London Courier Work

Ain't that the truth.

 

You missed a trick. Working as a _cycle_ courier is better. They
like the lycra shorts.

 

too.


Sounds very like a bloke I remember. Tony Powers, rode an ex-Plod BMW,
and his picture is in Bike of May 1981. He was a great geezer - worked
for.... Embassy, that was it. Had something like four aerials on his
Beemer: despatch radio, CB, BloodNet (or whatever it was called), and
the stereo in the fairing. Damn thing looked like a sputnik. Or a Gold
Wing.

K9 was his callsign - I find it slightly worrying that I can still
remember this, over the decades.

One Friday evening, diesel on the road, lost it, under a bus, curtains.
Monday morning the word got around. Rather upset me, did that. Must
have been 1982 or 1983.

In the couple of years that I did it, working for Mercury, we had no
serious accidents *at all*, which I still think is amazing. One of our
guys suffered a hit-and-run early on Sunday morning, leaving a party,
but that doesn't count.

What nobody's mentioned as a benefit is that you acquire a really good
knowledge of London. Even now, if I have to visit a company in, say,
Mortimer Street, I find myself thinking:

"Up Park Lane from Hyde Park Corner, keep right, right into Brook
Street, across Grosvenor Square, Brook Street, across New Bond Street,
into Hanover Square, leave via Princes Street, left into Regent Street,
over Oxford Circus, turn right just before the Beeb......."

 

"Don't go south of the Golden Gate Bridge mate.
Not after the last time."

( From another thread:
http://sfsurvey.com/photos/sail/imagepages/image1.htm )

 

Champ proposed

Is it time to bring that picture up again as supporting evidence?

 

Yeah I've learned a lot, today. All gratefully received.

The idea of bouncing someone elses bike round town does quite appeal.
I passed the Direct Access in 2000 and know my way round town
reasonably well. So yeah I think that'd be a good option.

A lot more appealing than taking up pedal cycle courriering round the
city. My hairy beer gut needs concealed in leather not displayed in a
lycra bib. And I feel a lot safer with a full-face lid and half decent
engine. Though can't deny the exercise would do me good.

I'll research the courier firms out there...
Cheers to y'all.

Sadly the "Office totty not quite wearing enough factor" was not upto
much in Hampton court today. Damn the suburbs!

 

I was only 17 in that photo. By 19 I looked different. Not
necessarily better, mind, but different.

 

TOG@toil wrote

Can I just mention that my knowledge of London, gained from decades of
fixing traffic lights, burglar alarms, computers and shit serves me not
at all well when the bastards keep rebuilding the place every five
minutes.

I bet you can't do that today.

You would prolly have to go clockwise on an exit less one way system all
the way round the park to Paddington and then come at it from Camden.
Fucking terrorists. And they want to take away fucking trial by jury
for them. Fucking what!! I want my fucking chance to find the
murdering cunts guilty! I don't care what they are accused of, I don't
even care if they are guilty or not, I want my rights as a citizen to
publicly convict them. I don't want some fucking judge doing it in
secret for me thank you very much. Then perhaps we can get back to
sensible roads for a sensible Britain.

 

In uk.rec.motorcycles, OurTim amazed us all with this pearl of wisdom:

The Rider's Digest is a good place to start, free in a lot of motorcycle
and accessory shops - Ignore what the adverts say about pay and bonuses
though, you'll need to ask them.

Here, have a look at this, too. I've not read the whole list but at
first glance the usual suspects are there.

http://www.touchlondon.co.uk/business/search.tch;jsessionid=AF0EFDFD8801
8D36EEFB374027B4D664?type=courier&name=&location.input=&x=31&y=11

The square mile's where it's at, buddy.

 

In uk.rec.motorcycles, steve auvache amazed us all with this pearl of
wisdom:

It's not the rebuilding so much as them changing the road layouts and
putting one way systems in. The last biggy was Gt. Eastern St which they
made two way but the arse end of Old St they made one way. Oh, then
there's Shoreditch High St as well...

You can actually ;o)

They've made a pig's ear of Grosvenor Square now though and you have to
go round Park St to go round the north side of it.

 

Whinging Courier wrote

You wait until you have 50 years of memories of what it used to look
like to call on.

Granted most of it is road improvements and the like but around the back
of Shoreditch they have rebuilt huge swathes of it. Barbican is another
one, London Wall to a lesser extent. The place has had some major
changes since the luftwaffe sold their same night delivery service to
the merkins.

 

Champ proposed

So what do you reckon you'd rather be? That age, but with the same
looks again, or the distinguished middle aged appearance of yours today.

 

"Don't go south of the Golden Gate Bridge mate.
Not after the last time."

( From another thread:
http://sfsurvey.com/photos/sai­l/imagepages/image1.htm )

Aye, spotted that earlier - he really should have seen that coming in
broad daylight, taking a boat like that between a shallow shingle beach
and a bridge support with those waves. The surfers hanging about would
have been a clue? Dramatic photos though!

 

Well, I get a **** sight more shags nowadays.

 

In uk.rec.motorcycles, steve auvache amazed us all with this pearl of
wisdom:

Is it that easy to redevelop a city that has no room left?

There's parts of the town I used to live in that I don't recognise at
all now.

They rebuilt that because they had to then. I don't see how you can
change something that much being as cramped as it is without causing
major disruption.

 

In uk.rec.motorcycles, PeterT@Home amazed us all with this pearl of
wisdom:

I know which one I'd rather have.

 

Whinging Courier wrote

They had the space.

In the mid 50's, which is as far back as I can remember, large swathes
of it were still covered in the rubble left from 13/14 years before.

The bit behind Shoreditch was among the last to be redeveloped and that
was not as bad as you might have expected. The streets immediately next
to the site were no go for all but bikes and peds really but no real
problem. Besides it is Central London, 100 yards away and it is a
different world entirely.

In the same area I have seen virtually every building in Houndsditch
pulled down and rebuilt one at a time over the course years but the
street hasn't changed at all and it hasn't been closed during the
process either.

 

Whinging Courier wrote

I agree but I just don't seem to be able to get the trick of
"distinguished."

 

In uk.rec.motorcycles, steve auvache amazed us all with this pearl of
wisdom:

"I remember when all this was fields"

They still don't close the roads and what a PITA that is. The last bit
of recent redevelopment they did was pedestrianising the north side of
Trafaglar Square.

Bastards.

 

Whinging Courier wrote

Change is a constant.

The other side of Billericay to me. Queens Park I think they call it.
I used to go plinking for peasants less than 20 years ago.

Or, 90 years ago: The very bit of Billericay where I live now according
to the bloke over the road who saw the airship come down in WW1 when he
was in short trousers. Dead now he is and the eyewitness history that
was his and his alone gone with him.

Reputedly: One of the local farmers, whose family s now quite a wheel in
Essex society, made a small fortune selling any old bits of scrap
aluminium as "salvage."