Jubilee flotilla

Am I too late to book getting a good view somewhere for this or alternatively actually being on a boat? Also I the scissor sisters have already sold out at tower bridge for the BT river o f music for the Olympics. I'm finding it a bit tough to get on the ball with all of what is going on....

I have my own concerns about this.
A few years back when the tall ships were on the river and leaving to go downstream toward the North sea, I came home just after lunchtime to my house in Elephant Lane SE16, which is adjacent to the river.
THere were cars parked haphazardly all down the approach road to my house, with the occupants all standing at the river's edge looking at the ships, but I was able to get through okay.
When I got to my house there was a car parked on my drive with it's rear bumper about one metre from my garage door.
I have space on my drive for two vehicles easily, so on the assumption that the car belonged to someone visiting my place I reversed into the space in front of it, although I wanted to park in the garage under the house.
When I went in and asked my wife whose car it was, she said, "Some guy parked it there and started to walk toward the river, I went out and asked him to take it away as it was the private drive to a private house and he just said "when I'm ready".
With that I drove past the crowd looking at the ships, went to a friend's place in Rotherhithe St., asked if I could borrow his ancient old Land Rover and if I left my taxi at his place would he follow me to my place in his battered Transit van.
My neighbour was away in France so we parked the Transit on her drive about half a metre from the offending car, but next to it.
I then backed the Land Rover up to about fifty centimetres from the car's front bumper, my friend walked home and I went in and waited for the fireworks.
Sure enough, about one hour later there was a ring at the bell, guess who?
I told the guy that just like him I would move the Land Rover when I was ready, and that I didn't know whose Transit it was, probably some prat who didn't care who lived there and was watching the ships.
He begged and pleaded, said that he lived in the Midlands and had to get home, I said "Tough s**t."
He called the police, they came and asked me to move it, I said no.
They told him that there was nothing that they could do and that he shouldn't have parked there in the first place.
I went down to the driveway around 9.30 p.m. with a baseball bat, I said, "Are we going to have a problem?" He said "No, I'm sorry."
So I let him out, it was five and a half hours after he had first rang the bell.
I don't think that he'll do it again in hurry.

Most probably one of the best anecdotes I've heard.

It was obvious that you were royally p***ed off at this cretin's action Mr. Pepper, no one could blame you for that.
But do you feel now, so many years later, that you may have over-reacted?
Let me be perfectly clear on this, I'm not saying for one minute that you DID over- react, the selfish oaf definitely deserved some retribution, but the fact that you felt it necessary to go out with a weapon for presumably possible self protection indicates that you may have felt that you'd pushed him a bit far.
I think your closing sentence sums it up though, he'll be unlikely to chance it again if he comes back to see the flotilla.

nigel wrote:

Most probably one of the best anecdotes I've heard.

Can't comment on such a subjective judgement, but variations on that sort of story are a regular occurrence around urban sports grounds (in my own experience, adjacent to Twickenham)

To address the original topic...Julia, there was an article in today's Evening Standard with some details of the plans for the river pageant. If you can't find it, no doubt the info will appear in other media over the next few days. I get the impression that if you are keen to witness the event, it would be best to watch it on telly.

Baseball bat? you could get arrested with something like that for goodness sake,whereas......

[img]http://http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d0/Millwall_brick_held.jpg/300px-Millwall_brick_held.jpg[/img]

Can't watch it on tv when I live this close. Do you think many boats will continue down rotherhithe or wapping way?

I bet some boats will be visible ... the Pageant ends at Tower Bridge but the flotilla will disperse from there to Greenwich. Even Shad Thames is too far to the east :-(

Debrajoan wrote:

It was obvious that you were royally p***ed off at this cretin's action Mr. Pepper, no one could blame you for that.
But do you feel now, so many years later, that you may have over-reacted?
Let me be perfectly clear on this, I'm not saying for one minute that you DID over- react, the selfish oaf definitely deserved some retribution, but the fact that you felt it necessary to go out with a weapon for presumably possible self protection indicates that you may have felt that you'd pushed him a bit far.
I think your closing sentence sums it up though, he'll be unlikely to chance it again if he comes back to see the flotilla.

It was a long time ago DJ, and I have calmed down considerably since then.
To fill in a blank in my original post, my first thought at the time was to call the police, although I knew that they would be unable to make much difference to the situation, and that the prat who'd parked on my drive had already "won" by default.
They duly arrived, quite quickly as I recall.
They explained that they had traced the registered keeper's address en-route, from the plate number I had given them over the phone, and it was an address somewhere between Nottingham and Leicester.
To send a local copper to the address, ascertain a mobile number for the driver, then try to call him was asking a bit much they quietly explained, although they sympathised with my anger.
They said that as much as it went against the grain, I would be better off waiting for him to return and take it away.
I suggested having it towed away, they said that they could not arrange that, and that if I got someone else to do it and the offending vehicle was damaged then in the eyes of the law I would be held responsible.
So ultimately the action that I took was the only legal thing that I could do that would inconvenience him, and make him suffer.
Feeling that he might in frustration damage the old Land Rover, (if that were possible), I had made sure that he saw the bat inside my hallway and advised him, (NOT THREATENED), to think twice before doing anything rash.
Just to be safe I had the bat with me when I finally let him out.
In retrospect, my over-riding emotion on that occasion was of impotence, not fury or anger, okay, anger too.

Julia7239 wrote:

Can't watch it on tv when I live this close. Do you think many boats will continue down rotherhithe or wapping way?

I also would like to know this and missed yesterday's paper. I've seen a few boats that are being towed down towards Greenwich way in preparation so it wouldn't surprise me if there is quite a lot to see here. And I do think that after getting to Tower Bridge most will have to come this way...