Vorsprung durch Technik and other ravings...

I heard on the radio the other day that the Germans have decided to pull out of nuclear power in light of the recent Japanese disaster. There I go, sounding like a newsreader again. I don’t get it though. When did Germany last get struck by a tsunami or even have a major earthquake? They don’t have volcanoes, so surely the biggest natural disaster likely to happen in Germany is a bit of flooding. In which case build the nuclear power stations on higher ground and whilst they are about it, away from the sea.

Now I know this would be a challenge, after all you need an awful lot of water to cool a power station. But I would have thought that a nation who invented motorways, the zeppelin, rockets, and bratwurst could have engineered something – after all ‘Progress through technology’ as the advert says.

I guess now that the rest of Europe, including us, will all have to ‘consider their position’ in light of a tremulous public who complain about the cost of energy on the one hand, but don’t want ‘dangerous’ nuclear power or ‘unsightly’ wind farms on the other.

Moving on - where do all the shoes by the side of the road come from?

I had occasion to travel a hundred miles or so very early this morning by motor car. I never did understand why the word motor was necessary in this description although it is a little better than automobile (which is meaningless to me). Anyway, on that single journey I passed no fewer than nine shoes by the side of the road including two, about twenty miles apart, which I am convinced was a pair.

What is happening? Does somebody suddenly get bored of the car journey and lob their shoe out of the window for a bit of a larf? Is it the shoe fairy? Is there a secret society which as part of an initiation rite, secretly secrete shoes along the public highway?

It’s almost as puzzling as the 'orange glove on the beach' mystery.

Lastly, why am I constantly being interrupted by youths from Liverpool knocking on my door and setting off my tweety-bird to sell me dusters and dishcloths at ridiculously high prices? Why don’t they purvey their goods in their home city, and don’t they realise that I have a dishwasher and a fantastic dusting mitt that I bought from the pound shop for… well, for a pound.

They always look so offended when I say ‘no thanks’ that I’ve taken to carrying all manner of cleaning equipment with me to the front door when I answer it, just so that they can be sure that I’ve really got one of whatever it is they are selling.

Actually I bought two dusting mitts from the pound shop, one for each foot. I use them to polish the flooring in the hallway, my own invention. I wonder if that goes some way to explaining all those roadside shoes? Maybe house, or rather car, proud drivers are replacing their shoes with dusting mitts and polishing their walnut veneer dashboards whilst driving along, carelessly discarding their shoes out of the side-window in the process.

Foot mitts, like orange gloves for the feet - orangenhandschuhe für die Gebühr - ingenious, eh? I bet I could teach those Germans a thing or two.