans 24-hour race were committed by British drivers. Police suspended the licenses of 31 Britons on the spot, compared with those of only 10 French drivers.

Last weekend, the Calais area, where half the serious speeding offenders are British, deployed a useful weapon against les chauffards anglais. They brought over two traffic police officers from Kent to help enforce the French law. British speed merchants were surprised to be pulled over, not by exotic Gendarmes but by familiar-looking British coppers.

Lieutenant Patrick Vanderstaerten of the Pas-de-Calais police gave us a run-down on the British speedsters in his zone. "Often when we stop them, they pretend they do not understand and they think that the French police have it in for them. It's an old cliché from the old Anglo-French quarrel. We hope that the message is getting through with the British officers here and that mentality will greatly change," he said. "France is beautitul. Don't make it a cemetery." 

Further testimony comes from Dr François Douchain, chief pediatrician at the Arras city hospital, near the Channel ports. François, a regular on this blog, alerted me to the Anglo-French police operation. His hospital receives accident victims from a long stretch of the A26 autoroute and there are plenty of Britons among them, he says. "One of the most painful memories in my career is when I had to tell young English children that their parents had been killed on the motorway -- probably because of sleepiness."

The excès de vitesse seem worse in the south-north direction because people rush to catch ferries or the tunnel shuttle, often over long distances, says François. "People come up from the Mediterranean or the Alps in a single day and they arrive tired, creating a danger for the last stretch."

Of course there are plenty of British drivers who obey the French law. The gap in fatal accident rates has narrowed, but British roads are still safer. But I wonder how much this is now due to the slow traffic on Britain's jammed roads compared with the wide open French network.

And, starting next year, European states are supposed to enforce cross-frontier speeding tickets, so British drivers will be getting a lot of mail from French speed cameras -- or radars, as they are called here.

Here's the standard procès verbal demanding payment for a speeding offence

Comments

[Rich]

As a British driver living in Calais, I see a lot of this, but I also see a lot of bad driving from the local French population. The British tend to drive very quickly in their big cars, or extremely slowly because going anti-clockwise round the roundabout is so alien to them (is it that hard to work out that turning left at a roundabout in France is basically a mirror image of turning right on a roundabout in the UK? Lots of British cars in Calais go round the outside of the roundabout without their indicators on, even when turning left).

French drivers on the other hand tend to stay less in their lanes, and drive more slowly than I would say is necessary on good, straight, rural roads. There seems to be a general lack of the use of the indicator too!

Another thing is priorite-a-droite - something we don't have in the UK (nor 'priorty to the left') - I live on the corner of a cross roads on a route between the motorway and a campsite, and there are frequent cases of (for example) UK-registered big black BMW X5s pulling caravans going straight through the crossroads, assuming they have priority, just because they are on the main road. This has in the past caused some problems, including the screeching of tyres - I'm sure it'll continue.

All in all, the British do cause their fair share of chaos for the locals, because they are not accustomed to the way that things are done on the French side of the channel.

However, it is the same in the UK with the French (and other nationalities) - in Britain, cars joining a motorway are accustomed to other cars moving courteously out of the nearside lane, which is much rarer in mainland Europe, so if a poor British driver has the misfortune of joining the M20 just next to a large French lorry, they may find themselves feeling blocked in. A British car in France on the other hand will join the A16 assuming that all the traffic will move out of its way, when perhaps it won't.

French drivers are nowhere near as bad as the British perceive them to be (and the French often complain about the quality of driving from non-French vehicles on their roads) - it is all about quirks between different Highway Codes and driving on the 'wrong' side of the road, plus, as you say, the assumption that being abroad means being immune.

[thanks Rich. I agree each side has its qualities and flaws. I was trying to be a bit provocative though I do think that French driving has greatly improved over the years that I have known the country. You do see some ghastly behaviour, especially around the cities. I live next to one of the last surviving priorité à droite roundabouts in Paris (place Pereire). It's still a nightmare in the rush hour. CB]

[John Gregory Flinn]

".. but British roads are still safer."

This is surely a statistic.
The roads, especially the motorways, in Britain are indeed much slower, much busier and generally poorer in quality.
One of the features of French auto- routes is their smoother road surface, less traffic and a better sense of sucurity while driving.
Consequently the contrast on leaving the M20 in Kent and joining the A26 or A16 at Calais is akin to slaking one's desire for the open road!
So, it's no excuse, but no wonder that Brit drivers morph into reckless Mr Toads...!

However, having said that we were recently surprised to find all routes into Spain on the Med coast- both 'route national et autoroute' - blocked due to some 15 kilometres of nose-to-tail traffic, which was effectively stationary. Local gossip had it that tourists were augmented by French shoppers at le Perthus trying to avoid Sarkozy's dwinding pouvoir d'achat (ref previous thread)!

[stephen Bull]

It is true that speed controls have had their effect but other aspects of French driving habits persist. Montpellier for example is a city with a confusing road layout and very poorly posted signs. These factors, aided by a Latin temperament, make it an inferno of horn-blowing, obscene abuse and impetuous overtaking and undertaking. To be fair, accidents are usually avoided, these being reserved for the nearby motorway.

[You're right about Montpellier. I got lost in a hire car last Friday night just trying to get from the station to the hotel Mercure. Hopeless sign-posting plus an underground system. CB]

[Joan Arles]

The driving here in the south is pretty scary -- I mean the natives, not the Brits. This is the land of latin brio at the wheel. Especially after lunch and the evening apéro. The Gard and the Herault and the Bouches du Rhone have the worst accident rates in the country.. or so everyone says.

[Sigognac]

What are the national statistics?

[Latest pan-European road death toll, from Eurostat, show that in 2006, there were 4,707 deaths in French road accidents and 3,297 in the Uk, which has similar population. The difference was that the French total almost halved between 1995-2006, while the British total dropped only a little. On Britons in France, the police have no breakdown, except pointing out that they make up a substantial part of the foreigners who are fined for speeding in France. The foreigners get 25 percent of the speeding tickets although their vehicles account for only five percent of traffic. CB]

[Maggie]

I think it would be interesting if you could give us some information about how people react to having their cars permanently confiscated. How many times has it happened?

And if it isn't a permanent confiscation, how long do they keep the car? It sounds like several months at least, waiting for a judge's decision.

Anyone losing a luxury sports car this way must have a pretty furious reaction. It's stunning just thinking about it.

I would think that if the goal is to reduce speed, surely giving maximum publicity to a few of these stories would do the trick quicker than anything else.

[Rich]

Talking of driving in Paris, this is worth a read...

http://www.penelope-jolicoeur.com/2008/08/aaaah-paris.html

[Dodo]

Thank you Charles, for the fun.
The article, if I read it correctly, is “Crazy British drivers shock France”

However the answers, which one could hope to be something like:
- it is a shame, it is indeed necessary to punish these imbeciles, it is
a lack of respect, it is a certain form of arrogance, etc... never came.

No ! The excuse turn around "how worst the French drivers are". Each
one giving the convenient short anecdote: One on the “Latin drivers” of the south (the good old xenophobic argument... you know, they are Latin!!) and even you, Charles, you believe to be obliged to confirm how your readers are correct while speaking about a turnabout which haunts your badly slept nights.

But nothing on what we could hope for: the behavior of these English drivers (or Britons, I never know when to use English or Britons, even if a friend once said to me: English is when England wins, Briton when it is the other ones) - these drivers thus, are not the confirmation of this ‘malaise’ some Britons fail to see in their own country ?
The arrogant behavior of these drivers in France curiously look like the one of these thousands of Britons in Spain
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/crime/article4509995.ece

[Yes, I agree that the speeding is part of general bad British behaviour abroad -- as I mentioned in the story. At the risk of making sweeping generalisations, British drivers seem to be getting worse while the French have got better. Yes, "Latin" driving is a cliché, but there is usually truth behind a cliché. The French do drive differently in the south from the way they do in the north -- toute proportion gardée. CB]

[richard.jones]

Racing it out on Greek roads is the answer with a native population that drives on the left or the right as the whim takes them adding to the luck of the draw.

[peter kinsley www.peterkinsley.com]

There are still generalisations but they have changed. "Attention les numeros bas" did apply in the sleepy south but the worst drivers were Belgians. Hard to imagine but in the 50's there was no driving test and all these big american cars came from the uranium in the Congo bought by the USA. Having passed the French driving test and written a book "Driving in France" I tried tosell it. The French Embassy in London liked the proof, (one of four printed in Beziers, but kept it. WH Smith said they would sell it, but I couldn't find a publisher. The attitude was: "The Brits just go to France and drive. They don't want to consult a book of hints". The truth is that most drivers think they are Sterling Moss when they get behind a wheel, but when they get caught they become Sterling Mouse.
What do the French cops say causes the accidents? "Le Vitesse" Not alcohol, although it does cause many. What the youngsters do not realise is that alcohol stays in the blood for 72 hrs but drugs can stay there for three months, including hashish. Confiscation is a good idea for serious cases, but if you want to have your polished pride and joy confiscated, go fishing without a licence or hunting without passing the test and getting the permit.

[Dominique]

After binge-drinking spreading in continental europe, now binge-driving?

Thanks the anglo saxons!

PS : i feel confortable using clichés since CB himself just wrote "there is usually truth behind a cliché"

[Dodo]

There is also something also apparently no one want to talk about : Driving on the left side? - driving on right side? - Did we know the basic rules?, the road sign? the warning ? - Is 130 km/h the same as 130 mph.?

We, the French, (and other Europeans), are true danger with the public while driving on an unusual side and, what is worst, with our right side car. The same for all this British cars.
I wonder why, our dear European commission who regulate even the size of a Camembert packing, never regulate this VERY VERY SERIOUS ANOMALY.
Until we, the Britons and the Continentals agree on what the correct side, the correct unit of measurement , I believe it is urgent to forbid continental cars in GB and Britons car in Continental Europe.
NB The post was edited when I saw the Richard's comment

[JULIEN]

Being a native from Montpellier, I could not agree more with some of the comments made here. People here are very aggressive in their driving, overuse their horns and are champions at sudden and scary overtakes (especially when you're on your bicycle). Yet having lived 4 years in Asia, where the rule is "I'm sure I can make it there" and there is no sense of anticipation whatsoever, I find the roads of France and Angleterre relatively safe. Tougher punishments, higher fines and the risk of having one's license torn down on the spot are to me the only effective measures that a government caring about its people can take.
For the one who got lost in Montpellier, I sincerely empathize. I get lost too sometimes.

[peter kinsley www.peterkinsley.com]

I agree about this business of driving on the left and on the right, but I can no more imagine Australians being told to drive on the right (the British would -- Baa baa baa)than I can imagine the reaction of the French SNCF if they were told all French trains must now travel on the right! Think about it.

[Dodo]

Peter,
I am quite sure that there will be no problem if the Parisian Metro and/or the SNCF change the side - indeed a on the platform in France, the train sometime comes from the left … sometime from the right. But a train is not a car and I don’t remember a Parisian subway colliding with a London underground.
The French use miles and knot in the naval without the French to take offence of it, and/nor oblige the British airplane to flight Level 8000 Km when in France and/nor ask our British friends to adopt Km as flight level.
My point is : We have to agree and found a common denominator. If Europe decides that the British way to drive and the British measurement are the best, let’s go. If it is the Continental system, let's go!
So many accidents, so many killed on the road because this paranoiac pride his appalling

[Just to set the record straight, the miles used internationally in marine and air navigation are nautical miles, which have nothing to do with Anglo-American measures. They correspond to one minute of latitude along any meridian. Not the same as the shorter Anglo-Saxon statute mile. A knot is one NM per hour. On the other hand, flight levels are defined internationally in English feet, in units of 100. FL 75 = 7,500 feet measured by an altimeter set at mean sea level of 1013 mb. A few countries, such as Russia, insist on using the metric system for altitude, but not France. And the trains run on the left in France because it was a British engineer who laid the first track here. CB]

[richard.jones]

Mr. Kinsley first,

Do you know why SNCF trains travel on the left, rather the exception in Europe?

Dodo next, I see the dangers and empathise with your point of view. Having standard speed units would help. Certainly for car maunfacturers dropping right-hand drive cars is a saving, although you need to talk to Japan first. However I do not think there is a quick solution but rather we should wait for the technology that does most of our driving for us with sensors that reduce speeds regarless of unit) according to distance between vehicles and road traffic density and electronic warning signs emitting radio signals etc. etc..
I am 90 now (in Greece and the Balkans) and 89 elsewhere. I have just been told by the Greek police that I must now take a yearly 'fitness' test to keep my licence so I follow the IT and mobility news quite closely. I think you'd be surprised how near we are to 'electronic' driving and all it brings to both carbon footprints and human health.

Finalement Dominique - 'Mais en arrière de la verité se trouvent trés souvent des clichés.' And that's the problem (Hobbes paraphrased)

[azloon]

[After binge-drinking spreading in continental europe, now binge-driving?] Dominique

how about binge-driving after binge-drinking?

CB, you didn't mention the effect of etoh abuse on driving behaviors in france, both by brits and french.

besides 'radars,' do french police stop speeders, or those demonstrating erratic driving patterns and perform 'field sobriety tests' or 'breathalyzer' tests?

what are the french penalties for driving while intoxicated? certainly, immediate confiscation of one's license to drive. confiscation of vehicle as well?
jail time? are brits or french more likely to drive drunk? a what blood alcohol level is a person in france considered impaired for driving purposes?

a friend of mine is currently serving four months in arizona state prison for his third 'driving while intoxicated' conviction within five years. since the third offense is classified as a felony in arizona (among toughest drunk driving laws in the u.s.), he has also lost his license to practice his profession, and also his driving privileges for three years.

how times change! when i moved to arizona thirty years ago, driving with an open container of alcoholic beverage, usually a beer can, was 'de rigeur.' it was a 'cowboy' thing to do, and boasted about by president lyndon johnson who would toss his 'empties' into the back of his pick-up truck.

[joelle]

Of course I support punishment of the atrocious excesses you describe...but most of the people receiving these speeding fines and losing points from their licenses are people who are pretty responsible drivers and are getting caught at 54 instead of 50 kmh in Paris, or 137 instead of 130kmh on the motorway. OK, fine them money, it'll sure dissuade them because it pisses us all off to waste money so pointlessly, but it's completely absurd to deduct points for minor oversights like that, people end up with no more points without ever having committed a serious offence...and that's how you get 2m people driving without licenses. And can anyone explain to me why driving without your seatbelt (risking merely your own death) will cost you a whopping 3 points, but driving while telephoning (by which you could mow down a whole group of pedestrians) is a bargain at only 2!

[Dodo]

To Richards,
Thanks for your answer. But it is European behaviour in European countries we are talking about.
Nor japans drivers nor Austrian drivers are the problem, I must say. The occasion to cross one of them on European road are very slim, it is not ? The CB’s blog seems to be a great opportunity to talk about this very serious problem. Imagine, just imagine, a huge car crash in France. The Front National would be more than happy to blame the European laxity.
An old joke, but I like it “Je suivais une voiture anglaise. Croyez moi, elle n’avait pas de chauffeur. Juste le passager qui semblait terrorisé. Arrivé à sa hauteur, j’ai compris : en sautant le chauffeur avait emporté le Volant..” ;)

[richard.jones]

Joelle,

My eldest great grand-daughter has been with me today. She is 8. She saw your post as she bade me 'kali nikta' & 'nost da' and quoth.

'Silly letter 'cos if u dunt fastern yer belt yer goes fru der windscreen like a cannon ball and yew cudd urt ovvers who mite be standin a round.'

Imagine a pour soul who's just said 'Oh! it must be my round what!' being broadsided by a nearby multiple accident in which nobody was wearing their safety accoutrements.

And so to bed.

[Dodo]

On my topic : Naval miles and Airplane.

Thanks CB for your comment, but please note that my point was : France accept to use non metric measurement and it did not hurt our “metric pride” ;)

[peter kinsley www.peterkinsley.com]

Boggle your mind by typing Driving on the Left and reading Wikipedia. Roman cart tracks? Men with horses carts and whips; Mussolini changing to Right when in power and littler Adolf (Are we not of the Right?) following suit. American teamsters, Canadian CMP vehicles for Left hand drive (Canada drives on the right); majorities, minorities left and right handed; the full catastrophe now impossible to change worldwide
Fact: On the Cote d'Azure during the 50's, 60's a British driver was invariably found guilty, as it was always said in court: "Your fault because you drive on the left in England"
My colleague had an accident in Nice. A journalist, he took a statement from a witness that he was not to blame. In court the witness said the Englishman was at fault because he was driving on the left. He paid a heavy fine, and his lady lawyer said to him: "How much did you pay the witness?" "I didn't pay him anything," he replied. "Oh, you must always pay the witness in France otherwise he will go to the other side."
Another journalist colleague in Rome told me that a gentleman took snuff from the little hollow on the back of the hand, made by pointing the thumb upwards, thus leaving his right hand free for the sword.
A Gentleman always walks on the road-side with his lady, he added: "To shield her from splashes, to leave his hand free for the sword, and so that he could spit."

[peter kinsley www.peterkinsley.com]

P.S: Re. the nightmare of Montpellier: My sister had to bribe me to act as a pilot to get her hire car back to Montpellier airport. I wondered whether Picasso on one of his visits to Nimes bullring, had offered his services to design the street plan beteen the bus station and the airport?

[dot king]

Azloon: French police do undertake random alcohol testing. You often see them at the exit of a village on a Fête day, also at the entry to main roads just after lunchtime.

If anyone gets stopped for speeding or any other traffic offense (telephoning at the wheel, not wearing a seatbelt, crossing an unbroken white line) they are also routinely breathalised. If alcohol levels are above the legal limit, the driver is not allowed to drive off, of course. S/he is taken to sober up in a "dégrisement" cell and not allowed to drive again until completely sober. (Then there are the fine and the points off the licence if not a court appearance with judge looking stern over spectacles.)

I have been stopped a few times for just a random check (when I had a job that involved a lot of driving around) without any hint of an infringement of any regulation, and always breathalised.
I was once stopped driving into La Dordogne with a friend and her mother and afterwards my friend asked why they'd stopped me. The answer was that had I been going too fast round the bend (in the road :)) I would have crossed the white line, and anyway they stop a car about every 5 or 6, and I had out-of-département licence plates and etc. They were very pleasant, asked "qu'est que le Gers vient faire dans la Dordogne?" and were quite happy with "la visiter un peu".
I was flagged down once at about 4.30pm (school-out time) by a motorcycle gendarme who wanted to check that my children were strapped in in the back. He was astonished to see me alone in the car, convinced he'd spotted heads in the back from afar - and I was tempted to say "Je les ai fichus dans le coffre" but decided not to after all - you never know whether the SOH is in gear . . .

They have just brought in a saliva test which detects everything you could have drunk, snorted, smoked or swallowed, so could you all just clean up your acts a little, please? ;D

[Daniel Strohl]

AZLOON,

In complement to Dot's post, and assuming that the lady is probably not very knowledgeable regarding alcohol :) : the legal limit is 0.5 g alcohol per litre of blood, i.e 0.25 mg alcohol per breathed out litre of air.

More information available on an official site (in French) :
http://www2.securiteroutiere.gouv.fr/ressources/conseils/l-alcool-au-volant.html

[David Powell]

Well there's a strange thing. I live near enough to go to Montpellier, say six times a year, but not near enough to get to know it and I don't find it that bad.

Richard, French railways run on the left because, in the 19th century, the French government believed it was missing out on the development of railways so it hired an English engineer, Brassey, from Birkenhead to design a system for them. Naturally he copied what he had done in the U.K. There is still Brassey Street in Birkenhead where he established his first works. And there used to be a Brassey Street School.

I have lived here for five years now and I find that, in that time, French drivers have become not just more respectful of the law, but more courteous as well.

I remember, about 25 years ago I was in South Wales with some visiting French friends who were amazed by the courtesy shown between drivers. Now it is quite common here to be let out, to be allowed to cross the road on a crossing (sometimes)and for a tractor driver to pull over to allow motorists to pass.

I have no theory as to why and of course there are still the crazies, but then there were in Britain as well.

All the above is untrue for the first and last weekends in July and August.

Finally, I got a ticket last year for speeding, in car I was not driving on a stretch of motorway I have never driven on. I HAD to pay 68 euros pending an investigation, Mt friends tell me if I get it back in 2 years I will be lucky.

[dot king]

"assuming that the lady is probably not very knowledgeable regarding alcohol :)" Daniel

Quite right Daniel - I can't drink much without an immediately-noticed effect, so don't drink if I have to drive anywhere or work.
I have been called in though, to interpret for a nonsense-burbling Brit drunk, so am suspiciously au fait with what happens :) (I loved it when he asked me to say to the gendarme "I wouldn't say I was drunk, but I am very tired" - I don't know how I managed to keep a straight face - you know how pompous drunks can be)

As a friend once put it, "I love the cocktails they do in (that)bar, they go straight to my legs" - funny how you know exactly what she means . . .

[PAUL]

One area where there is still room for considerable improvement in French road safety concerns two-wheelers, for which there is no MOT equivalent. Not only can anyone have a motorized two-wheeler from the age of fourteen, often "tuned" way beyond safety limits, but there are also now miniature motorbikes being driven on the road by kids under ten.
A further point,injury figures are always added as a sort of afterthought but there is a fate worse than death: to be completely paralyzed from the neck down for the rest of one's life.

[peter kinsley www.peterkinsley.com]

In Spain the Guardia Civile are and always were crack shots. When British visitors were the first tourits in Spain (Their allowance was £25 a year for holidays) in the 50's and they ignored a daylght road-block check (they are frontier police, responsible for smuggling)or a waving bull's-eye lantern at night, the driver would be astonished to see his passenger slump forward, dead, and the crack-shot Guardia was even more astonished to see the car keep moving. They did not know about righthand drives.

[Linca]

A major reason for the lower lethality of British roads is the much higher population density on that side of the channel. That population density means much less driving as people are closer from each other, and much less rural driving, which is were most deaths happen in France - the classic case being the teenagers driving back a dozen miles from the local disco, drunk and tired.

[richard.jones]

One small point (no pun intended) about the leftness of the SNCF. It is not a function, strictly speaking, of British Socialist track laying but a function of, in those days, mechanical signaling and the points plates and rods running along the left side of the track (maintainable without standing in between two tracks at night), thus all indications as to requisite driving behaviour were on that side too!

[azloon]

Daniel/Dot --

.5 is quite a low threshold. and means a person is impaired after a drink or two, at least for an hour or so after the drinks. i have heard scandanavia is also quite strict in its enforcement of drunk/drink driving laws with prison being an option (apparently not so in france).

the legal limit in most u.s. states is between .8 and 1.0. arizona lowered its definition of 'impaired' from 1.0 to .8 about five years ago at the same time it imposed mandatory minimum prison sentences for repeat offenders (and those whose offense includes accidents/injuries, even of the first occasion).

[peter kinsley www.peterkinsley.com]

David Powell: I now suggest that a new street sign near the Gare du Nord is RUE BRASSEY (in memory of the English engineer who had the good sense to make our trains drive on the left.)
There is usually a long silence when our French friends are asked why their trains drive on the LEFT. Like the following:
"Vous etes Anglais"
"Non, Ecossais"
"Non, Irlandais.
"Non, Pays de Galles"
"C'EST LA MEME CHOSE -- YOu all speak ENGLISH"
"Alors Vous etes Belge..."
"MOI? BELGE? Vous etes fou?"
"Well -- you both speak FRENCH!"
l o n g s i l e n c e

[joelle]

Whoah there, Richard! Did you see me telling me people not to fasten their safety belts? (I always do, although I've never actually needed the thing). I just think it's absurd to deduct 3 points for that and only 2 for using the 'phone, which seems considerably more dangerous for other people. Terrific imagination this 8-y-o grandchild, I must say, I predict a great future as a creator of spectacular video games, though sadly I'm sitting here next to a surgeon friend who's been working in A&E for 22 years and tells me she has never had to treat anyone harmed in the exciting and original way you describe...oh well, poetic license.

[richard.jones]

Hi Joelle,

As I posted I wondered if you'd take offence. Pleased you didn't. My great-grandchild Natascha (Gnasher to the family - her father is Swedish-Greek and her mother is Costa Rican) ) is a sharp bright light of a child and has just left with her older cousins for a panayeri (a sort of Greek knees up) in the next suburb, but before she left she gave me another wonderful image. 'What's wrong with George Bush, Papou, He can't even look after his own daughter properly!' She meant of course the Caucasian nation state.

[Gill]

I have just come back from 4 weeks in France and the only bad driving I saw was on the motorway from Dover to London when a British car joined the M20 from the M25 and zoomed straight across all three lanes of traffic narrowly missing another car which had just pulled out into the outside lane. It was only the quick reactions of the driver of the second car who was able to pull back in that prevented a very serious pile-up. The first driver then disappeared into the distance at, I would say, over 100 miles per hour (the motorway speed limit in the UK is 70 mph).
Driving in France is so much less stressful even in large towns.
I agree with Linca about country roads. People often go too fast because they know their local roads very well but forget that they may meet a driver who does not. This also happens in the UK.

[peter kinsley www.peterkinsley.com]

A good friend who was a senior police officer in Paris, with whom I had spent many happy hours fishing and hunting, told me that he had designed a new T-shirt (or Tank Top) for his holidays. He wore it when we met: it was white and had a broad black stripe running from the shoulder across the chest to the hip.

[Dodo]

"C'EST LA MEME CHOSE -- YOu all speak ENGLISH"

Peter, c'est de votre faute !
http://www.lequipe.fr/Jo/JoPaysMish ?edailleGBR_E_2008.html

All English ?
All Ecossais ?
All Pays de Galles ?

Sometime England, some time Scotland. It seems you use England - Walles - Scotland - Sometime all together and you want us to understand !

l o n g s i l e n c e

[dot king]

here's one to test some memories

http://ckuik.com/Beep%20Beep%20The%20Playmates

will the bubble car come back?

[peter kinsley www.peterkinsley.com]

Dodo == are you confused? I see someone on another thread says your comment does not make sense.
For an Irishman to be called "English" is an insult, The same applies to the Welsh and the Scots, all Gaelic speaking peoples. I think "Dodo" is a nom de guerre. So here is a little line from a lavatory wall in Ibiza:
To be or not to be -- Wm Shakespeare
To be is to do - JP Sartre
Those who can -- Do! - GB Shaw
Do-be-doo-be-doo -- Frank Sinatra.

Dodo - worry not, we aren't all raving nationalists of the Boys' Own variety . . .

[peter kinsley www.peterkinsley.com]

The British (i.e. English, Welsh, Scottish and Northern Irish) have a saying: "As dead as a Dodo"
I had a nightmare that Dodo had risen as a phoenix from the ashes and was blogging in the name of Dot King on this site who predicted that I would return in 20 years as an art restorer and she had given me my first assignment: to restore Tracey Emin's bed.

[dot king]

"I had a nightmare that Dodo had risen as a phoenix from the ashes and was blogging in the name of Dot King"
Peter Kinsley

You are obviously still delirious from your nightmare, I hope there's a cold sweat that lingers that nothing will rid you of, and any other discomfort your fertile imagination can conjure up.

You can be as rude as you like to me, I would hardly expect anything else from you, but Dodo, who is not me and if you can't see that, then it's as I thought, you can't read properly, shouldn't be getting the blunt end of your temper.
You owe him or her possibly, an apology.

BTW I thought you had a book to write and were only up to page 22? I'd have thought you'd have better things to do than spend time being thoroughly unpleasant on the blog.

[peter kinsley www.peterkinsley.com]

Thank you for your kind wishes, Dotty. I don't know your face but your manner is familiar, or as I sometimes say on p.c's: Weather Here -- Wish you were Nice.
I finished the book, 30 pp about 20,000 wds with photos and illustrations: Gunner the Wonder Dog, a sequel (for Children) to Gunner Strikes Back, the mongrel adopted by the British soldiers and the R.A.F men in Fontaineblea in the 50's/60's. He was dropped in Les Halles three times and walked back to camp -- 60 km. on the orders of the senior Guards Drill Instructor (a Corporal of Horse -- Household Cavalry) (The Horse guards are wary of dogs -- with reason) who had drilled the men for the Berlin Victory Parade in 1945 which he claimed was ruined by the Russians who were all the same height and wore flat caps, showing up the rest. Gunner took the bus (Paris Match photogaphed him queuing!) from the town centre to Camp Guynemer and watched the films in both British and American cinemas (he barked when Lassie came on); went on rugby and footbal training runs, to Parc des Princes for International matches, and was buried with full Miliary Honours (The Union flag on coffin, rifles fired over grave) in 1961 and is visited yearly by www.fontainebleauveteransassociation.co.uk
P.S.: The reason a dog turns three times in his basket before sleeping is because all dogs are descended from wolves, who do this to "make a nest" for warmth. They find direction by sensing the magnetic field, distinguishing North and South the reason many animals,cattle, deer, etc sleep facing in the same directon.
Now, children, write out ten times: "I like dogs because, like horses, they are nicer than people."

[dot king]

Thank you Peter for those kind words, and thank you for sparing us from having to read your book.

[dot king]

"Dotty. I don't know your face but your manner is familiar, or as I sometimes say on p.c's: Weather Here -- Wish you were Nice."
Peter Kinsley

Well Petey, your face is for all to see on the internet.
The weather here today, as I write, is just like you, WET, but nicer and somewhat more necessary.

Remember that I'm one of the possibly quite rare persons on the blog who has gone to the trouble of contacting you and buying and reading one of your books.
It resembled your blog posts, et la tronche qu'on peut découvrir, absolutely.

I have no wish to engage in any verbal skirmish with you, I usually only bother with people accoutred with an open mind. Thank you kindly.

[peter kinsley www.peterkinsley.com]

"people accounted with an open mind" - Dot.King
You must mean police officers: every time on TV they say: "We are keeping an open mind", and when a reporter asks: "Is it murder?" the spokesman says: "No comment."
Now, dear Dot, write out ten times: No comment No comment No comment.
That way, you will still have the last word!

[dot king]

"accoutred" (Dot King)

" accounted " (Peter Kinsley)

no comment . . .

[peter kinsley www.peterkinsley.com]

I must correct my literals...I must correct my literals...I must correct my literals.

Ful wel she song the service divyne
Entuned in hir nose ful semely;
And Frensh she spak ful fair and fetisly,
After the scole of Stratford atte Bowe
For Frensh of Paris was to hir unknowe
And gladly wolde he lerne, and gladly teche
No wher so bisy a man as he there nas
And yet he seemed bisier then he was

She was a worthy womman al hir lyve
Housbondes at chirch-dore she hadde fyve
The smyler with the knyfe under her cloke.

Geoffrey Chaucer 1340-1400

[richard.jones]

Mr. Kinsley,

You must have done Chaucer's Prologue to the Canterbury Tales for 'O' level or 'A' level English. The Wife of Bath would have given it a gap-toothed smile I'm sure, but you can't end on a 'half-rhyme'.
You need: -
Smilynge with bared knyfe under her cloke
She utterd lerned wordes wich made him choke.