Well hello my muddy 4x4 chums, how Ya doing? Time for another Blogg. As I write we have been home from Billing (the proper one at Billing in Northampton) 2 days now and we are just about straight. All the stuff I have to bring home that I need to set up the courses (for those of you new me site I am the Course Director and I run the off road site on behalf of the landowners) on the off-road part of the show are packed away in the back garage, and later on a winters day when I've not got anything to do I will get it all out and sort it and repack it for 2018. Hardest job is removing all those evil sharp staples we use to put the sings up from the arrows and other course furniture. I will have to go thru the 2x2 posts as some of them get damaged as well every year and make some more. Sometime next week we shall have a meeting in my office with my wife Hazel and Barrie Holt the Chief Marshal and run thru a list of things and we are always looking to be better even though this is the 11th year the marshals team has been together. By the way if you were there, wasn't the guys from Challenge South West up on the recently harvested field above the site doing a grand job? I have never seen that at any show before, challenge trucks constantly doing demonstrations and offering courtesy rides to members of the public as well. So well done Chris Pedlar and his crew, it was awesome to watch chaps.

Is it me or do you agree that generally the standard of driving on our roads has we wend our way is getting a bit below par? Certainly there is a lot more traffic on the roads now, so inevitably this holds us all up on a daily basis wherever we choose to drive. So is it that because of this, drivers are no longer so patient and any little perceived transgression leads to them losing their cool and becoming aggressive and trying to get their own back in some way? Hence this new thing we see on social media on dash cams, road rage. Some I have seen is suicidal and the perpetrators have clearly gone a bit crazy, well over the top. My old favourite gripe I still see all the time, drivers not giving way at roundabouts to traffic coming from the right. It's so simple to do but more and more it seems to be for some "just push yourself out in front of him he won't want to hit you and he will brake". Personally I have slowed down a lot whilst I am driving and I am a lot more careful these days in order to give myself a chance to avoid any accident. Also I am trying harder to squeeze as many miles per gallon out of the home fleet whichever one I am driving at the time, as the price of fuel forever rises due to either OPEC or the tax man.

Do any of you my special chums listen to music whilst driving?  I have become besotted by Joanne Shaw Taylor. Her new album WILD is a blast. She grew up in a house where her Dad and brother both played guitar, so naturally I suppose Joanne gravitated to play as well, and boy has this lady got chops? She can really play and her voice reminds me of Janice Joplin on a good day without the screaming. Catch her on Youtube or joanneshawtaylor.com and give her a listen, you won't be sorry.  I'm listening to her now whilst catching up with you my old chums so excuse me a bit whilst I get up and have a bop around the office, just gotta do it. Phew I'm bloody knackered now. So until we blogg again keep it real and live strong. And remember If anyone says to you "or else" look em in the eye and say "Ill have some of your or else mate, bring it on loser". My Very Best Regards & Happy Rovering.