Hundreds of angry motorists are lining the streets of Weston-super-Mare waiting for the sun to come out. This chaos has been caused by North Somerset Council’s decision to install solar-powered ticket machines on the sea front. Since being installed they have only triggered into power once, last Friday, when the cloud thinned for a couple of minutes. Three drivers managed to buy a ticket and they are now stuck in the car park surrounded by an enormous traffic jam. Weston-super-Mare has ground to a halt.

Queues in a murky Weston-super-Mare today

‘It’s ridiculous,’ said John from Bristol today. He arrived last Saturday afternoon hoping for a relaxing day out by the sea. ‘It’s like building a windmill in a valley,’ he reflected.

Councillor Denis Singleton arrived on the scene sporting two black eyes and a ragged looking suit. He said there were bound to be teething problems when you introduce new system whatever its nature. When Blighty pointed out that the British climate can hardly be considered a teething problem Denis triumphantly declared, ‘Oh, it can. We are working on that. North Somerset Council are funding the research into developing a CDM. A Cloud Dispersing Machine. It should be ready for use next summer.’ To a chorus of ‘What do we do until then?’ the councillor said that he had it on good authority that there is going to be a heatwave this summer. ‘My wife’s sister has a friend who works in the Met office and she’s told her to expect record breaking sunshine.’ When Blighty asked what the friend’s job was the councillor said she was a cleaner, but was very friendly with John Kettley.

While Blighty was investigating the situation this morning, things were eased momentarily when Kim Shaw arrived from Kim’s Klinic and Solarium with three burley men carrying a sun-bed. Eleven extension leads were bought from a local hardware store and it was plugged into a seafront amusement arcade. The burley men held up the bed, pointed it towards the ticket machine and it whirred into action. Joyous motorist poured into the car park. Then the bulb went.

On leaving the chaos this morning Blighty reflected upon the British spirit that resulted in hundreds of motorists queuing endlessly rather than attempting to park for nothing.