World of stupid visits TGWS.

Thanks for the title, Jen. You totally summed up the ‘stuff’ that happens at TGWS. Stupid.

So, where are we? Last year, we had all sorts of things happen on the forecourt of the business, which generated a great deal of ‘WTF’ comments. No bloody wonder. People hitting stuff, knocking over petrol pumps, two replacement pumps and a rebuilt wall, a quad rider suing me for his own stupidity and an eejit who blamed us for him dropping his bike. Quayside again, walloping the wall and bringing down the wall and the floodlight and this year, the Quayside lorry leaving the business and his tractor and trailer becoming disconnected in the middle of the main road! Oh, for a photo, however, I was out riding Smoggy. Had to get the bike into this blog somewhere.

Good grief; what can go wrong this year?

Plenty, it seems.

So, given we had to replace pumps 7 & 8, we had a choice: put kerbing around the pump (brain-bleedingly-expensive) or put a painted pole on each corner. Bright yellow, we painted them. BRIGHT ‘THIS IS A HAZARD’ yellow. Unscathed? Not in the slightest.

Bright-bloody-yellow

So, then I got an email from Susie, our star in the Filling Station. Back to pump 7 & 8. A woman had complained that the posts were too short and she couldn’t see them when she opened the car door. Should have gone to Specsavers. Apparently, she took a photo. According to the CCTV, she didn’t. The camera never lies. I look forward to THAT letter.

So, Mum is at the heart of things. She is out there, bonding (most of the time) with the public; having a chat and a blether, enjoying people watching. Kids coming into the business, no matter how good the teacher is at looking after them, can be a bit… well… out of hand. To cut a long story short, she asked them ‘politely’ (read: Lesley style – if you’re not familiar with that ‘behaviour’, just thing of me on steroids… ) to not leave bits of rolls out for the birds. Quite right. Shite and a general mess left all over the place. There was, however, a member of the public who didn’t like what Mum had said. He was a bit aggressive. What he hadn’t realised that Mum had swept the area before the kids arrived, so she was appropriately qualified to comment. BUT, what really pissed her off, was one of the kids scattering stones. Where ‘it’ got the stones from, I have no idea, however, Mum’s blood pressure went off the scale when one of the stones hit the tank of a motorcycle parked at pump 1. RAGE. Well done, Mum. You might not totally accept that your daughter chooses to get her leg over a machine, with her arse planted on a flammable tank of petrol, and have to dodge other potientially idiotic road users; you have finally got it. Thanks for that.

Then there was the Ducati Demo weekend. What a joy. An organised company, great craic, great weather and nearly 100 test rides on the Saturday. 99, actually. I genuinely hope that you make LOADS of sales out of it. The amount of bikes that visited was astounding. The amount of Police that visited was off the scale.

Ducati Demo Dat

Police? Where?

I believe that every traffic policeman on duty was under instructions to visit on the day. They did. In their squads. I thought that the cheek I got from one of them was worthy of comment. He said that with the price of the coffee, he should just go to the burger van down the road. *Short, stunned silence”. My answer? “That’s fine, you just go to your burger van, enjoy your coffee, and just remember when you go and visit our loos, that you don’t get a bloody toilet at a burger van.”

That afternoon, the Oban Police came to visit. Gathering evidence on an ‘incident’. Picture the scene: after a busy day (on the bike), I got the dreaded call from the Filling Station. Drunk driver. Kamila gave me the story, however, it go a bit lost in translation. “There’s a drunk driver, with three wheels, parked on the forecourt.” WTF?

Curious, and dressed in our multi-coloured slob gear, Ed and I headed down, not knowing what we were going to see:

Can I have my keys back?

TOTALLY steaming, as it transpires, 4 times over the drink-drive limit, this guy had driven down from Oban. Two hit-and-run incidents in Taynuilt, the following driver who pulled into the Filling Station behind him, yanked open his door and pulled the keys out of the ignition. He then gave them to the Filling Station staff. Every 20 minutes, he would come in and ask for his keys back. Every 20 minutes, we would say the same thing, “We can’t; you’re drunk; the Police are on their way.”

Every time, he would just walk away and go and sit calmly in his car. The first time he asked, he fell into the fridge. That’s on CCTV too.

The local Police weren’t available, so the Oban crew came down, blues and twos, to respond. They know me, but they must have had a WTF moment, looking at us in our colourful breeks and wondering if we were the responsible adults in charge. Handcuffs following a breathalyzer were required – they stuck their head in the window and nearly passed out with the fumes. Apparently, he asked to sit in the front of the traffic car. This is the guy who couldn’t explain 1) the lack of rubber round the wheel and 2) the fact the offside of the car was scraped with not a single panel missed and 3) wanted to get to Glasgow. On 3 tyres. He couldn’t explain anything. He was still very, very calm and friendly at all times.

So the Oban crew updated us and collected the CCTV evidence.

At that point there must have been at least 12 police officers in the car park. That’s fine. If they are there talking and persuading people to be better riders, then crack on.

So, after all the adventures, then there was more. Today, Ed said that I should go with him, because there was an ‘incident’ in the car park. Game on! There they were, the road marking crew, who had discovered to their delight that the plug had come out of their paint bucket. The truck was spewing white lining paint all over the gravel.

Spew!

So, having laughed our asses off, and laughed even harder when I was asked not to put the picture on Facebook, I did exactly that. Posted it on Facebook. Naughty Fi. Still laughing, we went to walk back. Then there was the cement bollard. You can’t just sort of ‘shift’ them. They need the teletruck, our lemon. We bought a lemon. It’s shit, it has been on a holiday and forgot to come back. Moving the concrete bollards is difficult when you don’t have a teletruck. The HGV, by all accounts had LOTS of company last night. I wonder how many drivers woke up wondering what the noise was when ‘he’ dragged this with him:

Crash

Scrape!

Then, I was having my breakfast, or at least organising my large bowl of ‘porridge-like’ lentil broth. I was excited. It’s a long time since the last lentil broth. Qualities? Gawd, it makes you go.

Enough of that shite.

So, I’d already said hello to some really friendly customers, and as I was walking past their table, the gent was scoffing a roll and sausage. There was a problem. I couldn’t help myself.

“Excuse me, I think you might find your sausage is hanging out.”

It did get a bit of a laugh.

I wish that type of customer would go onto my most hated website and leave a review!

So, what I’d hoped was going to be a ‘really productive day’, ended up being the usual. Some stuff productive, some entertaining. Some downright daft and generally funny enough to make you write a blog. It was a productive day, but with the most amazing stuff that happened to make it even more memorable.

Then, on a wander around the business, you realise that we sell something that you didn’t know you sold. Like 100ml really cool squishy containers for your shampoo, when you go on a flight. The amazing mobile phone dashboard holder that I didn’t know we sold (that’s what happens when you serve in the filling station. Susie’s imagination has no boundaries) and then stopping in my tracks when I saw this. Now, I reckon that this was the last one in stock. HAHAHAHAHA. GRIN. (Craig, that one’s for you…. the ’emoticon’, that is! Oh, I need that coconut)

Little naughty piggy

A huge thanks to the SCAA today when they flew into the village on other business and ended up dealing with a German bleeder who had taken an unfortunate face plant at our back door. Off from one emergency to the next, including climbing fences, twice. You are stars and peeps reading this, who don’t already contribute to the SCAA, just do it. Now. you never know when you will need them. Click here, to make a donation.

SCAA – Just magic

And, just for my road safety geek friends, there’s the Irish road sign that I am very fond of and Ed didn’t believe existed. On a series of bends, they will have ‘SLOW’ painted on the road. Just for good measure, just in case you missed it, are entirely stupid, or pissed (possibility) they will paint another sign on the road; brilliant and effective. Eric, our tame road engineer might like this. On that note, we need a hidden dip sign. 😉

Slower