Due to the inclement weather, I offered to drop my daughter Rachel off at work this morning. It was a frustrating journey, the type of which is never portrayed in glossy, Utopian drive car advertisements.

This was no sun-filled, carefree drive at the wheel of the only automobile on a picturesque Alpine road. A journey where I’d pass shepherds and milk maids in lederhosen on the mountain side! When I’d greet them with a disingenuous smile and wave, as I motored with abandon to nowhere in particular.

I realise that there probably isn’t a car advert involving Alpine milk maids and shepherds, but hey I’m trying to paint a picture here!

The motoring Utopia of an Alpine high performance car ride –  Exhilarating, liberating and …….. slow down you daft sod there are bloody roadworks and a speed camera around that corner!

No, my journey meant firstly having to navigate around busy school run traffic on School Lane. Following my escape from our normally pleasant suburban estate, it was time to address the works traffic. Every weekday, this sloth paced ‘car park’ graces the Leeds outer ring road with its presence at morning rush hour.

The dark and the rain did nothing to enhance my driving experience, or mood. As I drove down School Lane, I felt for the parent’s as they valiantly attempted to hurry their dawdling kids out of the unforgiving precipitation into school.

I pondered whether perhaps they required the shepherd, from the car ad I alluded to above, to round up their excitable brood!

Watching these drenched mum’s and dad’s made me thankful I didn’t have the job of taking kids to school now! After thinking more deeply about it, though, it dawned on me that actually I still run my 22 year old daughter to work! So nothing changes in some cases!!

In Rachel’s defence, I don’t run her everyday and when I do it’s the result of me offering! She never asks for a lift. To work anyway!

Within our housing estate, there is a proposal to build over 200 houses in close proximity to the school. This project crossed my mind during my snail paced journey to Rachel’s place of work.

If approved, this would be a development of approximately 250 homes. If you reckon on an average of 1.5 cars per household, that would mean adding around 325 vehicles into this already congested automotive mixture!

What could possibly go wrong?!!! ……. Answers on a postcard to:-

John Craven’s Newsround

BBC Television Centre

Wood Lane

London W1

(Do not post if you are reading this via Catchup, as your postcard may not be counted, but you may still be charged!)

After I’d dropped Rachel off at work, I called into Argos at the Colton Retail Park.

Lately, I’ve been printing off my writing so that I have hard copies of my work. This has resulted in utilising lots of printer ink, A4 paper and ring binder files. At Argos, today I was replenishing my printer ink stocks.

Despite lots of cars in Colton Retail Park, Argos had just opened so was fairly quiet. In fact, the only people in front of me were a milk maid and shepherd in lederhosen, buying a wooden stool, a hooked staff and rubber glove.

The milk maid seemed flustered and was heard complain about the volume of traffic in the UK, compared to back home in the Swiss Alps!

It was a relief to get in and out of the car park easily, as access is notoriously bad on the run up to Christmas. I was thankful I didn’t get stuck in stationary traffic on my journey home.

I did, however, get briefly stuck behind the following stationery traffic on my return to Chez Strachan:-

It would be a big understatement to say I severely lacked Christmas cheer during my bleary eyed car drive.  On reflection, it may be prudent of me to prepare for visits from the ghosts of Christmas past, present and future, next Thursday night!!

To close I’m going to share a joke I posted on Facebook this morning. I thought of the gag around 4 am, when I woke for the overnight curse of the middle aged man, a toilet break.

As I can’t legislate for the tangents my mind disappears on, I’ve no idea why having a pee made me think of this gag!

I try not to add Facebook posts to my blogs if I can help it. However on this occasion, as I was particularly pleased with this joke, I thought I’d include it in today’s literary offering! Here is my festive gag:-

“Karen has asked for the ABBA Greatest Hits and an X-Factor presenter’s album for Xmas, along with a Mary Shelley book.

So this year I’m getting her Gold, Frankenstein and Olly Murrs. ………. How very biblical!!”