Volvo Owners Club - Forum rules apply! ( to Catholic Irish, mainly )

Dear oh dear oh dear, as they say.

It's been a strange week indeed. About three months ago I decided to attempt arranging an 'All Ireland' meeting on the forums of the Volvo owners club, as it has several members both north and south. The initial reactions weren't promising. It began with a few Irish members ( who are happy to act the stupid Paddy to get by ) doing their car club politics on the idea. This ranged from begrudgery ("Well, I as the original person who used to organize meetings ..." ) to knocking the idea ("It's a waste of time").

Now a few years back, I went ballistic over 2 pages of anti - Irish 'jokes' on this site. The same Irish members who "supported" me privately while going on the forums to attempt scoring 'brownie points' among the U.K. members behind my back (obviously thinking that because I had 'left' that I wouldn't see, the internet being such a private medium !) were not happy at all. As the cheif ( Irish ) cock in this situation was also organizing meets in the past, I guess that it was a double blow that I was now arranging a meet ( having been excluded from meets for years because of their embarassment at themselves, ever since me confronting them about that situation at the time) Oh, and people were wondering why the meets died a death!

An Irish Cock ( with Avatar upload disability, obviously! )

After a while the Northern lads got in on it. No problem: I'm open to all car enthusiasts playing a part. Then it began to go wrong ( aside from a "waste of time" suddenly becoming a "great idea" ). First off, the location changed. Then the date changed three times. Then the Hotel changed while I was gone away for a weekend, without consultation. Last but not least, the Northern lads made it clear that the meeting was going ahead on Saturday the 31st. of November, regardless of whether people were in 4 feet of floodwater in the south or not ( worst weather on record ).

A Northern Cock

I took a short drive that saturday morning and decided it was downright dangerous to go: there was debris everywhere, with wheelie - bins blowing around the place and it was nigh on impossible to keep the car in a straight line while driving. While still in some control of the meeting, I had spent €60 and most of day doing a good scout of the route and places we were meant to visit. The meet went ahead without me, and the northern lad who hijacked it 'discovered' the route that I covered over a month previously!

I made an attempt to correct this amongst the after - meet gloating by said northern ( racist ) cock on the Volvo Owners Club forums, especially when he lamented how it was a wonder that it went ahead at all, "with all the date changes" ( which he forgot to mention were his doing ). We also had some references from a close 2nd. ( racist ) northern cock about how people on the "mainland" might think that "the Irish can't arrange a meeting without a fight".

A Cock from 'God's own country' no less!

I reported this, and got a reply from a 'Forum support team member' with a union Jack and 'God's country' avatar. Unfortunately he too was a cock. It finished off with me not being able to post any responses, but northern cock gloating away despite a ( southern - Irish members only it seems ) 'warning'. The thing is, I'm not going to get all anti - British here, because the simple fact of the matter is, there are cocks everywhere. In this particular case it's sort of gratifying that 1/ they worry so much about me, and 2/ they're that uncomfortable in their own skins.

There are two sad things about this though. Firstly a proper Irish ( including Northern Ireland ) meet seems impossible to arrange, because a few northern lads want Ireland to be one so that they can point out that they're not part of Ireland ( sound familiar?). Secondly, that relatively young men have inherited this attitude ( problem ). The sheer hatred / chips on shoulders towards southern Irish is absolutely unreal. Oh, I forgot the third - that some Irish members feel the need to be stupid Paddies so the master won't beat them. Against this backdrop they actually wonder why meets died a death!

Cock's creation

One poor guy who visited the forums at the beginning and hadn't been on since turned up at the wrong ( right, originally ) hotel with his family, and wasted a whole day. He went home having seen no sign of a meeting. The Volvo owners club is fine, but just remember your place if you're Irish. Most of the members on there - British and Irish - are some of the nicest you will meet everywhere, but when it comes to 'paddywhackery' just know that the site administrators fully support it, and you better be prepared to put up with it or find an Irish Volvo forum.

There isn't one yet. Watch this space.

Boards.ie and moderators building personalities

Having checked boards.ie following my 'ban' from a thread in the motoring section, I happened to notice that the so - called Moderator who banned me has been ridiculing my posts, after having actually banned me! He firstly banned me for 1 week, then 1 month, knowing fully that I would not have an opportunity to respond.

To be honest, it surprises me little. I enjoyed my time on the motoring forums there very little, not least because many of the moderators know very little about cars but rather just want to drive very, very fast. How immature. I blame 'Top Gear' myself.

Top Gear? - well, yes. I love the programme ( my work was on it once ) and I'd not miss it for the World. Like everything in life though, it's got to be taken in context. At the turn of the Millenium Top Gear was scrapped by the BBC. They then noticed that rival programme 'Fifth gear' was doing well, so they brought Top Gear back with a new format in 2002.

An important part of this new format involved opening out the concept. An important part of that was making fun of certain cars, in order to appeal to a wider audience - people who might otherwise pass it by. In short, the new Top Gear is a magazine programme with huge appeal; the old Top Gear was for 'petrolheads'.

Allied with stunts like blowing up Morris Marinas and slagging off Hyundai's, the personalities of the three presenters come into play. Unfortunately some of the moderators on boards.ie don't seem to realize that this is just a programme, and not something on which to build a weak personality. Further unfortunately some of the moderators seem to spend most of their time trying to be the bowel movement of Jeremy Clarkson, James May or Richard Hammond.

It's sad, but there you go. From the off it was clear that the 'moderators' didn't like the fact that I knew about cars. This manifested itself almost entirely in selective application of the ( highly abstract ) 'Rules', and ignoring me on the threads which they dominated with personality - building attempts whilst trying to sound like a 'Top Gear' presenter. It's not meant to be taken seriously, lads!

So where do I go now that most of my posts were removed for nothing, moderators only stopped by to disagree with me, and now having banned me the same moderator is making fun of me with no right to reply? Well, I'm busy organizing a car meeting. I'm also dealing with a guy who has a Volvo 164 apart and is welding the floorpan. Oh, and I'm learning how to coach - paint. In a way it's a compliment to be banned. I won't be bothered with boards.ie again, because beyond the tittle-tattle I actually like to talk cars on a Motors forum. All they seem to do is talk is tittle-tattle.

I predict that boards.ie will do well for the foreseeable future. It is clearly popular for being popular - it is not a good quality website ( from the abusive language 'upward' ) but rather got to where it is today because there was nothing else around. That will change. Already several sites have sprung up as a result of people's dissatisfaction with boards.ie. Most of those will fail, but some won't. The long - term future of boards does not look so good. At present, they go out of their way to make enemies, and allow immature people to take pride in being immature. The World moves on.

Ode to a dumb lady in a Focus

Yesterday afternnoon the ravages of hunger could no longer be denied. I went in search of a completely unhealthy solution. This involved something I've begun to slightly dread of late: joining the N11 Dual Carriageway. I would not be disappointed.

Approaching the small village of Kilmacanogue ( southbound ) I could see a car filtering on from the left in the distance. The overtaking lane was free for about 400 metres fore and aft, but I couldn't pull out because a black focus was driving alongside me.

No problem. A few seconds later I look and the focus is still driving beside me. I glanced a couple of times more. A young woman, doing what young women always do in such situations - looking ahead and pretending not to see me.

I had left loads of space in front of my car for the car which was filtering on ( the person did, but behind me instead ). What did Focus lady then decide to do? Well, having escorted me into the rest of the traffic on the inside lane she then sped up thorough the reduced speed limit, and cut in in front of the car ahead of me. She then jammed on the brakes and turned left into the Esso garage!

I was tempted to pull in after her and ask her if he actually knew what she was doing, or if perhaps she's just that dumb naturally. The driver in front of me must have had the patience of a saint. This kind of thing is widespread, but I'll never figure it out.

2 men dead. It's only 'misadventure'

I watched the News yesterday evening on telly as I do. On came a piece on an horrific accident which I vaguely recalled - in truth there have been so many it's hard to remember any particular one. This one involved a young female. Not the stereotypical victim, but the killer this time.

The matter further involved her driving an old Honda Civic saloon at excess speed, on a provisional driving license ( having never had any formal training - at all - it transpired! ) Having overtaken another vehicle, she crashed under a bridge. The two male passengers in the car were catapulted from the car and killed.

The politics of death clearly came into play here. If the driver was male, he would be herded to and from the court like a rapist ( if every other report I have ever seen is anything to go by ). There would be a historical retrospective citing every road accident since 2003 to accompany the report, followed by some stone - faced bastard trying to work himself up to the point of being hilarious scowling "people need to slow down".

Sure, it's in bad taste to write this. It's in even worse taste to believe in gender discrimination through death. When a young man kills he is a killer, when a young woman kills it is 'misadventure'.

Saab Performance Drive

I've been watching this video for quite some time on youtube ... that it has only amassed nearly 10,000 views in 18+ months is hard to believe, especially when compared to the banal rubbish that sometimes gets 30,000+ views in a few months ( like someone showing us around their totally standard apartment ... yawn )

Talk about car control! Tell you one thing, you wouldn't want to miss reverse gear ...

The long road of idiots

Today I came accross many fools, in the space of 10 minutes of driving. Firstly I should explain what a dual - carriageway is, for the benefit of anyone reading this in a non - 'quaint' country. It's not a motorway, but a two - lane road with a top speed of 100 k.p.h. ( 60 m.p.h. ) You can drive your 'carriage' at that speed.

Thanks to a ditherer in a Ford Ka, I was forced to take the overtaking lane - and I stayed there. Nothing behind, as merging lanes were coming up on the inside lane. After all, pulling in when both occur within a little more than a hundred metres makes little sense: it's too hectic and dangerous. Why are our roads designed like this? Good question.

As I passed the second merging filter road, this girl in a Black Fiat Stilo pulled out and proceeded to drive in my blind spot. I needed to pull in in order to take the next exit (this is the ongoing hazard of taking the outside lane - getting 'boxed out' by speeders on the inside ) but she wasn't dropping back one bit. Then mysteriously, she indicated that she wanted to take the outside lane, though there was nothing in front of her! Suited me fine, so I popped on my left indie and pulled in, and she pulled out. Weird though!

Further along in my journey the roles were reversed: I needed to join the Dual Carriageway. Indicated and built up speed. Could see a silver Opel Astra behind me ( 00-D-82324 for dickhead spotters ). I gathered speed as you do. Guess what? - he was gathering speed too. When this fool was happy that he had prevented me from pulling out in front of him, what did he do next? - he slowed down.

I can understand why people sometimes lose their cool on the roads. I can understand it. Thank God I don't drive from a living, assholes would die!

PS: Coming out of the estate I live in, a stupid bitch with jet black shades on came around the bend on the wrong side. She needed to pull into the driveway of a house.

Danone - arsed women

The Danone - arsed woman is a phenomenal species which never fails to amaze me. I'm not sure if they are unique to Ireland, but there certainly seem to be a lot of them around lately. Danone - arsed woman can be defined in the following manner. They are invariably overweight, and most of this weight lodges in the buttocks area.

They can usually be found wandering aimlessly around supermarket aisles, with gi-normous arse cheeks wobbling inside of the grey cotton tracksuit bottoms, on the rare ocassions in which they move suddenly. They bring up their ferral brats to believe that adults should be seen, and not heard.

Danone - arse woman thinks that her obvious lack of a brain / manners plus arse - weight / general weight / dressing like an escaped mental patient can be overlooked. Not only because she is ignorant, but drinks a little vial - like bottle of 'Danone' every day. Yes, it says great things on the Ads., so it must be true! Oh, and they also drive Minibuses ( sorry, I mean MPV's ).

I came across two prime examples of D.A. woman last week - in the one go. I turn at a juntion to find an oncoming Opel Zafira blocking my way. A D.A. woman with big hair is talking to a clone in another Minibus going the other way. I hang back, but though having seen me, the Zafira woman has no intention of moving either in or forward. I duly pull right up to the front of the Zafira. She gives me a look and keeps on talking for the best part of a minute.

I think the rescession is a great thing. Not only will it make Danone - arsed woman get some shape resembling a human back, but hopefully they will no longer be able to afford to drive minibuses which they can't drive.