3-2-1 GO!!!! The Scottish government is urging motorists to not panic buy petrol because a 48-hour wildcat strike by Grnageworth oil refinery workers actually will shut things down for three weeks.

What?

According to their CEO interviewed on BBC Radio 5 Live, the 48-hour strike for NEXT Tuesday and Wednesday, means they have been bringing the operation offline for three days with four to go, to ensure an orderly and safe shut-down. Bringing the plant back online, essentially reversing this process; requires a process that will take up to 3 weeks.

I could make this up?

Meanwhile the government assures us that there will be enough petrol for emergency services, doctors, medical, police and fire, the elderly, all people at risk and the rest of us should not panic because this refinery only provides all the petrol from Liverpool and Yorkshire to the Outer Hebrides and John O’Groats.

In the meantime, rice, another commodity, is in short supply worldwide prompting the US warehouse retailing giant Costco and others to limit purchases for fear of a run on this foodstuff basic. One can only purchase an amount equal to their normal buying habit. While no one is sure what that means, one must first speak with a store associate before loading up their trolley.

Having studied language patterns and the way in which the other than conscious mind processes information, the only missing ingredient here is lighting a match in a crowded theatre and yelling FIRE! If you tell someone to NOT think about a pink elephant, pretty soon he’s so much in your thoughts, you see him munching bon-bons whilst sitting on your couch in the living room. My kids have a wonderful book entitled “Don’t Talk to the Bus Driver” which of course everyone is warned NOT to do, so they do and calamity strikes the bus from accidents to missed stops.

So when you tell people to NOT panic buy, they will simply not hear the word NOT and… immediately panic buy.

By attracting media attention to the problem, human nature is such that no one in Northern England or Scotland (and, undoubtedly, the Midlands on down through Wales and perhaps into London and the Southeast (loose translation… the entire flipping country, even the Channel Islands and Northern Ireland) will ensure their auto petrol tank never goes below ¾ filled meaning everyone will run out of petrol across the nation because panic demand will greatly outpace the supply.

And we have such wonderful recent examples of NOT panicking. When the government said don’t panic, Northern Rock Bank is safe, every OAP in the country stood for days in a queue to pull their money out in an old-fashioned bank run that was so serious, the government intervened and we (the taxpayers) now have £24 billion pounds in debt on OUR books.

At least Northern Rock took a week to sort, the Yanks did a much better job as fear wiped out Bear Stearns over a weekend.

So please just stop, take a deep breath, look at how much you do drive and take a bit of a break. You’ll take a whole lot of stress out of your life and feel much better.