Netbasic Ltd.

Over the past 4 years, you could ask anyone at Netbasic and they would tell you that the A3 has been the bain of my driving life. You could say that it's partly my fault for living a) too far away and then b) closer, but still too far away. But at least in the second instance, I was sensible enough to live south of the Hindhead urghworks.



In fact, over the past year, I haven't really suffered much A3 stress. Sure, it's a long trip, but mostly, it's been trouble-free. So, to celebrate my imminent third (and even more sensible) move next month, I present my final A3 rant: Hammer Lane access to the A3 southbound is a joke (as of this morning).



When I first moved to Haslemere, I used the red route to get to the A3; easy-peasy 2 minutes. Then about 2 months ago, they closed my little cut-through and I had to revert to the blue route; still pretty easy, just a couple of minutes longer because of the sharp left turn.

However today, when I started off on the blue route as usual, I noticed that the southbound traffic had been diverted over to the other side of the dual carriageway. OK, cool - "I've got my own private road", I thought, and made my way down the open road towards the point where the two southbound lanes would obviously converge.

Except, they didn't.
The road just ends. With a hotel.

So I pulled into the hotel car park and turned around, at the exact same moment, 3 other cars arrived and the confusion on their faces said it all. "What the hell is going on?" "How do I get to the A3!?"

We all turned around and set off back up my 'private road', back onto Hammer Lane and then followed the signs (that we'd all missed when we'd turned into Hammer Lane the first time because they were facing the wrong way) "A3 traffic Portsmouth / London". They took us under the A3 and made us join the incredibly slow-moving northbound traffic!

All I said to myself while I was heading round the slip road was "I don't want to go to Hindhead!!". It would take forever!

So, I took a right at the next opportunity, spun a u-turn and then queued to rejoin the A3 southbound. So about 15 minutes after I joined the A3, I passed the same point again, but this time on a road that would not 'run out'.

The A3 fails. But hopefully, for me - for the last time.

Mr T (24) had been showing signs of cracking for a while, but it wasn't until yesterday that it became clear - he just couldn't handle it anymore.



What a mug! May he rest in pieces.

It all started at the pub (as all the best adventures do)...

New Chris was celebrating, after passing his 3 months probation, while the rest of us were drowning our sorrows at being stuck with the big man for the foreseeable future ;)

James was blithering on about some film I should watch before The Great South Run on Sunday, and going on and on about 'Hitting the wall' and 'Getting through the wall' and 'Being the wall', while Jon was starting to feel more and more sleepy.

Sarah was still trying to figure out if she actually did need some new windows after all, while Jake was deciding how many times he needed to look like he was leaving, before it was actually OK to leave.

So, we eventually left the pub and dropped Old Chris at the station ahead of his long journey home. Then Jon and I went and bought our Winza (a pizza made of win) so that we could just shove it in the oven after our game of tennis.

Now tennis, to re-cap, Jon was 5-2 up in the 3rd set and about to win the match. Which, despite all my efforts, he did. Then we got the 4th set underway with some great rallies, some terrible serves and shots with so much time to plan, that we inevitably failed to deliver.

But then something strange happened.... it was 2 games each in the 4th, and we were playing some great tennis. This was a real competition. After being 40-love down, Jon fought his way back to deuce. He'd worked really hard to pull it back and there was no way he was going to let that winning ball land in.

At least, in his mind, there was 'no way'.

Three things got in his way; gravity, a wall, and the undeniable fact that Jon isn't actually Super.


1) A paramedic 2) Nasty head-wound 3) Obligatory swearing 4) Skirt.

Jon One, 26 and born 18th June 1987, was attended to by paramedics court-side at about half eight on Tuesday evening.

"Running for tennis ball. Collided into wall. Not KO'd"

Jon Two, 26 and born 18th May 1982, was attended to by a paramedic in his front room at about 10pm on Tuesday evening.

"This PM, while playing tennis, accidentally fell into a wall hitting his head and elbow. Not KO'd"

Two different Jons got to the ball.
The point still counted.
I won the game.