OK, other than the entertainment I am getting from reading about the riots I'm starting to get mad. So here's what we will do.

1. Take up a collection for me a plane ticket.
2. Meet me at the airport and I'll pass out weapons
3. Pretend we are playing LFD and stop this nonsense.

Spit coffee? You have the wierdest erections...

No you are thinking of something else.

I call that nut fudge.

Either that, or they can't be used far from the nearest tap.

I'm not sure how that would work. You don't happen to have an EXPERT on hand to explain it to me, do you?

I think it's similar to the early electric cars that could only go so far as the mains plug would allow.

 

IGMC

Would that not be some sort of scalextric set?

 

If we hooked into the existing tram network in those cities that have them, we could feasibly connect the tracks up to the mains and have us all travel around in large plastic cars that impossible to control.

That'd be awesome! And we'd never need mechanics again, as it'd just be case of getting underneath and flattening/straightening the brushes out again.

 

And the headlights would randomly stop/start working for no apparent reason.

 

And random sections of track would lose power despite being connected perfectly and having every appearance of being totally fine.

And I'd regularly come off at corners and chip the skirting board! :$

This is what I want you guys to do tonight.

What, turn videos into animated GIFs to annoy peteR?

HA, that will work as well!

he'll get so mad, he'll start a riot or something.

I wouldn't doubt if it was him behind the current riots. Someone probably didn't offer the options he required on a phone or laptop or something and it set him in a rage!

you been posting on the BBC site?

haha no. I don't want you to machine gun people down. I just think guns server as a good deterrent. Plus a bullet in the knee never killed anyone.

Server? Can you tell I was up at 6 AM pissing with servers this morning? I have servers and riots on the brain!

Did you order your baseball bat from Amazon or are you just going to rock them to death if they decide to loot your area?

I just did a walk around Croydon and Purley, and... well I should have joined the looting and got a decent pair of walking shoes, because after 12 miles the cheap crap I was wearing made my feet pretty sore. :(

It's about forty hours after everything happened, but it's not as bad as I was expecting based on the news/twits.

There's a significant number of shops boarded up - but no way to tell how many are done as precautions vs how many were actually looted.
Most shops (over 80% I'd estimate) are fine and open normally.

Of three shops definitely raided in South Croydon, two of those are now open for business (GB Cycles - couldn't see inside though, Richer Sounds - no stock so delivery only).

Not many teenagers in central Croydon, compared to normal. There was a police presence, maybe half a dozen officers in the shopping area, very casual and I guess more to re-assure shoppers, of which there were fewer than average but not excessively so - you'd get less due to showers.

Some people were apprehensive/whatever, but I'm not sure there was any particular atmosphere - except around the London Road area.

About 150m worth of London Road is still cordoned off, and didn't look particularly cleaned up, wasn't good, but again didn't seem as bad as expected - though that bit is mainly small/local businesses compared to the main shopping area, so particularly bad in that respect.

The shop at Reeves corner is being entirely demolished. Nearby buildings look significantly damaged, but (to my untrained eye) appear to be mostly cosmetic/repairable - fortunately for the businesses/residents there, the destroyed shop was isolated (on a traffic island), otherwise it could have been significantly worse.

Over on Purley Way (industrial estate), most of the shops are boarded up. Sainsbury's was open and no obvious damage. Argos, TK Maxx, Best Buy, Jessops, Comet, PC World all boarded up. Curry's was also boarded up but still open for business. Couldn't be arsed to go up to Ikea to see what that was like. Significant numbers of police around, but nothing going on.

Purley is fine. One takeaway closed "for a few days", one café boarded up, and a few damaged windows - but those could easily have been from standard drunken behaviour. Despite all the nonsense on Twitter I don't think anything actually happened in Purley (unlike Croydon, it's too middle-class; so might be a few bored yobs at worst).

Still occasional sirens, maybe even an above average number, but not really an unusual amount.

That was a report from our man on the street Peter, now off to Frank for the forecast.

Actually, good job Peter!