Wild, wild Weston

High noon in the Badlands. Small white empty clouds float motionless in a steel-blue sky. A harsh sun beats down on a dried-out gulch. Not even the tumbleweed stirs as the long hand of the town clock ticks, ticks, ticks towards 12.

A curtain twitches and a face appears briefly at the window, casts a worried glance towards town, then vanishes. The curtain flicks back and the dusty street is still once more. They’re coming. And they mean business.

Actually, if you believe anything you’ve read in the last 80 words or so, you’re the victim of what is known in the trade as journalistic licence. It’s time for a reality check.

We’re not in the Badlands of South Dakota: we’re in leafy Weston Village, Bath on Sunday lunchtime. It’s not a baking hot day: it’s about average for the middle of September. And it’s not even high noon: it’s one in the afternoon. Although strictly speaking it would be midday if we were on GMT and not BST. Let’s not lose track, though...

Because last Sunday, they were definitely coming, and they certainly did mean business.

“They” in this case meaning the road re-surfacers.

Ever since the cold snap last winter, our road has suffered from a bad case of the potholes. Driving down the hill has subjected the Dixonmobile (and every other  vehicle) to the suburban equivalent of a spin round the tank training grounds on Salisbury Plain.

Suspensions have twanged, shock absorbers have boinged, passengers have bounced and unrestrained parcels have flown through  windows every time a car went by.

But all the time, the promise has been there: “One day,” the handouts from the council have assured us, “we’ll come and mend your road.”

So at last the contractors arrived. All the parked cars mysteriously vanished (except for one), and a sweeper lorry trundled up and down clearing away the early autumn leaves while purposeful looking blokes in reflective jackets taped over the ironwork.

And everyone on the street came out to have a look. The excitement was palpable, we all had a  chat, and waves of community spirit drifted upwards into the September air.

At last the big moment arrived and a gigantic machine started spreading the micro-asphalt.

(Which, for the non-technically-minded, is a combination of aggregate and bitumen emulsion that restores skid resistance quickly and with minimal disruption to the carriageway user. Or so it says in this leaflet. What it doesn’t say is how to get the bits off your carpet.)

First the machine did our side. Then it did the middle. And then it went away, along with the road-sweeper and all the yellow jackets.

An eerie hush descended and we all started to wonder: whose was that car at the bottom of the hill? Would the asphalteers ever come back and finish what they’d started?

Of course they did, on Monday, and we now have a lovely new road.

It may not be the wild, wild west. But it certainly livened up Weston.

Fixing a hole

It’s been a week of random and sometimes downright odd occurrences – and random and downright odd roadworks too.
They started digging up the pavements in Weston Park a couple of days ago, having stuck in some shiny new street lamps a couple of weeks before. It’s a bit hard to work out what the plan of campaign is here: there are a couple of small notices attached to the lampposts warning anyone with a powerful enough magnifying glass to read them that the road’s going to be closed for a few days some time in July. But they’re not letting on exactly when.
What we can be sure of is that the RUH overspill car park will have to be moved somewhere else for the duration.
The weirdest thing about the whole Weston Park affair, though, is the warning sign at the eastern end of the street.
Whoever wrote it has a great and apparently undiscovered talent: stating the downright obvious. “Road Works Start Here from 06/07/09. Due to roadworks.” You can see it at twitpic.com/9i85e if you’re of a web-browsing persuasion.
Now aside from the fact that the author of this gem is in two minds about how to spell “roadworks” and is more generous with their capital letters than the ambassador with their Ferrero Rocher, what a gem of concision and self-reference. A haiku for our times, a gnomic ripple in the pond of prolixity, a truly spectacular attempt to create order out of chaos.
Because in Weston Park, as everywhere, chaos and roadworks walk hand in hand.
More excavation news from Guinea Lane, which, as the estimable Mr Jenkins pointed out a couple of weeks ago, has been closed while the water/gas/electricity/telephone//sewage people (cross out whichever options do not apply this week) burrow once more for the Inca gold rumoured to lie below.
On the rare occasions that Guinea Lane is open to through-traffic, its surface is decorated with arcane hieroglyphics which are soon to be used as the basis for a new Dan Brown novel.
And when it’s closed, as it is right now, don’t rely on any signs in Julian Road to warn you about it. It’s much more fun to choose an alternative route right at the last minute.
In fact, what with these and all the other roadworks that seem to have sprouted up just in time for the last three weeks of the school term, you might be better off staying at home.
Apart from anything else, if you’re a Sky broadband customer it’ll give you a chance to read the small print in their latest mailshot which claims you’ll soon be getting a “new and improved” service.
New, undoubtedly. Improved? Not so sure. Especially if you’re on their “Mid” package, which has now been renamed as the far-more-catchy “Everyday”. Sky promises marginally faster speeds, but if you live any distance at all from your exchange you’ll already know that your broadband connection speed never gets close to the theoretical maximum figures in the adverts.
Plus – and here’s the rub – Sky has quietly reduced the monthly usage cap to a quarter of what it used to be, from 40Gb to 10Gb. So if you download a lot of games, videos or music, you may have to be more careful about going over your limit.
Either that, or you’ll have to brave those roadworks and get to the shops.