Back to school.

Festival of Indian cultures last Sunday, they looked very happy.
Hari hari hari hari Krishna hari hari.


The March hare outside the new offices on Serpentine Ave.
The EU declares that if you build a development you must install a work of art to a value in relation to the cost of the development.
You might remember the hare from O'Connell st a few years ago.

A really good idea this a taxi drivers index.

The other day I saw a really good idea in Garry's shop on Bond St. A taxi drivers manual. If a punter gets in and gives you the name of some new night club or restaurant you can look it up.
As taxi numbers approached 5,000 a few years ago I was going to produce a similar index. I had a list of things to put in it, I asked another driver what he thought of it. "Well If you print that I know plenty of drivers who will look for you and kill you. If they don't know they should not be driving taxis, its as simple as that". So it went on the back boiler.I wish them the best of luck with it.
I met the guys who compiled it and they said that the printing costs were so high that they will be lucky if they break even.

Monday morning saw the mother of all car crashes on the road between Ballymun and the airport. I saw 4 cars some said 5 were involved. 2 crashed head on at a fair speed and then 2 other cars went over and under each other one landing on its roof.
Now theres a thing you don't see every day thank God.

All the schools opened on Monday too and all the little ones were heading off to school in their new over sized uniforms, by Christmas they will have grown into them.
Business picked up a bit but it is still almost impossible to get onto a rank.
I think that if we had a 50% reduction in the taxi numbers there would still be too many taxis.
Some guys are very much under pressure, the Garda giving them tickets for blocking traffic is not helping anyone.

I have always said that the law is an ass, well here is an example.
I taxi pulls over to pick up a fare late at night, as he gets in the driver sees that he has stopped for a drug addict, the guy pulls a blade and a blood filled syringe on the driver. The driver was trained in hostage negotiation in his last job.
"Relax man, you'll get your money, take it easy man, nothing to be afraid of, I have some more money in the boot as well, relax. But we won't be going much further if we don't get some petrol." So the driver pulled into Clare Hall petrol station where he gets the support of 2 other taxi drivers. One dialed for the Garda and in the male the junkie jumped over the fence and headed up towards the Hilton hotel.
The Garda car arrived a few minutes later followed by an unmarked car, the guys in the unmarked car had caught him.

Great result you might think.
But this is where the law is an ass.
In order to prosecute him the driver has to give his name and address.
The junkies solicitor will be given the drivers details and the junkies mates can terrorize the taxi drivers wife and children.

So after all that the junkie walks away to do the same to some other poor sod.

You should be able to press charges through some means without giving your personal details.

As I say the law is an ass.