A SEASONAL TALE - Ho Ho Ho

It’s an early morning on a damp but mild Saturday in December and I’m off to one of my local villages to meet Josh, a new pupil, for an assessment lesson.

Josh is keen and has some experience of driving with his mum. Great! Things should go well.

So after checking his details and a quick chat about any concerns he may have we’re off.

He moves off nicely, builds up speed well and settles down to quite a competent drive. We discuss a few areas for improvement whilst on the move and then pull up for a recap of the lesson so far.

One aspect of Josh’s driving in particular I want to fix is his observations.
So, after confirming exactly what’s expected we’re off again and headed home.
During the drive I’m prompting him about when and where we should be using the mirrors. Then it got a little strange……

The conversation went something like this:

“Okay Josh, what hazards can you see ahead?”
“There’s a lorry parked on the left and it might pull out.”
“Well done. What are you going to do about it?”
“Erm, check my main mirror, my right mirror and improve my view.”
“How?”
“By moving out to the right a bit.”
“Good, now which mirrors should we check before we move back to the left?”
“Main and then my left.”
“Nicely done. Now keep any eye on the main mirror as we speed up. What can you see?”
“Whoa! Some beardy bloke in a red jacket on a Reindeer!”
“Yeah, Ok!”
“No really man, there’s a dude behind that looks like Santa.”

So, I checked behind and there he was. Santa was indeed following us, on a motorbike made to look like a Reindeer. There was no plastic or cardboard involved either. This guy had gone to a lot of effort and it looked like real fur had been used.

We can only assume ‘Santa’ was on his way to charity bash of some kind but it gave us a real giggle and the lesson finished on a high.

And Josh signed up for a course of lessons, a happy ending.

Strange but true.

Martin Lewis