Dingo40 said:
John,
In some Australian states a fine for unjustified travel is in excess of A$1,000 (£505.69 stg).
A mother/daughter couple were fined A$1,600 for undertaking learner driver practice (later quashed on appeal)
Fortunately, where I live, if a business offers any legitimate goods or services you may travel there to avail yourself of the opportunity!
A guy was gaoled, today, for serial sneaking out of quarantine in order to visit his girlfriend (sentenced to 40 days out of 6.5 months)
Dingo,
Fines such as you mention would just never get off the ground here.
In recent times the effectiveness of the police in most of western Europe, particularly in the UK and other "soft" regimes, has dwindled away to the point where they are only effective in certain sets of moral circumstances, where the majority of the population are in agreement with their actions and policies. The other 95% of their work is not understood by a public who generally regard them as ruthless aggressors. I bashed my head off brick walls almost daily in the 30 years that I tried to serve the public, and wouldn't like to be a modern "police state trooper", which the current lockdown rules are asking of them.
40 days here would be automatically reduced to 20 days, and depending on how busy the prison was, they might release him earlier than that, on the basis that the room was needed for more serious offenders, like an ex-copper refusing to pay a £60 fine for unlawfully driving on the highway to recharge his car battery!
The virus has the potential to turn the whole world into criminals, but they'll need to retain all those temporary hospitals as prisons. "Matron, there's a man climbing out of the window!" "That's OK, tell the court we have a vacancy now for the guy who was caught with three toilet rolls in his car. He'll still have at least 6 hours of his sentence to serve, and don't bother to fix that window, as the cops are holding another 3224 people who are still waiting to come and do their time!"
Tom said:
Hey John, I suggest a "trickle charger" for your car battery in these trying times. I've got a couple and they're not expensive, keep your car (and other machines) charged up when not in use. Don't know if you can get one for your head........or if you can go to the store to get one,we have Amazon here.....
Tom,
The mighty EU (whom we must still obey at present) threatened to close Amazon Europe down because they mainly deal in non essential goods.
Amazon had to place an order priority system in place in order to stop them snarling at them. Dog food gets shipped immediately. A new chair might take a week or more.
The issue was complaints from Amazon workforce that their safety was being compromised. 80% pay for a few weeks holiday is something that a lot of people want a chunk of, and you can't really blame them.
I bought one of those new fangled portable jump starters that you carry in the car with you (after charging it up), and it reportedly will start a low battery up to 20 times. It will be delivered from a store three miles away on Monday. I have used trickle chargers in the past, but the hassle of removing and replacing the car battery has no real appeal any more these days.
My head just needs a bump start every now and then. You might not be familiar with that in the US unless you use stick shift with a manual clutch. Switch ignition on, depress clutch, select 2nd gear, commission a team of "pushers" or head down an incline. Once you get up to about 20mph let the clutch pedal up sharpish, and bang, away you go. Success rate is variable, and some mechanical damage is inevitable, but it looks impressive if it works. Experts like me can also manage it in reverse. However, my Hungarian built Suzuki, with its Italian Fiat engine, has a push button start, so I don't think a bump start is an option, as you probably cannot keep the ignition active without a key.