Slowing down quickly

 It is time to wear my short-sleeved tee shirt. The season is on us again. This may sound ridiculous when we are moving into autumn; my attire is not connected to the weather but to the fact that it is time for jabs again, we have the winter flu and then later Covid jabs. It is a sign of the times and I suppose it will be for all of us from now on.

Another sign of the times is the way we now must think about our transport, not only because fuel is expensive but because of the pollution we cause when we move from place to place. Here in our little hamlet, we have no choice. There is no bus service and certainly no trains.

In 2009 I remember hearing about the new proposed HS2 from London and the main advantage seemed to be that you could get to Birmingham from London in much less time. You could travel at 225 mph, and it would only take 52 minutes saving about thirty minutes in travel times. Now the environmental advantages are being stressed, taking traffic off the roads and it being zero rated for carbon emissions.

We were going to be able to get from London to the north in record time but now it is going to stop at Birmingham and the only part of Shropshire that will notice is on the Northeast border of the county where some are breathing a sigh of relief that their villages will not be cut in half and houses and businesses will not be lost. It is a strange equation of losses and gains, but have you thought that after zooming from London to Birmingham those of us in west Shropshire will have to slow down to almost crawling pace when we get to Wales.

I was driving along the other day in familiar villages when I came across a 20mph sign, my car dash registered it too. Taken by surprise I braked as the other cars did too when they realized that now instead of trying to shorten our journey our priorities were safety and the environment. It is all very confusing.

But whatever your point of view the days are certainly getting shorter and we have put our bird table out once again for some old fashioned but interesting entertainment in the months to come from the variety of birds we will see.

On to a modern phenomenon have you tried texting by sliding to type? You slide your finger on the keyboard and do not lift it off until you have finished your message. Now that really does save time.

(Taken from my column in the Shropshire Star)