Police 'Intelligence' is not all it's cracked up to be

It could be worse. My Father-in-Law once offered me his Lada!

 

Look out Clara. They're coming for you:-

la police algerienne contant pour algerie vs egypte.flv - YouTube

 

What makes anyone here think the Police know owt about cars (re the silencing of the offending alarm) I can't imagine.

In a previous life I worked for a very senior Kent Police officer, so when my car broke down on the way to work one day and I phoned in to say I'd be late, 'Sir' told me not to worry, he'd mobilise his force to my rescue.

Eventually a Traffic car pulled up behind me, my knight in shining armour got out and strode purposefully in my direction stating '... Guv'nor says you've broken down.' I said yes, that I'd called the RAC but, because it was rush hour they were likely to be a while yet. 'Never mind', he says, 'I'll take a look'. He then disappeared beneath the bonnet and for the next 10 minutes 'did things', returning to his vehicle on a couple of occasions to 'get things', before disappearing under the bonnet yet again. Finally, he straightened up, 'Well, it's got me beat', he said shaking his head.

Fortunately, at that point the RAC man arrived, although I'm not sure which of us was more pleased to see him! Now they both disappeared beneath the bonnet, in less than a minute RAC man had diagnosed the problem, promptly fixed it and was returning to his van. 'Good job he turned up when he did ..' said PC Traffic Muppet, clearly relieved, before uttering those immortal words ........ 'I don't know anything about cars'

 

Its a genetic fault that only seems to affect us blokes. We have this deep seated belief that we are master mechanics. That belief, as far as I can gather, goes unshaken for pretty much our entire lives, faltering only briefly and temporarily when actually faced with a real faulty engine.

Imagine how much worse it is then when your car breaks down, and the breakdown recovery man turns up (mentioning no names, but not RAC), and he takes one look at the light on the dashboard and says 'yes, its bust', and then threatens to take the car away to a garage rather than attempt to fix it. Only after I insisted that it could be one of three simple faults that I could fix myself if I had my tools with me, did he look under the bonnet. Using the car's built in fault code reader (not all cars have that), I promptly told the man that the reading from the mass airflow sensor was missing or out of range. To which he replied, 'oh yes, that's under the car somewhere'. I tactfully pointed at the large black cylindrical object with wires coming off it under the bonnet, and said 'that's it there'. Wanting to save face, he shone a torch around different parts of the engine bay, nodded knowingly a few times, tapped a couple of bits with a screwdriver and made a great show of listening to things, and then promptly removed, cleaned and refitted the sensor I'd pointed out in the first place. First turn of the key, and the engine burst into life.

 

Me too Shiney! Glad I'm not the only one.
I'm not looking forward to tomorrow; I will be attempting to replace a headlight bulb in my car.
The way cars are constructed now, this will probably involve removing about half the engine. One thing is certain....it will not be a simple five minute job.
Even replacing a wiper blade causes me to break out in a cold sweat. Last time I attempted it, Mrs. Trunky came outside to find me struggling and cursing whilst attempting to fit one. She took it from my bleeding fingers, glanced briefly at it saying "Simple, it goes on like this, look," and click it was done.

 

Is the car still there, Clare?

And is the alarm still going?

Are the windows smashed in yet?

 

Hello Kindred

The car was still here yesterday, still with windows intact but sporting some nasty smears of God-knows-what down the sides, arranged to suggest - well - bananas and a couple of apples, probably . Clearly the local urchins had been having fun. This morning I was about to steel myself to ring the crack team at Kent Police again. I looked out of the window and there it was ... gone. And never said goodbye. I don't know whether they managed to get it started or whether it suffered the indignity of being shoved on the back of a truck. This sort of thing never used to happen in The Bill. Still, I dare say it's off to delight another neighbourhood with its penetrating love cry. The prospect of a (relatively) peaceful weekend looms ...

 

You would think the copper that had left it there might have come forwards by now.

How long does it take to realise where you'd left your car

 

To be fair to plod, it seems its an easy mistake to make.

Woman ‘misplaces’ her car in Munich for 39 days - The Local

 

All very mysterious. I just can't imagine how it got left here ... unless one of the local kids stole it from the police station.

 

Reminds me of The Freak Brothers Comic where the cop goes to pieces after his car was wrecked & then forgets who he was.